Castles on the Loire – A Culinarian Christmas

Thanksgiving weekend 2024 was an opportunity to introduce my grandniece, Lyndsey, to the chateaux along the Val de Loire. I also planned to sip Vouvray, sample local cheese, buy Loire macarons and savor the best new hotels—and their restaurants and spas—along the Loire River.

We booked high-speed Trains à Grande Vitesse (TGV) tickets from Rail Europe and arrived after a week in Paris and a 68-minute ride from Gare Montparnasse on the Left Bank. From our Citroën rental car, we discovered seasonal decorations, festive fare and authentic Christmas markets, with their traditional assembly of decorated chalets, little wooden pointed-roof stalls.

Our first stop was Château Clos du Lucé—where Leonardo da Vinci spent his last years—and the Château Royal d’Amboise, where historical figures appear in a modern setting: Louis XI is paired with a Spiderman action figure; Leonardo da Vinci is working at a construction set and King Louis-Philippe is driving an electric train.

At Château de Chenonceau, which has its own train station, we walked on the tree-bordered Grande Allée through the park past decorated trees in Versailles-like boxes to see the furnished interior with its holiday décor. With trees and garlands in the grand rooms, the décor also showcased a display of delicate porcelain birds by Maison Bernardaud. On our DIY tour, we spotted a long table that spanned the length of the famed extension across the river Indre, which was set for a holiday gala.

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Castles on the Loire: A Culinarian Christmas at Four Special Hotel Restaurants

Restaurant Christophe Hay at Fleur de Loire 

From Christophe Hay’s Fleur de Loire—the 44-room and 12-suite hotel that he lovingly transformed from a former riverfront hospice—we could see Château Royal de Blois, where King Francois 1 held court and which has metamorphosed into a magical, colorful holiday world with multicolor installations, illuminated designs and imaginary characters.

Hay, a Michelin two-star chef worked with “Monsieur Paul” Bocuse and headed his Bistro de Paris, a fine dining restaurant during his five-year stint at the Epcot theme park in Orlando, Florida. He was also chef for the elite B. Signature Hotel group in Paris and had his own Chambord venue. The Gault & Millau “Chef of the Year 2021″ opened this new Relais & Chateaux affiliate in mid-2022; it boasts a serene décor, a Sisley Spa where I had a wonderful facial and two destination restaurants.

The eco-dedicated chef is devoted to farm-fresh from his own acres, fish from the Loire, local black truffles, regional specialties, such as Caviar Impérial de Sologne and his own wine label.

Thanksgiving dinner at Restaurant Christophe Hay, which views the Loire River, is in a serene environment at one of Les Grandes Tables du Monde.  Our menu offered four courses not counting the amuse, the sides, the locally sourced Sologne caviar and the dish that was flambeed at tableside. Each piece of pottery was a work of art and one person on the team was tasked with bringing new cutlery for each course. Some of his signature dishes appeared, including the chef’s famous “La Carpe à la Chambord,” which celebrates Loire Valley ingredients with a whole piece of grilled local carp topped with shaved truffles, from the farmer chef’s personal truffle farm. The freshwater fish menu item is Hay’s interpretation of a dish created for the Count of Saxony at Château de Chambord.

Another signature course featured steak from Wagyu beef raised on his own cattle farm along with sweet potatoes grown in his Jardin du Potager, the nearby Fleur de Loire gardens. The cheese course arrived on a chariot or cart with selections under glass and others on shelves. Then came dessert: poached Anjou pears grown in the region. The post-dessert mignardises arrived in a three-level wooden tower designed to hide little plates and which opened to reveal two tiny specialties on each including sweets made with carrots, chestnut, guava and fruits. Christophe Hay bubbly and local Chinon wine added to the pleasure.

Amour Blanc, his more casual venue, is housed in a newly built stone and glass building overlooking the Loire and serves as a breakfast room, boutique, tearoom and gourmet restaurant, serving equally impeccable ingredients including hot stone-grilled meat and pastries.

L’Auberge at Les Sources de Cheverny

We gasped as the grand and graceful chateau at Les Sources de Cheverny came into view at the end of a long tree-lined path through the forest at Alice and Jerome Tourbier’s recently launched five-star sister spa to Les Sources de Caudalie. Before long, we strolled from the newly built reception building with its glass walls and recycled woods past a pond, gardens, former bee hives, and a few newly constructed, wooden lodges to ours. Our gracious room opened through glass sliding doors out to a terrace with a view of horses grazing in the pasture. We relaxed in the hammam and on chaise longues under the vaulted ceiling by the indoor pool at the inviting Spa by Caudalie before and after vinotherapy treatments, which are based on the grapeseed extract product line which Caudalie made famous.

Michelin one-star Chef Frédéric Calmels reigns at Le Favori, but we dined at L’Auberge, in a magnificently transformed farm building, where we sipped a Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte blanc, from the owner’s family’s wine estate in Bordeaux and a wine produced nearby: Domaine des Huards Le Vivier 2020, Cheverny Gendrier. For dinner, we continued the splurge with a hearty Steak Frites, a very special version, indeed: filet mignon grilled on a wood fire and served with crisp fries.

Le Grand St. Michel at Relais de Chambord

One hundred illuminated Christmas trees adorn the paths leading past formal gardens and to the exquisite Château de Chambord, where the amazing intertwining double helix staircase is attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. Special holiday activities, here, feature costumed characters, traditional music, Renaissance dances and Santa Claus.

Relais de Chambord, the charming hotel on the property is within a 19th century former farmhouse and stables on the estate and houses 55 rooms designed by a prestigious French architect, Michel Wilmotte, to give a sense of place, particularly the natural park enclosed by a 20-mile wall that is its setting.

Our light-filled corner room had a direct view of the extraordinary castle; so did the barrel-shaped hot tub on the spa terrace! The recently upgraded lodge is affiliated with Small Luxury Hotels of the World and boasts a spa, a cozy bar and lounge with seats by the fire where we sipped Château de Chambord wine. For our last dinner, we ate a comforting Loire Valley meal in an inviting country house inspired dining room in the hotel called Le Grand Saint Michel: an amuse, pasta with truffles and foie gras.

Château d’Artigny

On December 1, our final day, we dined at an elegant Sunday brunch at the majestic Château d’Artigny before it closed for a complete renovation. I had last visited the former country estate of François Coty, the famed perfumer, almost fifty years ago with my late husband during our first Loire Valley rendezvous in 1976.

The author, standing by the Christmas tree at Château d’Artigny.

Hours later, we rode the TGV directly to Charles de Gaulle (CDG) Airport where the station beneath the Sheraton Paris Airport Hotel links it by elevator and where we overnighted before exiting the hotel’s front door into Terminal 2 and flying home to the U.S.A.

It was a convenient finale to a festive, four-day, holiday-enhanced adventure on the Loire.

For more information about visiting the castles of the Loire, look to this website. 

-Story and photos, except where noted, by Irvina Lew, Europe Editor, Real Food Traveler

Real Food Traveler

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