Cordon bleu for me and yeu

Lisa Hilton dines in style at a cult buffet restaurant

THE WAY OF PIEDMONT LINKS the Alps to the Atlantic by way of Narbonne, for almost a thousand years a nexus for pilgrims en route to Compostella. Narbonne’s stupendous fourteenth-century cathedral remains a draw for the devout, but it has some stiff competition in Les Grands Buffets, an all-you-can eat restaurant in a retail park on the outskirts of the town. The Buffets has been a cult in France for some time, but recently made it onto the Anglo radar, notably via an effusive but slightly baffled article in the New Yorker. Americans have a morally antagonistic attitude to French food; they know it’s sophisticated but suspect it of sin. Moreover, capitalism isn’t meant to work like this. “Only the best for everyone” is a troubling proposition; mass doesn’t generally…

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The Critic (Digital) - 1 Issue, February 2025

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