We made a day trip to Carcassonne to visit the old walled city. We were happy to be there early before the crowds took over in the afternoon. The downside was that after exploring the town, we had more than an hour to spend before any of the restaurants opened for lunch. And we wanted to have lunch there to taste their famous cassoulet that every restaurant advertized. Carcassonne is one of those tourist attractions where tens of restaurants have exactly the same “unique” menu, and most of them open at exactly the same time for lunch, namely at noon. We were super hungry so we chose a place that opened thirty minutes earlier than others.

Their cassoulet was nothing to die for, maybe even bland (picture on left), but that is the case with many traditional French dishes. We made a mental note of trying to make it ourselves some day, and perhaps come up with a tastier version.