Markets, and how the week works
The Saturday market in Beaune, what closes on Mondays, and why the two-hour lunch is not a stereotype but a schedule you have to plan around.
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Rural Burgundy runs on a weekly rhythm that visitors keep colliding with. It is entirely predictable once you know it.
Lunch closes things
Most independent shops close from around midday until two, and in smaller villages until half past two or three. This includes bakeries, butchers, pharmacies and town halls.
Supermarkets on the edge of larger towns usually stay open. Everything in a village centre does not.
Plan the middle of the day as the time you eat or drive, not the time you buy things.
Mondays are quiet
Many shops that open on Saturday close on Monday, sometimes the whole day, sometimes the morning. Restaurants that serve Sunday lunch frequently close Sunday evening and Monday.
If you arrive on a Sunday afternoon, buy food then.
Market days
Beaune’s market fills the square around the covered halls on Saturday morning, and it is the big one — produce, cheese, charcuterie, and a rotating cast of stalls from further afield. It starts early and thins out by one.
Dijon’s covered market runs several mornings a week and is the better bet for everyday shopping.
Most villages of any size hold a morning market once a week. The tourist office lists them, and the list is worth collecting on arrival.
What to buy where
- Bread: the boulangerie, twice a day if you are serious. Bread bought at eight is not the same at seven.
- Cheese: the market or a fromagerie, never the supermarket, if you intend to eat époisses.
- Meat: the boucherie, and tell them what you are cooking. They will cut for the dish.
- Wine: not the supermarket, unless you know exactly what you are looking for.
August
A good number of independent businesses close for two or three weeks in August. This includes restaurants that appear in guidebooks.
It is not a rumour and it is not negotiable. Telephone before driving anywhere on the strength of a website.