La Fontaine Minérale — a French restaurant in the Drôme provençale

Our first night in Provence, S and I ate at La Fontaine Minérale, formerly an old mineral water spring where people used to go to "take the waters" in the late 1800s. You can still sample the water from the spring — it's fizzy and slightly sweet. We ate outside in a long, pebbled courtyard flanked by mountains and a big stone wall, and sheltered under a row of plane trees. It was in the tiny village of Pont-de-Barret, which is very close to Les Tuillères, the B&B where we stayed and took cooking classes.

We thought the food was fantastic. This was my favourite restaurant during our time in the south of France. The above photo shows my chèvre (goat cheese) salad, which had the best olive tapenade that I have ever had. S ordered the magret de canard, pictured below, a very common Provençale dish as we discovered. Magret is the breast meat of a duck that has been fattened for the production of foie gras. There are many variations of magret de canard; La Fontaine Minérale's was stuffed with chèvre.