Lyon is a great place for eating out. There are lots of small rustic restaurants which call themselves 'bouchons', so I had to find out more about that ... and try eating in one, of course!
So, a bouchon is a type of restaurant found in Lyon, that serves traditional Lyonnaise cuisine, such as sausages, duck pâté or roast pork.
Typically, the emphasis in a bouchon is not on haute cuisine but, rather, a convivial atmosphere and a personal relationship with the owner.
The tradition of bouchons came from small inns visited by silk workers passing through Lyon in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Apparently, the name derives from the 16th century expression for a bunch of twisted straw. A representation of such bundles began to appear on signs to designate the restaurants and then the restaurants themselves became known as bouchons. The more common use of "bouchon" as a stopper or cork in a bottle, has the same etymology.
