COOK À LA LOCAL IN PROVENCE

As cooking schools go, Le Marmiton at Avignon’s La Mirande hotel (la-mirande.fr) is more daunting than most. For starters, it’s in the heart of Provence, one of the spiritual homelands of French gastronomy. Its guest chefs include leading lights of Provençal cuisine. And, most impressive of all, the dining room of this 26-room luxury hotel once hosted the French popes who ruled the Roman Catholic Church in the 14th century.

La Mirande is a meticulous conversion of a medieval cardinal’s palace beside the World Heritagelisted Palais des Papes, the Gothic fortress that was the papal seat for almost seven decades.

The 25-year-old cooking school teaches the basics of la cuisine provençale at immersive five-day courses. At the Les Halles market, you’ll be introduced to the finest oil, bread and fish producers – then it’s back to the kitchen to cook.

The kitchen (pictured, above) is a perfectly rustic affair of copper pots, impressive crockery and a wood stove that’s fired up before each morning’s menu preparation. Classes are grouped into topics (white meats, sauces, desserts) and you’ll go on trips to storied vineyards in Châteauneuf-du-Pape or perhaps truffle hunting. You might also be lucky enough to be there for a guest appearance by the likes of Brandon Dehan from the two-star Oustau de Baumanière in Baux-de-Provence.

Accommodation is countryhouse style – fine linen, marble bathrooms and a garden shaded by chestnuts and perfumed with the scent of honeysuckle and jasmine – and most rooms look to the papal palace.

Sagnet also conducts the hotel’s La Table Haute, a fourcourse dégustation staged in a 19th-century dining room that kicks off with aperitifs in the cellar and often ends with a chef-led singalong. Bon appétit.