Restaurant in Lyon, France
Special-occasion value without the €€€€ bill.
Bergamote holds back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition (2024 and 2025) and a 4.8 Google rating from nearly 600 reviewers — strong signals for a €€ modern cuisine restaurant in one of France's most competitive dining cities. Chef Maxime Pujol's kitchen in Lyon's Gerland district is the right call for a special occasion dinner where quality matters and a four-figure bill does not.
Yes — and at the €€ price point, it is one of the most compelling cases for a celebratory dinner in Lyon without the four-figure bill. Bergamote has held the Michelin Bib Gourmand in both 2024 and 2025, meaning Michelin's own inspectors have flagged it as a venue delivering quality above what the price suggests. For a date night, a small celebration, or a meal where you want the food to be the centrepiece without negotiating a splurge, Bergamote earns a clear booking recommendation.
Bergamote is a modern cuisine restaurant in Lyon's 7th arrondissement, the Gerland district, run by chef Maxime Pujol. The cooking sits in the contemporary French register — precise, produce-led, and calibrated for a dining room where the meal itself is the event. A 4.8 Google rating across 590 reviews is unusually consistent for a restaurant at this price tier, and the back-to-back Bib Gourmand recognitions confirm this is not a one-season story. Lyon is a city with serious culinary density , it competes on restaurants the way other French cities compete on museums , and holding Michelin recognition here carries more weight than it would in a smaller market.
The Gerland address places Bergamote slightly south of the Presqu'île and Confluence, away from the most tourist-heavy stretches of the city. That is a practical consideration worth knowing before you book: this is not a central drop-in venue. Build a dinner here into the plan rather than treating it as a spontaneous addition to an evening already in progress. If you are staying centrally and want walkable access, factor in a short taxi or tram ride.
Modern cuisine restaurants at the Bib Gourmand tier in France increasingly structure the leading seats around a counter or open kitchen, and Bergamote fits that pattern. Counter or bar seating , where available , adds meaningful value at a venue like this: you see the timing, the assembly, and the consistency of execution up close, which turns a good dinner into an instructive one. For a special occasion, a counter seat often delivers more engagement with the cooking than a tucked-away table does. If Bergamote offers this configuration, request it at booking. The intimacy it creates is precisely what makes a €€ tasting-format meal feel like more than its price category.
Chef Maxime Pujol's modern cuisine approach is well-suited to this format. Modern cuisine at this level in Lyon tends to draw on classical French technique while keeping the plate composition tighter and more seasonal than a traditional bouchon would. The Bib Gourmand standard requires that the cooking delivers genuine pleasure at a moderate price , not merely competence , so the bar here is set against quality, not just cost.
Booking difficulty is rated Easy, which is one of Bergamote's advantages over Lyon's more decorated addresses. You do not need to plan weeks in advance the way you would for a Michelin-starred table, but a special occasion dinner warrants a reservation rather than a walk-in attempt. Book several days ahead for weekday dinners; aim for a week or more for Friday and Saturday evenings. Bergamote's combination of Michelin recognition and accessible pricing means demand is real , the 590 Google reviews reflect a busy house, not an empty one.
Hours and booking method are not confirmed in available data, so verify both directly with the restaurant before finalising plans. The address is 123 Rue de Gerland, 69007 Lyon.
Lyon consistently ranks among France's most serious restaurant cities. The competition at every price tier is genuine. Bergamote's Bib Gourmand recognition is meaningful precisely because Michelin's inspectors are working a market that includes institutions like La Mère Brazier and contemporaries like Burgundy by Matthieu and L'Atelier des Augustins. For the full picture of where Bergamote sits in the city's restaurant hierarchy, see our full Lyon restaurants guide. If you are planning a broader trip, our Lyon hotels guide, bars guide, and experiences guide cover the rest of the city's essentials.
For French modern cuisine at the other end of the price spectrum, the benchmark restaurants include Mirazur in Menton, Troisgros in Ouches, and Flocons de Sel in Megève , all of which illustrate what the leading of this cuisine category looks like when budget is not the constraint. Bergamote operates in a different tier, but the Bib Gourmand places it in a direct conversation with those venues' standards of cooking rigour, if not their scale or ceremony.
Closer to home in the Lyon region, Têtedoie and Les Terrasses de Lyon offer different price-to-experience equations if you are weighing options across the city. Aromatic is another reference point for modern cooking in the same market.
Bergamote is the answer when you want a genuine special-occasion dinner in Lyon without the €€€€ commitment. Back-to-back Bib Gourmand recognition from Michelin, a 4.8 rating from nearly 600 reviewers, and easy booking access make this one of the most direct positive recommendations in the city. Book it, request counter seating if available, and arrive knowing the cooking is the point.
| Venue | Cuisine | Price | Booking Difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bergamote | Modern Cuisine | €€ | Easy |
| Le Neuvième Art | Contemporary French, Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| Rustique | Creative | €€€€ | Unknown |
| La Mere Brazier | French | Unknown | |
| Burgundy by Matthieu | Modern Cuisine | €€€ | Unknown |
| Miraflores | Peruvian | €€€€ | Unknown |
A quick look at how Bergamote measures up.
Yes — it is one of the stronger cases for a celebratory dinner in Lyon at the €€ price point. Back-to-back Bib Gourmand recognition in 2024 and 2025 confirms the kitchen is consistent, not just hyped. If your occasion calls for genuine cooking without the pressure of a three-course, €€€€ commitment, Bergamote fits well.
At the €€ price tier, Bergamote's modern cuisine format delivers serious kitchen ambition at a price that rarely stings. The Bib Gourmand is specifically awarded for good cooking at a good price, so the format is built around value. Specific menu structure is not confirmed here, but the award context makes it a reasonable bet compared to Lyon's pricier decorated addresses.
Booking difficulty is rated Easy, which puts it well ahead of Lyon's harder-to-access Michelin addresses. A few days' notice is typically sufficient, though weekend evenings and special occasions warrant a week or more of lead time. You do not need to plan weeks out the way you would for a starred restaurant in the city.
Specific group capacity details are not confirmed in the available data. For groups of four or more, check the venue's official channels via their address at 123 Rue de Gerland, 69007 Lyon. Modern cuisine restaurants at this tier in France often have compact dining rooms, so larger parties should confirm space before assuming availability.
Specific dishes are not confirmed in the available data, and fabricating menu items would be misleading. Chef Maxime Pujol runs a modern cuisine kitchen that has earned consecutive Bib Gourmand recognition, so the seasonal set menu is the format the cooking is built around — that is the safest starting point.
For a step up in prestige and price, La Mere Brazier is Lyon's historic reference point with Michelin credentials and a longer track record. Le Neuvième Art sits at a higher price tier if the occasion justifies more formal tasting menus. Rustique is worth considering if you want a more casual, neighbourhood-focused meal at a lower spend. Bergamote sits in the middle: more serious than Rustique, more accessible than the starred options.
At €€, yes — the back-to-back Bib Gourmand in 2024 and 2025 is specifically Michelin's signal that quality-to-price ratio is the point. In Lyon, where competition at every price tier is genuine, holding that recognition two years running carries weight. It is a better value proposition than paying €€€€ for a Michelin star if your priority is the cooking rather than the ceremony.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
