Whenever I travel abroad for work or pleasure, I canvass the opinions of people I trust in advance. I might find a place worth reviewing, maybe even somewhere to take the family for a decent meal, but I also invariably run into a peculiarity of foodie behaviour: the weird culinary Catch-22 you might call the Tourist Trap Trap.

Let me explain. I think my entire adolescence centred on the ambition of sitting outside Caffè Florian in Venice, sipping an espresso, with Helena Bonham Carter.

It formed me. What I read, how I dressed, the tastes in food and drink I developed, my obsession with art history. And yet, when the chance came, when I told people I was going, it was like I’d suggested walking into a free-fire zone with a target on my back “Are you mad? You’ll be ripped off there, like some kind of tourist!” They’d suggest somewhere else which, when I mentioned it to the next ­opinionated foodie, would be shot down as a hopeless, fraudulent clip joint and so on and on, until finally it became apparent that, rather than go to Venice at all, I should stay home and feed £50 notes into a shredder.

A logical human might think it would be fun to go and do the things that are unique to Venice. Y’know, gorgeous architecture, museums, gondolas, alfresco eating in sunny squares, local food and great wine. But the minute you get specific, the advice turns toxic. There’s an ingrained dread of actually “being a tourist”. But dammit, I don’t go to Venice to replicate the experience of a middle-aged Venetian restaurant-goer who’s lived there all his life. When I eventually sat outside the Florian, as a grown-up, unabashed tourist, it was every bit as bloody marvellous as I’d imagined, even though the espresso was execrable. We need to stop denying ourselves in this way. Let me tell you why.

A friend suggested I try La Cambuse du Saunier in in the French Mediterranean town of Gruissan when I was on holiday earlier this month. “It’s a bit of a drive,” she said, “maybe a bit touristy, but they filmed Betty Blue near there and the food is really good.”

I was travelling with Tris, my best mate and longest-serving culinary wingman. He was ideal for the gig. He speaks French beautifully. He’s an editor and cineaste, which makes him a congenial companion on long car journeys, and he can pack away more seafood in half an hour than a Russian trawler.

“Jesus. This is surreal.”

And it was. We walked past the screaming warnings of a honeypot — the car park, the gift shop, the weird little scooter hire stand — and the sky opened up before us. Cloudless and a deep lapis lazuli, it ran down to a razor-line horizon and then to the endless bubble-gum pink of the water. Yep. Salt flats as far as the eye could see, the colour of a Barbie tricycle. Entirely otherworldly and on an impossible scale. We just stared, immobilised by its weird beauty.

We were already late. They wanted to close the kitchen, so we ordered everything at once. Bang! Half a dozen oysters, slurped like they were trying to escape. Bang! A big crab, cloven down the centre line so we could get half each and take it like hyenas cleaning out a giraffe.

We hadn’t said a thing since the food arrived. The sun was dappling through the rush matting on to our heads. There was sand and salt underfoot and when we finally paused, we just grinned, big easy happy grins, wiped fish off our chins and jerked the cork out of the wine. It was a white. Cold, crisp, a bit fruity, am I imagining a bit salty? Glorious local stuff called La Clape. Remind me to get a case.

“That was incredible.”

“I know. And I still can’t stop staring at the horizon.”

Then the mains came. Tris sat and laughed at his for a whole minute.

“It’s about 40 degrees out there and I’m eating cuttlefish cassoulet. And it’s stupendous.”

The beans were soft, smooth with cubes of cephalopod lurking beneath the surface in Lovecraftian threat. In case you missed the point, there was a spare little cuttlefish, grilled on the side. We found a sausage buried at the bottom. God knows how it got there. Maybe it was some kind of test.

I love salt cod. I love the way the salt tightens the flesh and enhances the flavour. I love the way they do it in this part of the world, Catalan-style, slow-cooked with tomatoes, onions, capsicums and espelette pepper. But since La Cambuse, I love it best ladled over a mound of chips. Yep. Olive oil fried potatoes, a healthy mound of them, buried under a kind of hot stew, hiding a piece of fish the size of a car battery.

“You know what? The French do cod and chips better than we do.”

I’m still getting over La Cambuse du Saunier, but not just the company, the food, the wine and the bonkers view. No, what’s waking me up in the small hours right now, startled and shaking, is the realisation that, if I’d listened to most of the people I usually consult, I’d never have gone near the place. Just like they told me to skip La Sagrada Família, most of Montmartre, Sydney Fish Market and the entire state of Oaxaca. If I’d listened, I’d have avoided the queues, the autoroute, the car park and the gift shop and gone to some tight-arsed château.

I wouldn’t have disgraced myself by being a tourist, but I’d have missed one of the most extraordinary, joyous and memorable meals of my life.

Tim Hayward is the winner of best food writer at the Fortnum & Mason Food & Drink Awards 2022

Follow Tim on Twitter @TimHayward and email him at tim.hayward@ft.com

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