Flavigny-sur-Ozerain

Flavigny-sur-Ozerain sits on a rocky spur above the Ozerain valley, walled and gated almost entirely as it was in the Middle Ages, with a population small enough that the whole place feels less like a village and more like a single, very old building complex you’re allowed to walk through. I went initially for the anise, and left thinking mostly about doorways.

Anis de Flavigny, made where the monks made it

The reason most people have actually heard of Flavigny, even without knowing the name, is the little oval tin of Anis de Flavigny, the aniseed sweets that have been produced here — first by Benedictine monks, later by the family business that took over the abbey buildings — since at least the 9th century, making it one of the oldest confectioneries still operating anywhere in France. The production still happens inside the old Abbaye Saint-Pierre, and you can tour the workshop and watch small aniseed cores being rolled in sugar syrup in enormous copper basins, a process that takes fifteen days per batch because each layer has to dry before the next is added. I bought more tins than I needed, gave most away, and kept one in the car for months afterward, mostly out of guilt at how good they were.

The village Chocolat borrowed for a season

It wasn’t until I was halfway down the main street, past the Romanesque doorway of the old collegiate church, that I placed why the whole village felt so specifically familiar: Flavigny was used as the primary filming location for the 2000 film Chocolat, its cobbled streets and stone facades standing in for the fictional village where Juliette Binoche’s character opens her chocolaterie. Very little was changed for the shoot, which is part of why it still reads exactly as it did on screen — the same crooked lanes, the same weathered stone, none of the touristy overlay you sometimes get in “famous film location” villages. Lia, who’d seen the film years before we met, spent the walk quietly pointing at corners and murmuring “that’s the one” to herself.

When to go: Spring through autumn works well, though the village is quiet and worth visiting almost any time of year since it’s never truly crowded. Check the abbey’s tour schedule ahead if the anise workshop is the main draw — it isn’t open continuously through the day.