Moutarde de Dijon

The Confrérie de la Moutarde de Dijon brings together lovers of Burgundian mustard around a single mission: to represent Moutarde de Dijon and ensure the promotion, making and tasting of moutarde de Bourgogne. Each year, it inducts new members at grand chapitres and travels across France and abroad to meet other gastronomic brotherhoods — thus carrying on a festive tradition linked to the city's guilds of vinegar makers and mustard makers.

The history it embodies reaches far back: moutarde de Dijon appears in texts and popular sayings as early as the beginning of the 13th century, and its rise gathered pace in 1634 when the city's vinegar makers and mustard makers formed a guild with exclusive production rights. A religious brotherhood placed under the protection of Saint Vincent, founded in 1600, was recognised by Louis XIV, who granted it its coat of arms, ‘azure with a silver funnel’. It was not until 1742 that the Dijonnais Jean Naijeon substituted verjus for vinegar in the recipe, giving birth to the flavour that made Moutarde de Dijon famous — defined under this name in 1937, and protected since 2009 by the PGI (IGP) ‘Moutarde de Bourgogne’ for production originating from the Burgundian terroir. Whilst the city still counted 39 mustard manufacturers in 1870, only four remain today in Dijon and its region — a decline that the brotherhood specifically aims to highlight and combat through its presence at fairs and gastronomic gatherings.

Moutarderie Fallot presents itself as an independent, family-owned Burgundian house dating from 1840, combining high-performance industrial equipment with the preserved savoir-faire of the artisan mustard maker; its production facility has achieved IFS (International Food Standard) certification.

It produces its mustards — Moutarde de Dijon, Moutarde de Bourgogne (PGI (IGP)), moutarde à l'ancienne and flavoured varieties, as well as pickles, vinegars and verjus — using seeds sourced from its home region. The house offers two museum-style tour routes, ‘Découvertes’ and ‘Sensations fortes’, as well as boutique-workshops in Beaune and Dijon.

Reine de Dijon presents itself as a manufacturer of mustards made with 100% French seeds, located in Fleurey-sur-Ouche, in Côte-d'Or. The company boasts 185 years of know-how, dating back to 1840. It describes a range including Moutarde de Dijon, Moutarde à l'ancienne, Moutarde de Bourgogne PGI and its wholegrain variation, complemented by flavoured mustards (honey, curry, piment d'Espelette, blackcurrant, ceps and garlic...) and sauces (Caesar, salad dressings). It highlights an environmental commitment backed by several ISO certifications.

The producer's website also serves as an online shop.

The Amora Maille factory in Chevigny-Saint-Sauveur, in Côte-d'Or, produces one hundred million jars of mustard every year under the Amora and Maille brands, both now owned by the Unilever group. Covering 138,000 m² and employing around 300 people, the site also manufactures mayonnaise, vinegar, vinaigrettes, cornichons, and sauces, making up a total of 350 products sold across 90 countries. In the late 1980s, Amora-Maille — alongside the Fallot mustard mill — set about reviving mustard seed cultivation in Bourgogne, production having virtually vanished after the Second World War in favour of Canadian imports.

Sifting and grinding of the seeds remain in the hands of master mustard makers, who adjust the machinery and the coarseness of the grind recipe by recipe, along separate production lines for Amora and Maille. In 2024, around 30% of the seeds used came from Bourgogne, compared to 70% imported from Canada; the site was then aiming for 50% local seeds within a few years, subject to finding enough farmers willing to commit in the face of the pests that had affected Burgundian harvests.

The Maille brand, one of the two labels produced on site, claims an heritage dating back to Paris in 1720, when Antoine-Claude Maille the elder came to prominence as a distiller-vinegar maker, before his son opened the firm's first shop in 1747. Dijon entered this history in 1845 with the opening of a shop that is still operating in the heart of the city centre: there, master mustard makers offer tastings of mustards served 'from the pump' and truffle mustards, alongside vinegars and cornichons.