Gontran Cherrier

La basilique du Sacré-Coeur de Montmartre

Yesterday after work, I took a quick trip to Montmartre to visit the main shop of one of the most fȇted bakers in Paris, Gontran Cherrier. Extremely gifted, Cherrier has long been a part of Parisian life, but has recently achieved national fame as one of the judges on the popular TV program La Meilleure Boulangerie en France (The Best Bakery in France). His three shops in Paris have been joined by one in Singapore and one in Tokyo. It doesn't hurt that he looks like a rock-star, either.

It was very quiet when I arrived at the shop in  the Rue Caulaincourt. I took a coffee, a patisserie and a seat by the window, and within minutes the place had filled up parents and children on their way home form school, popping in for le goûter, the French equivalent of afternoon tea.

I tried his tarte aux pistaches et agrumes (pistachio and citrus fruit tart): segments of sweet orange, and sour pink grapefruit, lying on a verdant springy mattress of pistachio and almond, in a walnut-coloured bedstead of pâte sucrée—the most even and delicate I have ever tasted. Chapeau M. Cherrier. I will be back.

Gontran Cherrier, Rue Caulaincourt

Tarte aux pistaches et agrumes

Butter ratings:
Gontran Cherrier, 22 rue Caulaincourt, 75018 Paris, France

Battle of the croissants.

The origins of the croissant lie closer to Zürich than to Paris. As the french term, Viennoiserie, used to refer to croissants, pains au chocolat, chaussons aux pommes, and the like, suggests, it was the Austrian capital that exported 'kipferln' to France after the Napoleonic Wars.

During my final week in Switzerland, I decided to consumer test 'gipfeli', as Swiss-German calls them, from two of the most popular bakeries in Zürich: Jung (est. 1976), on Bleicherweg, and Sprüngli (est. 1836), on Paradeplatz. I will be comparing these with the french version in the next few days.

The Jung gipfeli (1.40CHF / 1.13€), straight shaped with quite a dark colouring, was soft and dense, with an obvious flavour of butter and a hint of salt. 

The Sprüngli gipfeli (1.70CHF / 1.37€), a perfect crescent shape, in fact almost a circle, with a golden colour, was crispy but rather dry, with a light consistency, again a good buttery flavour, and more salt.

For flavour, I preferred the Sprüngli, but I must say I preferred the consistency of the Jung. However, both were a little disappointing, especially the dryness of the Sprüngli.




Butter ratings:
Sprüngli, Bahnhofstrasse 21, 8001 Zürich, Switzerland 

Jung, Bleicherweg 10, 8002 Zürich, Switzerland