French Bakery Tour + French Breakfast (BETH IN FRANCE 🇫🇷)

Hi guys, how are you? This morning we are headed into town to share one of my favorite bakeries here in Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, La Boulangerie Bleue. And then we'll head back home and fix up breakfast, le petit-déjeuner. Come with me! The bakery is located in the older part of Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie and I love to walk down these little streets and check out the art galleries, little shops for the home. We found a lot of the market baskets in this shop. There are little restaurants. There's a church square. You can already see people lining up at the butcher. A beautiful old church, which we actually had friends that were married in this church. And I love to walk by and check it out. So pretty. Then right around the corner you'll start to see people lining up. There's always a long line no matter the date, but it is totally worth the wait. As you get there early, you can see all of the cases being filled with delicious pastries of the day. When I was there, there was a woman who was coming with these beautiful tartes aux fraises, just freshly made. I mean, look at how beautiful and fantastic those look. This boulangerie also functions as a patisserie, so you will find incredible desserts here. I'm always amazed at how beautiful and decorative and delicious these desserts are. Look at this peri-breast. How fantastic does that look? And then to the left were all the classics, the pain au chocolat, croissants, pain au raisin, all the things that you want for a typical French petit-déjeuner. And of course, the baguettes. Look at how beautiful these look. The boulangerie is also a great place to get a sandwich if you're headed off to the beach. They're made fresh daily. You can also pick up a little piece of dessert. You can also find things for the apparel like little savory breads, quiche, and of course a croque monsieur. But the real treat was going behind the scenes to meet the owner and baker Lucien Meriot, who showed me all of his beautiful treats for the day. Look at this traditional brioche. How beautiful is that? Then it was off to one of the many bread rooms. Here they're making the small petit-pain, typically used for restaurants. So they form the dough and then it goes into the oven. And look at that. How delicious. Then they get placed in these charming wooden boxes and delivered to the restaurant. Then he took me to the real heart of the operation, the baguette making. It was really fascinating to see them formed, see the dough being whipped up in a huge mixer. This bakery sells thousands of baguettes a day, which really shows you how important the baguette is to the French culture, especially in the summertime when Saint-Gilles is at its busiest. It was interesting that each room in the bakery had its purpose. So then we went to the refrigerated dough room where there were tart shells being made for tarts as well as quiche. But the real fascinating dough was the croissant dough, which he took out to show me. He explained that the flakiness of the croissant is due to the many different layers of dough. Then he put it in this nifty contraption, which actually stretched it out. I took a croissant workshop once where we had to do all this by hand. So I was really impressed by this machine. Then it gets placed on his workbench, straightened out, and then he trims the edges and the ends. And then the impressive cutting begins. I sat there mesmerized as I saw him cut these triangles. Each one was exactly the same size and dimension. I don't know how he did it. This is what passion looks like. I mean, look at this expertise. It was truly incredible. And then each triangle gets perfectly rolled up. And again, look at the expertise. He must have gone through 20 or 30 croissants in a matter of minutes. And each one is beautifully shaped and perfect. It was a sight to behold. Then these will get proofed for three hours before put in the oven. This process starts at four in the morning in order to be ready for the customers by 7 a.m. So of course, I had to buy up my own little stash of treats now that I had such a greater appreciation for how they were made. Then right across from Luzanne's Bakery is the most amazing little shop that just opened that has amazing products. And I'm going to go in there and get some jelly and jam. This shop would be known as a sort of gourmet épicerie. And they specialize in the most beautiful olive oils, vinegars. Then around the corner, you'll see it's stocked with like an incredible selection of tapenades, rillettes, all different kinds of things that you may want for cocktail hour. But of course, what caught my eye was the corner from the window. I could see they had an incredible collection of jams and jellies. And I thought that would be the perfect complement to go with all of our freshly baked pastries. Look at this, so beautiful. And then I also picked up a little tin of cocoa powder for hot chocolate. All right, you guys, I am back home with my bakery haul. Now I can really show you what's in all of these things. So when you shop at the bakery, they'll put whatever you bought in these little bags, and then they'll twist it. And with one slip of the wrist, it'll kind of go like this. And they'll say, avec tu si? Which basically means, do you need anything else? And see the little twists kind of keep it together. So let's open it up and see what we got. Ooh, these are my favorite. Pan raisins. All right, look at these beautiful specimens. Do these not look delicious? And basically what it is, is like a puff pastry filled with pastry cream and raisins. Now I know my raisin haters are out there, and you might be rolling your eyes thinking, oh no, here she goes again with the raisins. But I'm telling you, they are so delicious. It is worth trying. You see, you've got all that level of flakiness, the custard, and of course the raisins. Not overly sweet, moist inside, delicious custard, plump raisins, A plus plus. Then I'm going to serve all the things that I bought in these beautiful baskets. And I just found these at a pecan yesterday, which I think are perfect because they're low and shallow and not too high. And then I also like to line them with some of these beautiful cocktail napkins, which I think are the perfect size for a small basket. Okay. And then we can put one of these in here and then we'll put the other one in there. So anytime I'm entertaining and I have a large crowd and in July and August, we will start to have our parade of friends and family that will join us here. I like to do two baskets like this and fill them with the same things. That way you can put them down the table and everybody kind of gets the same thing. Let's see what else we got. Of course, the classics, we can't forget those. So I got a few of these beautiful plain croissants that we saw Lucienne making. And then of course, a few pains au chocolat. We got to have those. All right, let me cut into these so you can see the texture. With these types of things, it's all about the texture. I mean, look at all of that delicious flakiness. Oh, I can't wait to try. These look delicious. I find you can tell the quality of a croissant by the mess they make. The bigger the mess, the better they are. These are worth the trip and all the jet lag. So good. Now let's try these chocolate croissants, shall we? Let's dig into this. Look at that, the chocolate. I mean, it's all about these layers. Have you ever seen anything so delicious? One of the ways you can tell a really great pains au chocolat is two things. One, the chocolate is not that sweet. So it's a little bit bittersweet, which I think makes them all the more delicious. The other thing is, is the chocolate isn't hard. So you can tell that they're fresh. I just bought these this morning and the chocolate is still melted as opposed to one you may buy late in the day where the chocolate's already hardened. So that would be my other tip about going to a French bakery. Get there before 10 a.m. because that's when everything is at its best. Now, another thing that I bought that was fun to throw into the mix and I wanted to show you guys are these croissants aux pommes. See, the literal translation is apple slipper. And they kind of, I guess, look like a little slipper of yesteryear. And they're filled with an apple compote. And sometimes you see them more with like a puff pastry. This looks like more of a kind of traditional pastry that's been brushed with egg wash and then scored. So you can see those decorative marks. And then there's also typically fluting around the edge. All right, let's cut into these so you can see. Wow, look at that. See, it's filled with like applesauce. It's the perfect complement, I think, at breakfast time to pair with some of these other things. So if you're putting together your French breakfast, I would throw in one of these. Okay, so traditional French baguettes that you buy fresh are not meant to last very long. They're actually best eaten the day you buy them because you'll find that they get very hard the next day. But if you do have leftover, then you serve it for breakfast the next day as pain grillé. So basically, these are the baguettes I bought today. But I can show you the technique with the fresh baguettes. And then cutting a baguette is a bit of a messy affair because again, like the croissants, it will make a lot of mess with the crumbs. So I really love this little gadget, which is a cutting board that's slatted and it comes in two pieces. So you cut your bread here, and then all of the crumbs collect here. And then you can go throw that away or you can save it for breadcrumbs. Feed it to the birds, which seem to be very hungry this morning. Years ago, I bought one of these and brought it home in my suitcase, only to find that I didn't really use it in the States because I wasn't buying that much bread. So they're kind of a great thing to have here or if you do eat a lot of bread at home. So a pain grillé would probably be about this big. See? And then you slice it in half so that you can put it through the toaster. See? And even a day-old baguette will still be pretty great. You have the most incredible texture inside. And Lucienne's baguette, I mean, this is pretty amazing. The crunchy exterior. And not only is it just great like this, but it's fantastic toasted. It does help in France to have a little pass to take the toast out because when you stick a baguette in the toaster, it can be hard to take out and you don't want to put a fork in there. Just makes it so much easier. Look at how gorgeous. All ready for the basket. So here is the gorgeous brioche. Look at that. Is that delicious or what? And I wish you were here because it smells so divine. Now, oftentimes you might consider a brioche a little bun and you do see that in parts of France, but here in Vendée, this would be considered a more traditional way that brioche would come, which is as one big loaf, sometimes braided, sometimes not. And when I asked Lucienne why it was so long like this and not the individual portions, his response was, well, because we eat a lot of it. So you need a big loaf. All right, so I'm going to serve this just on the cutting board with a bread knife and people can help themselves. I'll show you what it is. See, I mean, isn't this gorgeous? Look at this. The texture is like unbelievable. It's so soft. It's so springy. I could just sit here and eat this all day. I'm going to need a lot of laps in that pool. Now, if you would like to recreate this in the States, you could either head to your local French bakery and buy up the croissants and the pain au chocolat. Or if you have a Trader Joe's near you, they have the most amazing frozen croissants, frozen pain au chocolat, and they are worth buying because they are so delicious and really convincing, especially since you can serve them warm right out of the oven. And people will think either you made them yourself or you headed to the local bakery. Okay, now let's talk butter and jam, which you would serve with the brioche as well as the So there are two types of butter that you will find in France. In fact, there's a whole aisle of butter that you will see in France. In fact, the choices are always mind-boggling to me and our first few trips when I was shopping the grocery store, I couldn't tell them all apart. I didn't know what was what until my husband set me straight. Okay, so here's my favorite, which is the beurre demi-sel. And see, look at how big it comes. This is like a huge amount of butter, but when we have a lot of people in the house, we'll go through this in a week, no problem. And the demi-sel has little crystals of salt in it, which might sound strange, but I'm telling you, it is so delicious, especially on the brioche or the pangriet with a little bit of jam. It is like to die for. So I always go for this. Now, if you're not a salt fan, then I would look for the beurre doux, which is what this is. See? And doux has a lot of different meanings in French. It could mean soft, it can mean light, it can mean unsalted, basically. Unlike in the States, when you would cut the butter because our sticks are smaller. This is me cooking or baking with it, which is why I've cut it. But the better thing to do for breakfast is this. Instead of cutting it, we're going to scrape the top of it. And the reason why you want to do this is then you get really soft butter, which then allows you, you see, I'm gonna take some of this brioche, to spread it ever so gently on things like brioche, so that you're not like pressing it down and ruining the texture. So it's really the way to go. One of the things that I love about jams in France is that they're not that sweet. They have a delicious tartness to them that really allows you to taste the fruit. These in particular seem to be somewhere between a fruit syrup and a jam. They are so delicious. Okay, now let's talk about the drinks. So one thing that's pretty customary is orange juice. And this is kind of a new thing that I've seen in France now, which is the ability to get fresh squeezed orange juice at the grocery store. So you go up to this machine, you get one of these little bottles, you put it under, and you press down the spigot, and out comes the most delicious, beautiful, fresh squeezed orange juice. And you can see the oranges right there pressing themselves. Okay, so the most traditional hot drink you would serve at a traditional French style breakfast would be a cafe au lait. And really the traditional way is in a bowl like this. These are a little bit bigger, I think, because these are kind of a modern take on it. I use them for cereal, but I do have relatives that will come and drink coffee and tea out of this. Because you want to take your day old bread that you've grilled and dip it into your coffee or your tea, because that will make it a lot softer and easier to eat. I've never been like a huge fan of doing that, because I always find that yes, the bread might be good, but then you're sacrificing the taste of the coffee, which then has all these crumbs in it. So when I was shopping for coffee mugs for the house, I actually went for something in between. So it kind of feels wide like a bowl, but it also feels like a coffee mug at the same time. So a cafe au lait begins with a base of espresso. While our espresso is running, I had to just show you this. This is what the milk looks like in France. It comes in these little white bottles that to me always look like little bleach bottles. And the fact that it's not refrigerated. So a lot of the milk in France is made to be shelf stable, and you'll see it in the grocery store unrefrigerated. And that always sort of threw me for a loop, especially with this sort of bleach bottle design combination. I was kind of like, huh? But that's just how they do it. Okay, and then you just add your steamed milk to your espresso. Unfortunately, I know no latte art tricks, but wouldn't this be the time to try? This is a sad attempt at any latte art. Maybe I'll swirl it around. There we go. Then a popular drink for the kids would be a chocolat chaud, which is basically just hot chocolate. And this is powdered chocolate, 70%. And then you can see it has this beautiful chocolate grains. It's so good. It tastes just like kind of ground up chocolate chips, but like the best quality chocolate. So I'm going to add the milk, and then you can stir that around. And you'll start to see a beautiful hot chocolate. So if you wanted to host a French style breakfast at your house, which could be a fun alternative to just the regular coffee and muffins, this is how I would set the table. First, get yourself a nice linen. It doesn't need to be a full tablecloth. In fact, I actually collect these linens that are just oversized napkins because I think they make for great mini tablecloths. It's also a great thing to bring home from France if you're here and you're shopping the pecans because they're so small, they fold right up just like a t-shirt. You stick it in your bag. And I would look for ones that have nice decorative edges to them. Like this one has a beautiful monogram. Sometimes you can find your own monogram. The beautiful stitching around the edge, it just makes it a little extra special. Okay, so we're going to put that down first. Then we're going to put down our delicious baskets of goodies here. Then we'll put down our beautiful brioche here with a bread knife so people can serve themselves. Then we'll put down our butter here and our beautiful jam. So there is such a culture of jam in France. It's something that's taken pretty seriously. And one of the things that you will find at the different flea markets are these beautiful jam jars. So if I really wanted to be fancy and kind of fake people out, I would take this jam and put it in here and serve it. And people would probably think I made it myself. But it's one of the things that I love to buy at flea markets. In fact, the one I was at the other day, I bought this adorable little basket, which I was told was used to hold rabbits in. I just felt so bad before rabbits stuck in this basket. That's probably another story. But look, I got all these beautiful jars. And what's so nice about them is they're so heavy. They're really well made. And what I'm going to do with them is use them outside on our outdoor table and put a candle in them. Because they're heat resistant and they're meant to hold hot liquid when you're making jam. But I think they work perfectly as little candle holders. And then because the French breakfast is such a carb fest, I do like to add a little additional protein in the form of some yogurts. So these I think are beautiful for entertaining because the packaging is just so beautiful. So I got apricot. This is a blackberry blueberry mix. And then these I thought were really pretty too. These are vanilla. So I'm going to go ahead and save these little pots once they're done because I think they would be beautiful for little bud boxes in the guest rooms. So now we've created a focal point in the center of the table with all of our different treats, our condiments, our juice. But then I like to put the plates kind of on the outside, which I think makes for a pretty display. So we're expecting four. So I'll put the plates here on each side like so. And this is such a classic Bistro style of glass that you can find in France. They come in all different sizes. So like this would be a larger size. In the States, I might serve this for juice. But here because this juice is so delicious, it's so high quality, you kind of don't need that much because it's pretty rich when you're drinking like fresh squeezed juice. So I put them in these little glasses. My kids and I call them the fairy cups because when they were little, this was sort of the only portion that I would give them because it was all they would drink. But now they're known as the fairy glass in our house. So I'm going to four of these fairy cups here. And then for breakfast, really all you need is a knife and a spoon. So when I'm shopping all of these different bricomp, I love to look for interesting knives. Sometimes you can find them in these little cases. And it looks super fancy, but you can get really good deals like these. And these are, this is Bakelite. I got these for seven euros. So basically a euro a knife. And look how pretty those are. Now, if you can't get the salty butter, a little fake that you could do is take regular butter and soften it and then whip in some of that fleur de sel sea salt. And that would approximate the taste of salty French butter. And then just put it in something like this. You could have like a little butter dish that you could put in. Another way you could serve coffee if you didn't have an espresso machine would be to put it in a French press. And I usually put down the trivet just because these are hot. A French press coffee basically looks like this. And I find the perfect ratio is two tablespoons of coffee to one cup of hot water. So you would put the coffee in, then pour the water, then you would let it sit. So a French press needs to sit for at least two to three minutes to steep. And then once it's ready to serve, you can press it down. And then of course, I love how the French always serve warm milk in these cute little pitchers. So you can find yourself a cute little pitcher for your milk. Put that down like this. And then add a little sugar pot, something like this. And there you have it. You are all ready to go. Your beautiful French style breakfast to impress all of your friends and family with. I hope you guys give it a try and let me know what you think. And I'll see you back here next week. Until then, bye.