The Best Bakery in Céret
By Jenni Gainsborough
Editor’s note: Jenni is a loyal Let’s Go Write regular workshop attendee and also one of our favorite people! Read on for her thoughts on bakeries in Céret.
It’s a cliché of course – walking around a French town with a baguette under one arm or poking out of a shopping bag. But that is absolutely me when I am in Céret. My favorite bread baker is in a small side street just off Boulevard Arago, where our favorite apartment is located. Le Boulanger Artisan opens at 6am but the baker has been up for hours before to prepare freshly baked bread in all shapes and sizes and flours. My favorite is the céréale but I will happily eat any of them. An early visit there and my breakfast is taken care of – warm from the oven bread to go with the delicious cheese (purchased from the amazing Saturday market). My second visit of the day is to provide the writing group with a nutritious mid-morning snack. I’m not sure of its official name but it is a delicious flaky croissant-like pastry filled with Swiss cream. No one can resist it.
The bakery is closed for a few hours in the afternoon, presumably so that Monsieur le Boulanger can eat lunch but more importantly so he can bake more bread. When he reopens around 5pm I am there again, first in line to pick up several freshly baked baguettes for dinner. By the time of my third visit I have accumulated a pocket full of change and I will try to be a helpful customer and give monsieur the right amount of money (and lessen the weight of coins I am carrying). This can take a while as I try to make sense of the value of each coin and add them up correctly. Monsieur is endlessly patient and helps me when the task becomes too much. He is smiles sweetly too at my attempts to make conversation with him in French – a smile of encouragement not disdain. Don’t believe the old gripe about the French sneering at foreigners attempts to speak their language. It doesn’t happen – certainly not in small French towns. The locals always appreciate our attempts.
Bread and cheese! One of our favorite meals in France.
Of course there is a patisserie in Céret too. Maison Duclos is where we go to buy fancy desserts when the need arises. It is a lovely place with delicious cakes and pastries and helpful counter staff. There are also small tables outside where you can sit and eat and people watch – always a source of entertainment. But in Maison Duclos I feel like a visitor while at Le Boulanger Artisan I can convince myself that I am part of the Céret community, a sense of belonging which is, for me, a vital piece of the Céret experience and keeps me coming back whenever I can.
A selection of pastries at Maison Duclos