The return of the croissant

Many of you my friends from home or from the road have asked me you have not spoken aout croissants or baguettes for a while!!!!

Well, did not post on it but it is still part of my trip. I love wandering in the side streets or in the marketplaces in hope of finding this one bakery that would become the one.
In all honesty I found 4 great bakeries where either croissants or baguettes (or both) were excellent.

All these bakeries had a common point: they were pretty expensive and were not really local. In Ventiane, Cuzco and in Sydney they were French owned. Japan is really crazy about France and French products; what they do there, they send apprentice bakers for internship in France so that they get the French technique and then the bakeries import all ingredients (flour....) and as far as the oven to make sure they get the same taste. They also get French names such as Delices de France. But they also put a Japanese touch to it with a croissant having orange taste (it´s delicious). The best bakeries in Japan were in the luxury department stores.

The famous croissant a l orange

I have never found a really good baguette anywhere else and I am more or less convinced by now that my taste is too biased to find one outside France.


As for croissants, well, I have had good surprises with decent ones at times in Ecuador and Peru. But opne thing about croissants: so many countries like to have them with ham and cheese, what a sacrilege!!!! I sometimes even think about the morning croissant of AH (in Holland) as quite good that is to sy hopw few times I have found some.

During my trip I have added a few items to the list of bakery items I was craving for:
The first one, much easier to find than croissant, is the pain au chocolat. Ok, a good pain au chocolat is not so easy to find because many bakeries lay think that a pan au chocolat Scandinavian style is better: the difference is that chocolate is spread on the tpo instead of a bar inside. Anyway since when Vikings are good at making delicacies?

The good and the pale copy

Then they are the chiffones or kind of yoghurt cakes called chiffon with a vanilla or orange taste. I could find them in most of the countries of South America I have been and they re really good (mention speciale a Cuenca and Cuzco) and are perfect for trekking.

Ok, they are not small but I do not mind carry them

Oh, I have to mention the amazing chocolate cookies of the premium brand of W (I do not make ad for supermakets). First they have converted me to cookies and secondly everyone who tasted them on my advice agreed on their quality.

Also the fruits ice creams Dolci + Gelati in Cairns just made with fruits were exceptional (pineapple, strawberry and mango) and even beat the ones of my mum!!!.

from the website

And I cannot finish without speaking about the crepe au Nutella from Thomas in Cuenca. I was just coming from a week of illness and they were perfect to recover.

So overall, where do I stand on bread?
Well, Thailand is a bread desert while Australia and New Zealand are swamped with toast bread (ie, this is not bread to me).

Boooooohh

South America is not a baguette continent but luck can make you cross the way of a decent ciabatta or some local bread usually with the form of a bun (petit pain). (the ironic thing is that it is usually found in supermarkets which shows how bread as I like it is not part of the local culture).

Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam really are a step-up for baguette-like bread and that made my life easier for breakfast.

Japan still tops my list for the reasons I have explained earlier.

This ranking (where New Caledonia does not appear because this is too close culturaly to France) does not reflect how I liked countries because except Thailand and to a lesser extent Vietnam I loved them all. But even these two I would be happy to visit again to change my opinion. At the moment Japan remains the most exotic (= different) country I have ever been to, the natures of New Zealand, Patagonia are dreamlands for me, the Asian food is the most delicious, the beaches of Thailand, New Caledonia and Australia the most beautiful, the people of New Zealand, Colombia and Chile the most friendly, Laos the most relaxed country and South America my favourite continent because I feel so good here!!