I admit it. When it comes to French pastries, I don’t know my Religieuse from my Madeleines. Don’t get me wrong, I love these pastries as much as the next connoisseur, I just don’t know their names. While they are quite tasty, I don’t live near a French bakery and I don’t frequently go out for pastries. What can I say? I’m more of an ice cream kind of girl I suppose.
Another thing I just didn’t know was that Kyoto is a hot spot for French pastry. Yes, you read that correctly. It’s hard to imagine but the chefs in Kyoto love cooking French food, especially pastries. There are many authentic French bakeries in Kyoto, scattered about the city, and there are authentic French pastries readily available should you find yourself out and about wanting a bite. Imagine my surprise when I found myself in Kyoto surrounded by all kinds of baked good products. (You know how it ended the last time I was surrounded by evil baked goods people, right?)
As luck would have it, right next to our hotel, almost attached really, was a bakery type of place. They served salads, cups of soup, coffee in the morning and, of course, the aforementioned French pastries. Little did I know what I was getting into with the pastries here, but they were on the menu and readily available.
Fast forward to the early days of our trip. We had been walking around Kyoto all day, a bit tired from the jet lag still, and wanting a bite to eat. Our hotel offered a large full breakfast, which we enjoyed, but later that day it was time for what I would call “a snack.”
You know what I’m talking about here. Something akin to a small cup of soup, maybe a side salad, and we’re good, right? Throw in a cup of something warm, like maybe hot tea, and let’s call it “dinner” and move along. After all, we had photos to edit and Japanese bathrooms to decipher, not to mention the chimping that happens in the early days of location photography.
It was cool but not really bitter cold outside, a little bit rainy and kind of brisk, the way late autumn days tend to be. Kyoto is not in the tropics, but by nature’s good graces it wasn’t snowing either, an especially lucky turn of events given it was late November/early December and it’s been known to happen there. Think time for some warm mittens and hot cup of tea and you’re there. We rode the elevators up to our hotel rooms to dump the gear and decided to meet up in our neighborhood bakery/cafe kind of joint. It was right next to our hotel and offered up just the type of small portions we were craving.
I walked in and the place was crowded but my companions had already grabbed a table. They had menus, and were browsing. “Oh, they have pastries,” I said. “That might be a good idea. Maybe I’ll do a small cup of soup or a salad and a nice little pastry. Hmm…”
“It’s a bakery and they look pretty good,” my friend replied. “You should try one.”
“Let me see what they have,” browsing menu I spot a few pastries I don’t recognize. “Profiteroles,” I said, “I won’t what those are?”
“You know those,” my friend replied, “they are like cream puffs.”
“Oh! Right! Yes, I do know those…Hmm…A cream puff could make a nice little dessert right about now.” I pointed to the menu as I spoke.”
“Yes, the pastries look good. I think everything here is fresh too,” she replied.
With that, I had profiteroles for dinner. Now, I didn’t just have them for dinner, no, because they served me a giant plate of profiteroles. A giant plate, I mean like a heaping helping. It was one heck of a giant cream puff! I think it was the largest puff pastry I had ever seen. I would up eating parts of it for several days. There was a recovery time involved in this pastry, let me tell you. After taking a bite? Yeah, you had to rest a minute. It was that big, that much of whopping cream puff. Phew what a Profiterole!
It’s safe to say Kyoto has one heck of a giant cream puff scene going down and I inadvertently stumbled into it. This is a giant plate full of pastry goodness, the great big plate of profiteroles I was served for “a snack” (also known as one heck of a giant cream puff!)
I still don’t know much about French pastries, but I do know that, when in Kyoto, if you order the profiteroles, you had best invite a friend (or twenty!) Because you are going to get something BIG. Phew!
Until next time…
PS Should you want a recipe, there are several online. Here is one for smaller profiteroles. I will leave as an “exercise for the reader” for you to figure out how to make them the size of the monster that swallowed all of Kyoto. (Sorry, you’re on your own for that one.)
