Bakery Barometer

Kouglof: a soft, sweet pastry from Alsace that can be made either in individual or family-sized portions, sometimes lined with dough, and then filled with pastry cream, and often sprinkled with icing sugar; typically adorned with candles and decorated with holly leaves at Christmas.

Important background information: In my past life (Paris), I was in an ongoing war with the local baker. It all started when one day I was in line with a lady who asked the question “Is there a difference between whole wheat and organic bread?” 

Having just written nearly 3,000 words on organic produce in France, I knew that indeed there was a major difference. But, I kept my mouth shut, interested to see what the baker would say. Her and I were already on not-so-friendly terms because 1) as soon as she heard my accent, she rolled her eyes, sighing ‘oh les américaines’ and 2) it took nearly 10 minutes of back-and-forth arguing the day I tried to order an iced-tea, which she insisted is pronounced ‘eeeased-thhé, and I begged to differ seeing as how the word is in English and IT COMES FROM MY COUNTRY, or just next door, same-same.

Ok , back to the whole wheat vs. organic bread debate. She said, with total confidence (read: arrogance), that ‘bien suuuur!’ they were the same thing, but that the whole wheat loaf was sometimes a little darker in color. I could not let this slide. You have to take your small victories where you can in France and I was already down a win, having let the iced-tea thing go. I told the lady the difference and she bought a loaf of each, anyway, to see which tasted better. No big loss. Or so I thought. What lay ahead of me were 3 years of refusal to sell me certain breads under the pretense that I had to pre-order them or that they were reserved. Sometimes, she just threw the croissant on the counter and the change too. And so on, and so forth....

Current day: So with all of this history in mind, going into a new bakery is a source of stress for me. Will I get yelled at? Will someone make fun of my accent? Will I say ‘une’ instead of ‘un’ croissant by accident?  You are going to see the baker every morning and possibly every evening, so the Bakery Barometer can set the tone of your day.

Before heading in, I take a careful look at who is going through those doors. Are they crying when they come out? Smiling? How are they dressed?  Well, no one ran screaming from the store (the baker can’t be that mean), no one was in Chanel from head-to-toe (it is affordable) and everyone came out with something in their hands (they are well organized, unlike my previous baker who never had croissants at 10 am on a Sunday morning).

I look around for a dog hook to attach Lucie, but there isn’t one so I pick up her up, take a deep breath, and I close my eyes, waiting to get yelled at for bringing a dog into a bakery. Nothing. Eyes open. Cool, this is good.

Next, I check out the massive selection of things they have – like ‘Tigres’ (a sort of pound cake with chocolate swirls and a chocolate cookie on top of it) and apricot-fig bread and – good god in heaven – KOUGLOF! This brioche-bread is like The Rolls Royce of pastries, in my opinion.  And it is only 3.50 euros for the whole thing. I paid nearly 5 euros for one of its pathetic plain brothers, pain de mie, in Paris.

I get to the counter. The baker looks me up and down, with a little smile. I wasn’t waiting for the Brady Bunch, this is France, but a little smile is a good sign.  Then, wait for it, she points at Lucie, who is still in my arms, and says “Is that your dog?” I start to head for the door.  “Wait, mademoiselle!” Big bonus points here. I hate being called 'Madame', which brings to mind old(er) ladies in thick pantyhose, carrying canes.

“Where are you going? I just wanted to say that she is so cute! What type of dog is it?”  At this point, I start to look around for the hidden camera, certain that she is just messing with me and at any moment the head baker will show up and kick me and Lucie outside for good.

“Uhhh… it’s a Cavalier King Charles spaniel. Can I have a Kouglof, please?”  Better not waste any time – I am getting that Kouglof before we kicked out, come hell or high water.

She wraps it up in and folds the paper around it like an origami animal or something and off we go. As we head for the door, I see that in line are not one, not two, but THREE other dogs, waiting and sniffing and no one is getting thrown out. 

Ahhh, this is definitely the start of a beautiful relationship. 

ps. I would like to point out that if we do in fact win the lottery in the future, Al and I still plan to shut down the bakery bitches in Paris. I know we won't live there, but just on principle, we would still like to see them out.