Un Dimanche à Paris

Are you a chocolate lover? If yes, there is a new, spacious (800 square meters – what a difference in comparison to the tiny boutiques of Pierre Hermé or La Pâtisserie des Rêves) place in the heart of Paris (métro Odéon), waiting for your gourmet visit. Open seven days a week from 9 a.m. to midnight, “Un Dimanche à Paris”, is the first “concept store” of the chocolate chef Pierre Cluizel. It started to operate only a couple of few months ago. It relates to chocolate and everything around it. Visit the historic Cour du Commerce Saint-André at the base of the ancient 13th-century city walls built by Philippe Auguste and you will find the spacious, bright, friendly designed store, including a shop, a pâtisserie, a bar, a restaurant, a lounge and a chocolate salon - all under one roof.

Pierre Cluizel is son of Michel Cluizel. You probably will not be surprised if I write that his father is a famous master chocolatier… Michel has been making chocolates since quite a long time, meaning since 1948. He began his career in his parents’ pastry and chocolate shop in Normandy. He is famous for, inter alia, processing cacao beans in his own ateliers (which is not so obvious even in the world of chocolate makers).

Let’s come back to the son, Pierre, and his shop. The ground floor, equipped with huge windows, welcomes you to visit the chocolate boutique and pastry shop. You will find candies, chocolate by the piece and by the block (milk, dark, white) or pastries (éclairs, macarons), and chocolate cookies. For those who are not so crazy about chocolate, I propose to check their caramel au beurre salé, and other sweet confections – jarred, canned or in bags. The personnel is patient and friendly and thanks to the huge surface – as for Parisian conditions –, you can enjoy your visit at your own pace, nobody will hustle you or hurry you up with mad eyes.

Another thing that makes it different from other Parisian pastry shops that I know is an open (or at least transparent) pastry laboratory, located on the ground flour, next to the shop. This laboratory has glass walls, so it is possible to watch desserts and pastries being prepared from scratch.  Unfortunately, when I visited the place, the kitchen was on a break, and I could not watch pastry chefs doing their wonders. You pass the shop and the pastry laboratory, and you enter the “salon de thé” (tearoom) and a spacious dining room, meaning a restaurant serving savory dishes – all of them prepared with a touch of chocolate. We did not have any time to have lunch there, so I am awaiting your critics and comments should you make it first at this place.

That’s not all. Climb the stairs to the first floor where a bar and lounge serves drinks prepared from chocolate. There is also a teaching kitchen where chocolate and pastry classes/workshops are organized.

I wish I could try at least some hot chocolate there, but running out of time, I only bought a few macarons which I found quite good. I regret that I did not have a chance to spend more time there because, since we are moving to Poland for some time, I am afraid that I will not visit the place again in a near future.

That’s why, my dear fellows, I invite you to give me some news of your own experience there!