10 Best French Desserts To Try In Paris

10 Best French Desserts To Try In Paris
Jana
Jana 
Published
| 3 min read

Coming to Paris and being on a diet isn’t the best idea. Everywhere you go, you’ll be surrounded by tasty looking food. The smell of freshly grilled chicken spreads in the streets as well as the special types of cheese offered in specialized French boutiques. Equally, the frequent chocolate shops are luring you by homemade pralines and candies. On top of all this, there are the famous French bakeries that offer, next to the fresh crunchy baguette, an extremely large number of sweet treats. They are just irresistible. Not entering a bakery to taste at least one of these delicacies would be a crime. To whet up your appetite even more, here is a short list of the most popular sweets that you should not miss.

Croissant

Croissants
Source: Photo by user Open Grid Schedul... used under CC0

Croissant and several other famous types of Parisian pastries are a type of viennoiserie, which are baked goods made from a yeast-leavened dough or puff pastry. By adding butter, chocolate or vanilla custard to the basic dough, the final products are sweeter than bread. Croissants, the buttery puff pastry rolled bread, is the most popular. French eat croissants very often for breakfast, with butter and jam.

Pain au chocolat

10 best french desserts to try in paris | pain au chocolat
Source: Jana Markova

Pain au chocolat, also a very popular viennoiserie, is made from the same dough as croissants, but differs in shape and filling – the rectangular dough is filled with two dark chocolate sticks on the sides. Pain au chocolat is best when it is freshly baked and the chocolate melts. When it is still warm it is highly addictive.

Chausson aux pommes

10 best french desserts to try in paris | chausson aux pommes
Source: Jana Markova

Another popular viennoiserie will please apple lovers; “chausson aux pommes” is a puff pastry dough pocket filled with delicious, sweet apple sauce.

Eclair

10 best french desserts to try in paris | eclair

Éclairs are oval shaped puff pastries filled with custard. The dessert is topped by a delicious sweet glaze. The original flavour of éclair is chocolate, but if you like to experiment, you can try the one with coffee or caramel filling. They’re all delicious!

Chouquettes

10 best french desserts to try in paris | chouquettes
Source: Jana Markova

If you’re not so hungry, but you’d like to taste some cream-puff pastry delicacy as well, you can opt for tiny balls of cream-puff dough sprinkled with pearl sugar that are called chouquettes. Usually, Parisians buy them in a huge paper cornet. Buy some to snack on during a walking tour. But pay attention, they are so delicious that you may eat them all in one go!

Flan

flan
Source: Jana Markova

If you’re a vanilla-flavour lover, you can’t miss a dessert called flan. Flan is a round custard consisting of delicious thin dough layer on the bottom and vanilla custard filling that is baked in the oven. Made from egg, milk and sugar, flan is a great option if you’re looking for some light dessert after a rich lunch.

Tartelettes aux fruits

tartelettes aux fruits
Source: Jana Markova

Parisian bakeries offer also a large selection of desserts for fruit lovers. While classical apple or pear pies for Parisians are almost as basic as the most usual white baguette, the shops also offer more special pieces that you should not miss. First of all, pay attention the delicacy called tartelettes aux fruits. Usually, a tartelette is a small round crust made of a crunchy tea biscuit that is filled with creamy, sweet vanilla custard. Already this combination sounds tasty, but French pastry chefs have lead it to perfection by adding fresh fruit slices on the top. It is just impossible to resist the huge fresh strawberries or tasty looking raspberries that are waiting for you!

Tarte tatin

tarte tatin
Source: Jana Markova

If you are a real fruit lover, you should also try the special upside-down fruit pie called tarte tatin. Its particularity lies in a special baking process – the apple slices, that make the basis of the pie, are caramelized in sugar and butter before baking. This process gives the final product an extremely smooth and sweet taste.

Mille-feuille

mille-feuille
Source: Jana Markova

To make the mouth-watering list of sweet treats complete, let’s talk about the most decadent: mille-feuille and fondant au chocolat. Mille-feuille, in English “thousand leaves”, is a pastry consisting of three layers of thin puff pastry plates that are alternated with vanilla custard or cream filling. The top layer is usually decorated with sugar icing. This pastry has a long history – it was created in 1651 by a famous French chef François Pierre de La Varenne.

Fondant au chocolat

fondant au chocolat

Saving the best for last, fondant au chocolat is one of the classical French chocolate cakes. Fondant means “melted” and this adjective fits perfectly with the dense and sticky structure of the cake that is obtained by a slow and long baking that caramelizes the ingredients. The dough consists mainly of high-quality dark chocolate, sugar, egg and butter, with a minimum amount of flour. It is mainly this composition and the process of baking that distinguish the brownie-styled fondant au chocolat from the classical chocolate cake, in which flour is the main ingredient.

The best of French pastries

Paris is the kingdom of bakeries. The smell of freshly baked baguettes lure your senses everywhere you go. So, why resist the temptation and try some French delicious pastries? Here is a list of the best sweets that you should not miss!

Disclosure: Trip101 selects the listings in our articles independently. Some of the listings in this article contain affiliate links.

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Hi, my name is Jana and I am a Czech girl currently living in Paris. Student of cinema and dance, I love to meet new people all over the world, to speak with them in different languages and to...Read more

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