{"id":3242,"date":"2014-03-06T23:31:17","date_gmt":"2014-03-06T22:31:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/?p=3242"},"modified":"2014-03-06T23:43:47","modified_gmt":"2014-03-06T22:43:47","slug":"sweet-spots-toulouse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/pastry-shops\/sweet-spots-toulouse","title":{"rendered":"Sweet spots in Toulouse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some time ago I visited Toulouse<\/strong>, also known as “the pink city<\/strong>” for the massive amount of red-brick buildings<\/strong> (so it should rather be “red city”, yeah, that’s what I thought too)<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It is also famous for its huge Capitole square<\/strong> and is one of the biggest cities in France<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

For me, “visiting a city<\/em>” is a synonym of finding the best pastry shops in town<\/strong> \ud83d\ude42 so on this occasion too I toured the streets of the city centre to find the nicest sweet spots in town.<\/p>\n

The first one I encountered on my path was “Michel Belin<\/strong>“.<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

Michel Belin<\/strong> is an artisan chocolatier<\/strong>, member of Relais Desserts<\/strong> and owner of a boutique in downtown Toulouse and in Albi, a town nearby.<\/p>\n

If you say “Toulouse” in France, you also say “violette<\/strong>“: the violet flower is the symbol of the city, where it is treated as a fine specialty<\/strong>. Many shops, including Michel Belin, in the region sell candied violet petals<\/strong> and other violet-based products (e.g. natural flavouring for pastries, chocolate bars with violette, etc)…<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

But the best product of the shop was, of course, chocolate<\/strong>! The shop offered a dozen or so different types of dark and milk chocolate<\/strong>, with different origins and cocoa percentages, plus many more unpackaged pieces of chocolate with nuts, dried fruits or candied flowers<\/strong>.
\nI really regret not tasting all of them as all the few different chocolates I tried were amazing<\/strong>.
\nThe prices were ok for a big city, a bit more than 4\u20ac for a square of chocolate (80g, I think), but of course violets were more expensive (a small box of candied petals cost around 10\u20ac).<\/p>\n

It was quite hot when I was in Toulouse, so I stopped several times for an ice cream too! The best places I found were Octave<\/strong> and Philippe Faur<\/strong>, where both the creams and sorbets were outstanding. Again, price ranges were in the French average (which is, like, the double of Italian prices for ice creams).<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

Finally, for some more traditional pastries, I headed to Pillon<\/strong>, apparently an institution in Toulouse.<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

I tried a double-chocolate verrine<\/strong> and I recommend it! \ud83d\ude42 I also appreciated that the shop offered something more original than the standard croissant.<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

Usually French pastry chefs are quite traditional when it comes to pastry basics such as croissants and brioches: for example, while in Italy you can find chocolate-filled brioches almost in every bar, in France you’re going to have a hard time if you’re looking for a filled croissant<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Well, Pillon<\/strong> had right in the shop windows some very original<\/strong> chestnut and violet brioches, plus a pear-chocolate turnover, definitely something worth trying for a change!<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

I was very pleased with the service because the shop assistant<\/strong> was very helpful<\/strong> and knew what she was selling. She was also the only one so far<\/strong> who imagined the consequences of me entering the shop with a camera, so she put all the individual cakes in order for my picture<\/strong> (aww so nice!). She wins! \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n

\"Toulouse<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Artisan chocolatier Michel Belin
\n<\/em><\/strong>9 rue du Taur<\/em>
\n31000 Toulouse<\/em>
\nTel: +33 (0)5 61 23 40 21<\/em><\/p>\n

Octave<\/em><\/strong>
\n9 Place Du Capitole<\/em>
\n31000 Toulouse <\/em>
\nTel: +33 (0)5 61 12 27 00<\/em><\/p>\n

Philippe Faure<\/em><\/strong>
\n51 rue des Filatiers<\/em>
\n31000 Toulouse<\/em>
\nTel: +33 (0)5 62 73 11 89<\/em><\/p>\n

Maison Pillon<\/em><\/strong>
\n2 rue Ozenne<\/em>
\n31000 Toulouse<\/em>
\nTel: +33 (0)5 61 52 68 14<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some time ago I visited Toulouse, also known as “the pink city” for the massive amount of red-brick buildings (so it should rather be “red city”, yeah, that’s what I thought too). It is also famous for its huge Capitole square and is one of the biggest cities in France. For me, “visiting a city”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3243,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[271,112,155,443,446,447,448,442,444,445],"class_list":["post-3242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pastry-shops","tag-best-in-town","tag-chocolate","tag-france","tag-ice-cream","tag-michel-belin","tag-octave","tag-pillon","tag-toulouse","tag-violet","tag-violette"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.roadtopastry.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}