Montreal, Canada (The Joy of Food) — A visit to Au Kouign-Amann in Montreal is a pilgrimage, a chance to visit a patisserie making a classic version of the famed kouign-amann.
Fads like the Cronut come and go, but French pastry is forever. For the uninitiated, the kouign-amann is a pastry originating in the Brittany region of France, once described by the New York Times as “the fattiest pastry in all of Europe.”
The name translates literally to “butter cake,” and that’s what this delightful delicacy is: a round cake containing layers of leavened dough, salted butter, and sugar that have been intricately folded, baked, and caramelized. As the pastry bakes, the butter steams and separates the dough into layers. And the sugar crystalizes, creating a beautifully burnished cake. Just looking at it makes your butt bigger. Once cooled, it’s cut into wedge slices and served.
Texture is as vital as flavor, and the folks at Au Kouign-Amann have turned precision into an art form. The classic kouign-amann has a slightly crisp exterior that gives way to layers of buttery goodness. The inside is moist and has a dense, almost custard-like consistency, basically a buttery core enveloped by something created through the miracle of caramelization. The internal fluffiness belies what it contains.
It is a perfect pastry experience and a total study in contrasts. It is chewy, and it is creamy. It is sticky, and it is doughy. It is crunchy, and it is airy. It is sweet, but not cloying. It is savory, but not too savory, helped along by little ribbons of sugary goo laced throughout the well-defined folds. One slice is rich and decadent, but if you really want to kill yourself, entire pies are available.
Elsewhere, you will find kouign-amann in a number of shapes and sizes, all with different textures and made with varying levels of expertise. Bakers in North America, nothing if not skilled in turning an already sure thing into an individualized money-maker, started baking the kouign-amann in muffin-sized tins, creating the single-serving treats common in the U.S.A.
The dough rises up and out of the tins and makes a misshapen flower-like pattern strewn with caramelized sugar. Places like b. Patisserie in San Francisco and Dominique Ansel in New York (where it’s known as the DKA) sell respectable renditions of the kouign-amann. There are many interpretations despite using basically the same ingredient list.
When you’re standing in line to order at Au Kouign-Amann, you’re going to be distracted by many choices. Because in addition to the kouign-amann you have undoubtedly come for, there are all kinds of French pastries done exceptionally well: croissants, pains au chocolat, and tartelettes. Should you manage to bypass the bakery, there are also a smattering of sandwiches from the salé (savory) menu. And a few different types of quiche.
Lucky for you, Au Kouign-Amann isn’t far from the base of Mont Royal. I recommend eating in and then hiking up and down the mountain twelve times on foot as caloric payment for stuffing yourself full of delicious pastry.
Written by Joy
Thanks for reading. The Joy of Food blog celebrates eating well, traveling often, and living la dolce vita. San Diego, California is home base, but thoughts are from all over. Reviews and photos help to highlight wonderful (or not) food experiences from around the world.
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Montreal may have been the first time I lost weight on a trip, and Mont Royal is probably the main reason for that! But it’s worth hiking up on its own. Hard to imagine, though, (after reading Christopher Plummer’s autobiography) skiing down it just as a way of getting around.
I can think of a whole nest of Montreal restaurants, Au Kouign-Amann included, that should have something like Hike and Dine packages. Eat 30,000 calories and lose weight! It could work. I’ll need to ski down that mountain sometime like Captain Von Trapp er I mean Christopher Plummer.
Mmm… I gotta go to Canada.
Canada is an excellent food country, Montreal and Vancouver in particular. Montreal is one of the best gourmand cities in the world, and Vancouver is a melting pot with tons of variety.