Bakers, rock stars of the bakehouses

We tear off their virile sensual, robust, proud loaves, with a coppery crust whose warm vibrato is heard under the tooth of the knife. They lead customers who had lost their taste for it. And turn the mills at the heart of millennials who swallow with ecstasy and bluntly paved and bastards with flour of found wheat. The latter having the good fortune not to offend the contemporary hypersensitivity that gluten has made the new anathema.

The golden age of bread is not a mythical past, it is now, and its best days are yet to come

Strangely, this underground, whose stars compete today with pastry chefs and cooks in the Who's Who gastro-media, was not born from predestined batches. For the most part, these converts are reconverted. Pioneer of natural sourdough, Thomas Teffri-Chambelland, whose gluten-free rice and buckwheat loaves make the 11th arrondissement of Paris a neighborhood of high tolerance, was a SVT teacher before becoming a miller-baker. Striped hat, inhabited gaze, it is also at the origin of the bio-ecological of the Maison Deschamps in Lyon and the Bread Factory in Aix-en-Provence. Better, messianic cantor of a return to good grain, he created his international school of bakery (EIDB), in the middle of the fields, a few kilometers from Sisteron. And has just published a Leaven Bakery Treaty (Ducasse éditions), a new testament for baking beatitudes. A straw, however, alongside the five volumes and 2,642 pages of Nathan Myhrvold's Modernist Bread , just translated into French (Phaidon editions). Doctor of Science - in economics, geography, mathematics and spatial physics! -, a number two time from Microsoft, this Yankee decided to study cooking and baking in France. Since then, father of The Cooking Lab, an incubator of 32 researchers, chefs and photographers, he explores and analyzes new culinary techniques. And his verdict is final: "The golden age of bread is not a mythical past, it is now, and its best days are yet to come."

Read also: They break the crust and the codes of traditional baking

Bread and ideas is also the credo and the name of Christophe Vasseur's bakery (Paris 10e). A former fashion executive, he sent everything on a stroll to get into custom bread. Since then, his "bread of friends" has run the whole of Paris. Ditto for Jean-François Bandet. Co-founder of the sports brand Venum, he sold his shares, returned to the benches of the Ferrandi school and opened Bo & Mie with Magali Szekula, a fellow lawyer in retraining for bread making. "It was my dream to create the bakery that I would have liked to find near my home," he says. Natural sourdough, flour directly from family mills in Île-de-France, gentle fermentation: we are in a hurry to the gate of this new Eldorado on rue de Turbigo (Paris 2e) whose zebra praline bread is buzzing on social networks . This glam duo of Les Halles has just extended its fan zone to rue Saint-Martin (3rd).

As for the French Bastards, it is the boy band of the year. Twenty-five years old, hipster look, they are all the rage in Oberkampf (11th). Julien, the leader of the group, chef baker by training, convinced his friends David, a diamond cutter who passed a CAP bakery for a good cause, and Emmanuel, in the last year of HEC and organizer during his electro holiday hours, to set up a bakery and sandwich shop and patisserie. In the bakehouse, it remixes. Exit the flours too white to be honest, too refined not to hide some unhealthy additives and the Perlimpinpin sourdoughs. The stars are organic flours of hazelnut, millstone, white quinoa, black bean or even corn. And the bastard, a plump, brown baguette, cooked to the point. Another concept: at Atelier P1, which has just opened on rue Marcadet (18th), a happening is happening. Julien Cantenot, baker-musician, offers customers a hand in helping them learn how to make their bread.

Read also: Mamiche, best cinnamon roll in Paris

On the female side, there is no shortage of muses either. At the top of the poster, the Mamiches. Again, both were not born with a bread shovel in their hands. International affairs for Victoria Effantin, management for Cécile Khayat, the young ladies were profiled for a career in a CAC 40 company rather than in spelled. But, toasted with bread, they decide to throw their gourd over the Pigalle mills, rue Condorcet (9th). From the local bakery, they made a bakehouse with their hand. Tattooed with an M, their signature loaf of wheat flour from the Roc du Roc, a crumb of velvet and a crunchy braid, and their babka, a soft twisted brioche and marbled with chocolate, are the it from Pigalle. And here they are at the head of a second address, a former hot spot, rue du Château-d'Eau (10th). "It's crazy, when we opened, people already knew us, were waiting for us , " says Victoria.

Food is a subject that affects our generation. There is a desire to start from scratch, to rediscover ancestral skills, to explore new ones

Another phenomenon is the switch between kitchen and bakehouse. At the start, Julien Duboué wanted a bread oven to simmer good dishes. But even if it means having an oven, you might as well make bread. And, in the process, cultivate their own wheats in the native village with his band of peasant peasants from Landes. Suddenly, rue Ordener (18th), BOULOM has become a bakery with canteen and unlimited backstage buffet. Show in front! Chef Anthony Courteille transferred his table from the Canal Saint-Martin (10th) to a bakery, returning to his first love. Sourdough on hay, out-of-age wheat, its very HEALTHY breads are blossoming with sweet pepper, tarragon, turmeric, squash: the leg of a chef who welcomes the emergence of all these outsiders , these passionate converts of the second hour who bring another vision of the profession. “When I passed my CAP, we were taught to make beautiful tasteless. We were not concerned with taste, authenticity, respect for the product. Without these “break and enter” bakers, we would still be there. ” Same story with Anthony Bosson de l'Essentiel (5th, 12th and 13th), whose pie has just won the national competition for the best organic bread. “Ten years ago, when I moved to Paris, there were barely a dozen of us making organic and sourdough. Mine, made from a small piece of rye, honey and apple juice, is always the same. ” And Alexandre Drouard, head of Terroirs d'Avenir, which, after that of rue du Nil (2e), opened at the beginning of February a second bakery on rue Paul-Bert (11e), to add: “Food is a subject that affects our generation. There is a desire to start from scratch, to rediscover ancestral skills, to explore new ones. There is work to be done, but it is an extraordinarily exciting job! ” Dominique Saibron (14th), Le Bricheton (20th), Utopia (11th)… we could continue the playlist of bakers against the system of roundabout bread sheds, who refuse to make us eat our white bread and are good decided to put an end to the breaking bad in series of dough pieces boosted in chemistry and devoid of flavor. When they arrive in town, the bakery walks on the wild side .

Four Parisian bakers in sight

• MAMICHE

Victoria Effantin and Cécile Khayat at the Mamiche bakery in Paris. SEBASTIEN SORIANO / Le Figaro

Before launching an assault on the Pigalle district and naming their house of bread, not without humor, Mamiche, Cécile Khayat, the pastry soul, made her debut at Pierre Hermé, and Victoria Effantin, aspiring baker, got their hands dirty at the Tour d'Argent.

• TERROIRS OF THE FUTURE

Jonathan Herbster. Press service

For two years, Jonathan Herbster has joined Terroirs d'avenir, sourcers of products that combine gastronomy and sustainable agriculture. A real breath of fresh air for this young and bubbling baker who was tired of kneading "industrialized" bread miles from his values.

• BOULOM

Julien Duboué. Iddo_lavie

Accent of the South-West, rugby man with a frank speaking, Julien Duboué is never late for a shaken idea. The friendliness, sharing and quality of the products are his only compass. The idea of ​​working with ancient wheat produced in his native village was not considered, it was imposed.

• THE FRENCH BASTARDS

Julien Abourmad. MarleneHuetStudio

After passing through Ducasse and Potel & Chabot, Julien Abourmad flies to Tel Aviv, Melbourne and Sydney. Where he meets chef Mike McEnearney, who affectionately nicknamed him "French bastard". A name that will become that of the bakery that, back in France, he opens with his two childhood friends.

This is a palace!

Éric Frechon set up a mill in Bristol to obtain fresh flour before kneading live bread. BENOIT LINERO / Le_Bristol_Paris_x_Le_Pain_Vivant

In palaces too, the importance of sourcing your bread well seems to have gained ground. Bread alive in Bristol, born from the meeting between Éric Frechon and Roland Feuillas, legendary peasant-baker from Cucugnan. The idea germinated to install within the hotel a stone wheel in order to obtain minute fresh flour before kneading. From engrain, starch, poulard or spelled: its 100% natural breads even inspired the three-star chef to pair them with flat-breads. And we leave the Epicure's table with a loaf of your choice. At the Ritz, we serve Lodève bread: originally from a small village near Montpelier, it is the ancestor of all unshaped French bread, a sharing bread. Once kneaded, the dough is not cut into dough pieces. It rests for 24 hours, then it is cut into large strips and baked straight away on a long baker's shovel that Place Vendôme specially brought from Italy. Light crumb, honeycombed, this crispbread is served hot. Thierry Marx, chef's hat from Mandarin Oriental, has become a "serial baker". The one who dreamed of having a bakery as a child joined forces with Joël Defives, Meilleur Ouvrier de France, and now owns three in Paris. Organic flours from Île-de-France, hand kneading, its two flagship products are the Loyale baguette, wheat and rye, and breadmaki, a rolled sandwich. As for Meurice's pastry chef, Cédric Grolet, he has just opened his own shop near the Opera. With Yohann Caron, his accomplice, they awakened their common passion for bread. Result, you can spend the evening looking for your sourdough baguette, hot out of the oven. And soon, their breads and pastries will be served on the tables of the palace on rue de Rivoli.