Mamiche

Babka, chou and a hand-kneaded levain

The levain is kneaded by hand every day here, and the bread carries as much of Mamiche's identity as the sweets do. A tourrier folds butter into the dough for croissants, pains au chocolat and pains aux raisins, which is the other half of the morning's work. The house shorthand for itself is direct: everything made on site, big miches, house viennoiserie, good coffee, a lunch casse-croûte. Victoria Effantin and Cécile Khayat opened the first shop, and it has grown into a small Paris network of three addresses since 2017. What makes it recognisable is the overlap, since bread, laminated pastry, sweets, coffee and lunch food all come off the same counter rather than from separate specialists.

A counter-led stop, not a cafe to sit in

The rhythm is picking things up rather than settling in. Mornings through lunch are the useful window, and the queue inside is part of the experience, moved along quickly by efficient service and a cheerful welcome. The shops are slightly jazzed-up versions of the classic Parisian bakery, with colourful signage, young staff and a case that mixes less traditional items into the standard repertoire. The crowd is local as much as visiting. Come early if there is something specific you want, because the signature items are the first to go and the case narrows as the day runs on. The traiteur side counts as much as the bakery, with sandwiches and quick lunch food covering the middle of the day for people who came in for bread.

Order the babka, then take a loaf

The chocolate babka is the thing to order first, a rich brioche dough braided with chocolate and sold by the loaf or by weight. The chou vanille follows it, a crisp choux shell filled with vanilla-scented cream. Tradition chocolat is a dense chocolate bread with chips running through it. Then take a loaf. Muesli bread is a sourdough of stone-ground wheat and rye flour carrying dried apricots, pumpkin seeds, cranberries and roasted oats. Pain noir is the seedier one, rye and spelt with pumpkin, sunflower, flax and sesame. Around those sit baguettes, rustic sourdough loaves, buns, beignets, éclairs, orange blossom brioche, cookies and the occasional maritozzo. The sourcing explains a good deal of it: AOP Charentes-Poitou butter, Valrhona chocolate, stone-ground wheat flour from Les Moulins Bourgeois, ham from Terroirs d'Avenir.