What do you think?
Rate this book
Kitchen Rhythm: A Year in a Parisian Pâtisserie
"At 5.37 a.m. my alarm goes off for the first time. By 6.09 a.m. I will be waiting on the metro platform. By 6.27 a.m. I pull open the swing door and duck under the pink curtain of the patisserie. I am probably last. "In our tiny bakery on the other side of Paris, our cakes are made in the early morning, to preserve that freshness and crunch."
Following in the footsteps of Rachel Khoo, Frances Leech has been lured to the city of love by puff pastry. For the past year she has worked in a small little French-Japanese patisserie where margins are small and the pressure is on. On any given day this small bakery uses 100 passionfruit and coconut mousses, 18 kg of chestnut and rum paste for Mont-Blanc tarts alone.
Frances trains alongside her Japanese colleagues perfecting meringues, passionfruit mousse, millefeuille and sticky caramel as well as a working knowledge of idiomatic Japanese. She feels incompetent, clumsy, tall and gets burned a lot. But her colleagues are patient and kind and she learns to love the art of pastry, despite the early mornings.
Following in the footsteps of Rachel Khoo, Frances Leech has been lured to the city of love by puff pastry. For the past year she has worked in a small little French-Japanese patisserie where margins are small and the pressure is on. On any given day this small bakery uses 100 passionfruit and coconut mousses, 18 kg of chestnut and rum paste for Mont-Blanc tarts alone.
Frances trains alongside her Japanese colleagues perfecting meringues, passionfruit mousse, millefeuille and sticky caramel as well as a working knowledge of idiomatic Japanese. She feels incompetent, clumsy, tall and gets burned a lot. But her colleagues are patient and kind and she learns to love the art of pastry, despite the early mornings.
12 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 4, 2013
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
March 29, 2022
Kitchen Rhythm is a fifteen-page essay on Leech's observations about working in a Parisian pâtisserie run and staffed almost exclusively by people originally born in Japan. Where most essays on food tend to focus on sight and taste, this essay highlights the scents and touch of working with pâtisserie. It's charming and delightful.
August 29, 2022
What a quick and charming little read! One felt like you were right there in that minute kitchen space churning out pastries, learning about the ‘sounds’ of pastries as well as textures, vocabulary words, and exhaustion behind the scenes. Loved it!
July 29, 2021
Great essay! It describes the author's apprenticeship as a pastry chef in a French-Japanese bakery. She uses all of her five senses to create sweet delights, with a unique emphasis on touch and sound.
It was an enjoyable read that gives glimpses of culture, language, and just how bakers/chefs use their whole body in food preparation. To the point that touch and sound can tell them so much about the cooking process. And of course, all the talk about eclairs, puff pastry, and mousse is its own reward.
She writes: "You can feel the "thousand leaves" crackling with caramelised sugar as you demolish it. Listen really carefully and hear the vanilla seeds pop between your teeth" (kindle loc. 35). 🍰 💕
It was an enjoyable read that gives glimpses of culture, language, and just how bakers/chefs use their whole body in food preparation. To the point that touch and sound can tell them so much about the cooking process. And of course, all the talk about eclairs, puff pastry, and mousse is its own reward.
She writes: "You can feel the "thousand leaves" crackling with caramelised sugar as you demolish it. Listen really carefully and hear the vanilla seeds pop between your teeth" (kindle loc. 35). 🍰 💕
January 2, 2019
I don't do book reviews like you keep seeing, as I find that some give too much of the plot away and I personally hate that, as it makes the book not worth reading. I much prefer to take the authors back cover write up as a review as it can either intrigue you enough to read the book of provide you enough information to make you decide that the book is not for you.
My review rules are: The more stars, the more I liked it.
If there are too many typos or errors the less stars I give
If the storyline or plot is poor or contains too many errors, the characters are too weak, the ending lacking something, then the less stars I give.
Simple, uncomplicated and to the point without giving anything away.
Some of the books I read have been given to me by the author as a pre-release copy and this does not bias my reviews in any way
My review rules are: The more stars, the more I liked it.
If there are too many typos or errors the less stars I give
If the storyline or plot is poor or contains too many errors, the characters are too weak, the ending lacking something, then the less stars I give.
Simple, uncomplicated and to the point without giving anything away.
Some of the books I read have been given to me by the author as a pre-release copy and this does not bias my reviews in any way
August 22, 2020
If you're interested in languages, foreign cultures, cooking or music you'll enjoy this essay about living and working in Paris with Japanese people in a French pastry shop. She captures the essence of confusion and pleasure, behind discovering how hard it actually is to live your dreams.
November 9, 2017
This essay rambles a bit, and while it technically covers a year, it isn't an essay about year's experience. Leech writes well about food and the passages about sound when cooking are quite good.
November 26, 2018
This is an interesting essay . . .
This is a sort of a “day in the life” type work that takes the reader along the highlights of a bakery shop worker. It’s well-written, with vividly described environments, and a smattering if French and Japanese terms.
This is a sort of a “day in the life” type work that takes the reader along the highlights of a bakery shop worker. It’s well-written, with vividly described environments, and a smattering if French and Japanese terms.
August 28, 2013
I really enjoyed this essay about working in a Japanese Patisserie in Paris. The author writes beautifully and masterfully about the subject. I could see everything happening in my mind and it made me want to go and eat a millefeuille.
March 7, 2013
Essay length - a year sketched in a few pages.
May 11, 2013
I loved the descriptions of the food! It was interesting to see a focus on the sounds and textures of the food, instead of their looks and tastes. I only wish it had been much longer!
January 25, 2016
Nice description but not much to it overall. I guess I expected a book rather than a story.
April 3, 2015
I love that she talks about the sound and feeling of baking.
Want to Read
February 25, 2016kindle 100kb (food)
June 15, 2017
Nice little glimpse into how a passion can change your life and lead you somewhere unexpected. Shows how the pleasure of food is not just in taste.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews