Chez Karine's store front. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
The Manila dessert scene just got a major boost with the much welcomed opening of not one, but two French patisseries in Bonifacio Global City’s Serendra.
First to open, last June 24 was Chez Karine, a French patisserie with an Asian twist—Japanese being the strongest, as shown in its minimalist, modern approach to the store and packaging designs as well as its product offerings, with the intention of letting the products become the focal point of the store.
Chez Karine means “at Karen’s or Karen’s place.” Karine was the adopted name of chef/owner Karen Yang, during her first pastry internship in France, where everyone called her Karine in lieu of Karen. The Le Cordon Bleu Paris, Patisserie Diploma graduate, had always dreamt of owning a patisserie, serving all her favorite desserts, thus Chez Karine was born to serve as her outlet to introduce everyone to her distinct world of pastry.
Chez Karine's delectable dessert jars. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
Chez Karine currently offers macarons, dessert jars, small cakes, cookies, specialty coffee, tea, and dessert drinks. Early crowd favorites are its macarons, which most people are familiar with since a lot of pastry shops offer it here. But what sets Chez Karine’s macarons apart from the rest is the unique texture of its shells and the quality and taste of its fillings, something Karen probably learned to do well from ‘staging’ at Pierre Herme patisserie, working with the “macaroniers” and making macarons for seven hours a day.
Passionfruit Igloo is one of Chez Karine's bestsellers. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
Salted Caramel is the current best selling macaron flavor followed closely by dark chocolate, pistachio and earl grey. Chow Buzz highly recommends its Royal Pudding line, which are soft set custard puddings with liquid caramels at the bottom, sort of like a cross between a crème brulee and a crème caramel, that comes in three flavor variants (Vanilla, Muscovado and Chocolate), and are inspired by Karen’s travels to Japan and Taiwan.
Gourmandise at Serendra. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
Currently on soft opening, just at the other end of Serendra and facing Market Market, is Gourmandise. The Goose Station’s Chef Sunshine Pengson’s newly opened Parisian-style patisserie that is specializing in mainly two delectable Parisian dessert staples, eclairs and tarts.
On soft opening at Serendra is Chef Sunshine Pengson's Gourmandise. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com
Chef Sunshine’s love affair with Parisian sweets started when she was based for over a year in Paris, while pursuing both a culinary and pastry degree from the prestigious Ecole Ritz Escoffier. While in Paris, her favorite specialty food store was Fauchon, the store that inspired her to eventually open her own Parisian patisserie here in Manila.
Gourmandise currently offers 10 different flavors of Parisian eclairs and five different flavors of Individual tarts to-go. She intends to change flavors, aside from serving weekend special flavours, regularly and will be soon offering Nespresso coffee to-go as well.
Selection of Parisian eclairs at Gourmandise. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
Current éclair flavors include chocolate, praline, salted caramel, peanut butter and jelly, lemon, dulce de leche, raspberry, coffee and more.
Tarts at Gourmandise. Chow Buzz photo for InterAksyon.com.
For the tarts, there are peanut butter with chocolate and caramel, lemon meringue, raspberry, apple and the best selling chocolate gianduia. Chow Buzz must trys are chocolate, praline and salted caramel éclairs.
Both Patisseries are now open in Serendra mall, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig. Check-out the desserts ala Francaise this Saturday, July 14, 2012, to celebrate Bastille Day.
