50 most popular regional desserts in France

Everyone knows the macaron and the éclair. The more interesting list is the one below: sweets that belong to a single town, are still made there, and are the reason that town has a queue outside one particular shop.

Caneles bordelais, small cakes with a caramelised crust
Canelés — dark caramelised crust, soft vanilla custard inside. Buy them the day they are baked.

Caramels d’Isigny

Caramel belongs to the north-west, and Isigny stands out because of what goes into it: local crème fraîche or butter stirred into the sugar at the end of cooking. The small amber squares, hard or soft, plain, vanilla or salted-butter, have been made since the end of the 19th century and now carry a protected name. One traditional factory remains in the town; the shop is open all year and the workshop can be visited in summer.

Nougatines de Poitiers

Crushed almonds, caramelised and sealed in meringue: a round, slightly flattened sweet that dissolves rather than chews. Part of the gastronomic inventory of Poitiers, sometimes coated in chocolate or served with ice cream.

Nougat de Montélimar

Nougat from Montelimar, made with almonds and honey
Nougat de Montélimar: at least 30% almonds, or 28% almonds with 2% pistachio, and a quarter honey.

Nougat reached Provence from the East in the 17th century, and Montélimar owes its version to the agronomist Olivier de Serres, who planted the first almond trees in France around the town. Almonds gradually replaced walnuts in the recipe. The name is protected by composition: at least 30% almonds, or 28% almonds plus 2% pistachio, with 25% honey. About ten producers still make it.

Canelé bordelais

A small fluted cake with a dark, almost burnt crust and a soft vanilla and rum custard inside, baked in copper moulds lined with beeswax. Bordeaux sells them everywhere; they are best within hours of baking and dull by the next day. See the cuisine of Nouvelle-Aquitaine.

Kouign-amann

Kouign-amann, the caramelised butter cake of Brittany
Kouign-amann from Douarnenez — dough, butter and sugar, folded and folded until the outside caramelises.

From Douarnenez in Finistère: layers of dough, butter and sugar baked until the outside caramelises. Heavy, not especially sweet, and impossible to eat much of. Bakeries sell it as a 20 cm cake for 7–8€. See the cuisine of Bretagne.

Bêtises de Cambrai

Betises de Cambrai, striped mint sweets from the north
Bêtises de Cambrai — mint boiled sweets with a caramel stripe, named after a mistake.

Mint-flavoured boiled sweets with a caramel stripe, from Cambrai in the north. The name means «blunders»: the story has an apprentice mishandling the batch and producing something better than the recipe. See the cuisine of Hauts-de-France.

Bergamotes de Nancy

Bergamotes de Nancy, amber bergamot-flavoured boiled sweets
Bergamotes de Nancy: translucent amber squares flavoured with bergamot oil.

Translucent amber squares flavoured with bergamot essence, made in Nancy since the 19th century and sold in flat tins. Sharp, floral, and unlike anything else on this list.

Calissons d’Aix-en-Provence

A thin lozenge of ground almonds and candied melon on a wafer, topped with royal icing. Aix has made them since the 15th century and still treats them as the town’s emblem. See the cuisine of Provence.

Candied fruit from Apt

Candied fruit from Apt in the Vaucluse
Apt in the Vaucluse has candied fruit since the Middle Ages — melon, apricot, cherry, whole figs.

Apt, in the Vaucluse, has candied fruit since the Middle Ages and calls itself the world capital of it. Melon, apricot, cherries, whole figs — the fruit is cooked slowly in successively stronger syrups over weeks.

Anis de Flavigny

Anis de Flavigny, aniseed sweets in their round tins
Anis de Flavigny — one aniseed seed, coated in syrup for fifteen days, sold in the round tins everyone recognises.

From Flavigny-sur-Ozerain in the Côte-d’Or: a single aniseed seed coated with flavoured syrup over about fifteen days, sold in small oval tins that have barely changed in a century. The abbey where they are made has been producing them since the 17th century.

More worth finding, region by region

  • North and east: tarte au sucre and cramique in Flanders; macarons de Nancy and madeleines de Commercy in Lorraine; kougelhopf and Christmas bredele in Alsace; biscuit rose de Reims in Champagne.
  • West: far breton with prunes and crisp crêpes dentelle from Quimper in Brittany; teurgoule, tarte normande and sablés in Normandy; tourteau fromager, the black-topped goat cheese cake, in Poitou.
  • Centre: tarte tatin, upside down and caramelised, from Lamotte-Beuvron in the Sologne; clafoutis with unpitted cherries from the Limousin; pain d’épices from Dijon.
  • Lyon and the Alps: bugnes at carnival, coussins and papillotes in Lyon, gâteau de Savoie in the mountains.
  • South: tarte tropézienne and the thirteen Christmas desserts in Provence; navettes in Marseille; berlingots in Carpentras; gâteau basque and croustade in the south-west.

For the classics — crème brûlée, tarte tatin, éclairs, macarons, mille-feuille — and the rest of the regional table, see the most renowned desserts in France, traditional dishes from France and French cuisine.

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