Yann Couvreur

Yann Couvreur: the Parisian refined style of the confectionery

French is known as the baby cot of fine gastronomy art. Someone embody it perfectly, bringing to the contemporaneity: Yann Couvreur

A 37 years old parisian man with two hands that found their perfect habitat between sugar, flour, custard and all the raw material of confectionery. A 37 years pastry chef that comes from a city, where it’s hard to be an amazing chef – because “amazing” it’s not so amazing when the cleverness of your competitors is very high – that now he is maybe one of the best pastry chef in the world. We are talking about Yann Couvreur, he man who decided to create the ring of conjunction between sugar and salt, between second course and dessert.

Let’s just make a step behind to understand the professional path of Yann.

He studied at the Tecomah where he got the “Brevet ‘etudes professionnelles de cuisiner” and the “Certificat d’aptitude professionnelle de patisserie”. This opened the doors for Yann for working at the Trois Marches by Gerard Viè. After some years he became the sous chef at the Park Hyatt Paris-Vendome, then he became the pastry chef  at the Eden Roc of Saint-Barthelemy. Many are the experiences of Yann in the hotellerie (restaurant La Scene, Burgundy, Prince de Galles, exc…) and maybe it’s this the point: working in this prestigious hotels he learnt the class, the elegance, the importance of the details even in the traditional recipes.

When he opened his first confectionery at the 10eme arrondissement in Paris  indeed he poured all his competence creating amazing and surprising dessert: “Merveille au pralinè”, the “Kouign-amann” or the unforgettable vanilla milfoil of Madagascar. Yann says: “The desire really is to propose a patisserie that’s high-end yet plain, whilst favouring the local producers and season produce” then continues: “ I really like to push the boundaries but without taking people for guinea pigs. I look to the benchmarks of pastry and consider reassuring accompaniments that everybody knows like chocolate, caramel, strawberries and so on, then I’ll try with small touches of risk to make a subtle marriage of flavours. The idea is not to frighten but rather to stoke the fires of curiosity”.

His confectionery is a mixture between the technique of cooking and presentation of salt food and main courses with the elegance of the desserts in a virtuous exchange.

I know that is difficult to stay here and read this article without thinking about the Madagascar vanilla, the custard, the chocolate and other wonders, but this is the tragic destiny of the food journalism!

Yann Couvreur