![[Paris] The prettiest Bûche de Noël of 2015](https://www.sugarednspiced.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/lenotre.jpg)
Christmas is no doubt the busiest season for pastry chefs. I spent my past three Christmas in different pastry kitchens in Paris, and the most memorable was definitely at Fauchon where we made over 6000 cakes for the season. Imagine: a kitchen filled with pastry chefs in Santa hats working on Christmas cakes until late nights…yup, that was us. “Bûche de Noël” is literally a “Christmas log”, but of course nowadays pastry chefs are going above and beyond the log shape, using Christmas as the opportunity to showcase their creativity. Here are a few of my favorites from the 2015 Christmas cake collection, sharing them with you so we can drool together.
Lenôtre
Name: La bûche à trésors
Flavors: chocolate, yuzu, almond, citrus
Price: 130 €
Lenôtre works with a different brand every year to create their Christmas cake, and this year, it’s Hermes’ petit h. All these little items on the cake are sculpted from chocolate and almond paste, very pretty…too pretty, in fact, that I wouldn’t know where to cut!
Jean-Paul Hévin
Name: Bûche d’Enfer
Flavors: dark chocolate, nougat, buckwheat honey
Price: 36-77 €
A contrast of red and black, with flames and little demons…this is not your warm and fuzzy Christmas cake. The demons chocolate stand is optional for purchase, but I guess the cake wouldn’t be as interesting with only the red flames. In terms of flavor, it’s JPH’s specialty – chocolate.
Fauchon
Name: Houx Là Là
Flavors: Bergamot, lemon, milk chocolate, vanilla, raspberry
Price: 100 €
All I want to say is that this cake looks very complicated to assemble…to my colleagues who are still there, good luck. I wonder if this year they are also going to churn out 6000 Christmas cakes?
