Un Dimanche à Paris is a nice breath of fresh air in the touristy St. Michel area, which is otherwise devoid of really good pâtisseries. This review is just for the pastries in the boutique, which do some great things with raspberries and strawberries and have some sublime lime creations as well (pun definitely intended.)
Tarte framboise estragon (5.90€): a creatively shaped rectangular "tart" with two pieces of pâte sablée shortcrust sandwiching a light tarragon-white chocolate ganache, itself sandwiching a center of raspberry confit. The shortcrust rectangles are amazingly buttery and flavorful, some of the best shortcrust I've had. The white chocolate ganache is smooth, not overly sweet, and has a perfect amount of tarragon flavor, and the raspberry center is tart and fresh. Terrific individual components, terrific presentation, terrific balance, I only wish Un Dimanche had different flavors of this same tart, 9.5/10.
Frisson (6.20€): coconut streusel base, lime gateau, wild strawberry confit center, surrounded by a light lime crème. Nice crunchy streusel and moist lime cake combined really nicely with the tangy strawberry center and tart lime crème. Extremely fresh tasting, very light. Terrific flavor combination with nice presentation and textures, though a tiny bit less lime cream would have been nice, 9/10.
Lacté noisette (5.90€): another rectangular pastry layered with hazelnut streusel base, hazelnut dacquoise, salted caramel, and milk chocolate mousse. Pretty rich but not overwhelming. Generally milk chocolate and hazelnut is very safe, but the salted caramel added some nice contrast and the hazelnut streusel and cake layers were very strong. Milk chocolate mousse was excellent, a little sweet, 8/10.
Balle de match (7.50€): a tennis trophy-shaped pastry with a big yellow ball perched on a thick hazelnut streusel. That bright yellow ball is basil mousse surrounding almond-pesto gateau and a strawberry confit center. Phenomenal streusel base, the hazelnut flavors were very strong with just a hint of lime. The basil mousse was surprisingly good, though weird, and the almond cake and strawberry confit were just as good as expected. Really liked a lot of the individual components, especially the streusel base, but I'm not really sold on the flavor combination, think there are a few too many things going on, 7.5/10
Jardin fraise (5.90€): rectangular shape with layers again - wild strawberry confit over pistachio dacquoise cake, vanilla chantilly on top. Tart, fresh tasting strawberry confit, solid pistachio dacquoise with whole pistachio bits, very refreshing bites. The red-colored white chocolate thins sandwiching the pastry didn't do it for me. Overall, it was definitely tasty but not terribly inventive or interesting and also quite small in size compared to everything else, 6.5/10.
Crumble fruits rouges (5.80€): rectangles again - pâte sablée and almond sablée surrounding a mixed berry preserve center, lime-mint crème on top. Stunning presentation, great layers of sablée biscuit and sublime lime crème, but I wasn't blown away by the fruit confit center which lacked brightness and tartness compared to Un Dimanche's other pastries. It was by no means bad, just again not very interesting and a bit one-dimensional, 6/10.
Definitely swing by Un Dimanche à Paris for some pastries. They tend to rotate their selection very frequently, but I'd place my bets on any pastry where raspberry, strawberry, lime, or coconut is prominently featured. read more