Nuvrei Pastries

Monkey Bread,

Nuvrei Pastries, $2.50

From a subterranean kitchen in Portland's Pearl District, Nurvei Pastries produces a variety of traditional and contemporary French treats. Nurvei mostly sells wholesale to area restaurants and coffee shops, but the bakery itself keeps a small case stocked with fresh treats for passersby. Although a perky pink sandwich board on the street that welcomes you in, the experience itself is a tiny bit intimidating; the bustling bakery is tucked away inside and downstairs, and you'll be waited on by a baker in full kitchen whites who, though gracious, certainly has more urgent things to tend to (I won't even answer the phone if I have a sheet of cookies in the oven--much less 100 hand-folded croissants!). Happily, work is underway on a ground floor cafe, and you'll still be able to watch the bakers toil through basement windows set into the sidewalk outside.

Since I was there on a windy day I opted against one of Nurvei's handsome croissants, imagining it shattering at the first gust and dusting me with golden, buttery shrapnel. Monkey bread was a perfect choice for a wandering snack: a loose jumble of diced apple and cubes of butter-rich croissant dough, spiced with a generous amount of cinnamon.

Nuvrei

404 NW 10th Avenue

Portland, OR

503/546-3032‎
Check out Wanderfood Wednesday for more on-the-go foods...

Matsukaze

Miso Matsukaze Cake

Matsukaze is a Japanese expression that describes the rustling sound made by wind blowing through pine trees. It is also a tea ceremony term, referring to the whisper of water in an iron kettle reaching the correct temperature for tea.

Matsukaze is also the name of this simple steamed cake. The secret ingredient is miso, a salty, pungent paste of fermented soybeans that is more usually used for soups, sauces, and marinades. Like meat, truffles, and seaweed, miso is intensely umami, the term used by the Japanese for that "fifth flavor," a savory quality that imparts a feeling of satisfaction.

Although matsukaze is relatively light, containing no butter, egg yolks, or oil, the addition of miso gives it a strangely meaty richness. Thanks to the steaming process, matsukaze's texture is also something you can really get your teeth into; think sweet-salty foam rubber.

Miso Matsukaze Cake

from Masako Yamoko's First Book of Japanese Cooking

2 Tbs low to medium sodium miso

1 c sugar

2 egg whites

1 1/4 c flour

1 tsp baking powder

-prepare a small cake pan by lining it with parchment or coating with butter and flour.

-preheat oven to 400F.

-mash the miso into the sugar, then add a scant cup of water and whisk until there are no lumps.

-beat eggs into stiff peaks. fold into the miso.

-sift flour and baking powder together. sift again into the egg/miso mix. blend well.

-pour batter into the prepared pan. cover with foil and pierce with several holes.

-place the cake pan inside a larger pan with an inch or so of hot water.

-bake around 50 minutes, or until it passes the toothpick test.

-for a brown top, remove the foil for the final 15 minutes, or grill the cake, top down, in an oiled skillet.

-serve hot or at room temperature.

Jonboy Caramels

Caramels

Jonboy, $9/box

One year confectioner Jonathan "Jonboy" Sue whipped up a batch of caramels to give away over the holidays. The response from recipients was so encouraging that Sue transitioned from "gifting amateur" to professional, launching Jonboy Caramels with business partner Jason Alm. Their products are now available at some farmers markets and several Seattle-area stores, including Whole Foods.

Jonboy caramels are handmade using a short list of natural ingredients. Their cream comes from the Skagit Valley and the Absinthe with Black Salt flavor--a nod to Scandinavian salted licorice--uses liquor from Woodinville's Pacific Distillery. The Fleur de Sel flavor features a restrained sprinkle of sea salt, while the Molasses-Ginger has a comforting warmth.

Suikanshuku

Suikanshuku

Minamoto Kitchoan

Persimmon season in Japan is much like zucchini season in parts of the US. In a good year, growers will have such a surplus that it becomes almost a curse, and they resort to ingenious means to deal with it. At one of the schools where I taught in Tokyo, we often found that a silent, anonymous persimmon fairy had left sacks full of ripe fruit in the waiting room while our classroom doors were closed for lessons.

There is a moment during which a fresh persimmon is sweet and juicy; before it they taste like sour dish soap and after, like insipid mush. There is, however, a laborious and specialized process that extends and magnifies that delicious moment, resulting in dried persimmons known as hoshigaki that are so succulently sweet they seem almost to have been glaceed. The ripe but firm fruit is peeled and suspended by its stem from a rack in open air. Over the course of several weeks, the fruit is massaged every few days to tenderize the pulp and prevent it from becoming tough and leathery. As the hoshigaki cures, the fruit's natural sugars migrate to the surface and crystallize, forming a delicate second skin.

Minamoto Kitchoan's Suikashuku is a premium seasonal confection that features a hoshigaki stuffed with white bean paste and coated in red bean paste. The persimmon stem protrudes from the bean paste skin, and the whole thing is dusted with granular starch that evokes the dried fruit's natural bloom. It's a delectable trompe l'oeil--the mellow sweetness of the bean paste tempering the intensity of the fruit and coaxing from it a pleasant tartness.

Slow Food USA has more on hoshigaki, including information on a growing number of US producers.

Almond Schnecken

Almond Schnecken

Cafe Besalu, $2.75

Standing at Cafe Besalu's counter or sitting at certain tables, you can watch the bakers at work in the open kitchen and marvel at their ability to turn slabs of pale, flabby dough into golden, flaky baked goods.

Besalu's schnecken is a testament to that transformative power. This traditional pastry takes its name from the German word for "snail," but its originators were probably eastern European Ashkenazi Jews. Neither filled nor topped, the almond-scented schnecken nevertheless offers a tantalizing variety of textures: a crisp and airy skin, a tender center of buttery, barely-baked dough, and a pebbled bottom of not-quite-caramelized large-grain sugar.

Cafe Besalu

5909 24th Ave NW

Seattle, WA

206 / 789-1463

Mochi Ice Cream

Mochi Ice Cream

Mikawaya, $4.50/6

When I tell people about my interest in Japanese sweets, I usually get one of two responses: either polite silence, or "Have you tried those mochi ice cream balls?"

If I had a dollar for every time I've rolled my eyes at that question, I'd be able to hire my own personal mochi maker. Yes, I've tried mochi ice cream. Is it delicious? Sure. Is it interesting? Until recently, I didn't think so.

If this criticism seems absurd, let me explain that I normally find mochi as fascinating as it is delicious. Essentially an amorphous mass of so-called "sweet" glutinous rice beaten into a paste, mochi is a bland and blank thing of almost unlimited potential. Mochi can be: dried, steamed, roasted or fried; made sweet or savory; filled, coated, or dipped; formed into a hundred different shapes; eaten as a snack or offered on an altar.

Mochi is a major feature of Japanese New Year's celebrations and many families or communities gather annually for mochi making parties. Last year I attended two such mochitsuki. At Seattle's Nichirenshu, the congregation has been making mochi as a fundraiser for decades; using noisy electric grinders to transform the steamed rice helps them to keep up with orders. On Bainbridge Island, the community mochitsuki is a younger tradition with a more old-fashioned approach; volunteers take turns beating the rice with a heavy wooden mallet while onlookers enjoy the "fruits" of their labor, filled with red bean paste or dipped in sweetened soy sauce.

This year I was unable to make it to any of Seattle's mochitsuki, but I was in the mood for some mochi with which to ring in the New Year. And there they were, in the freezer at Trader Joe's: Mikawaya mochi ice cream balls. They turned out to be better than I remembered and more interesting that I expected.

Los Angeles-based Mikawaya was established in 1908 and named after Mikawa, a town in the Japanese prefecture of Aichi that was home to one of the founders. Ryuzaburo Hashimoto bought the company two years later, and his descendants have been in charge ever since. The company face a major challenge in 1942, with the signing of Executive Order 9066. Along with thousands of West Coast Japanese-Americans, the Hashimotos were "relocated" to a rural internment camp and their business was shuttered. Although Mikawaya remained closed throughout the war, the Hashimotos were able to reopen by Christmas, 1945, one door down from their previous location.

Compared with many Japanese-owned businesses, Miyakawa was relatively undented by the wartime hiatus. The Hashimoto family, however, had one unforgettable reminder of their expereince: daughter Frances, born at the internment camp in Poston, Arizona.

Today, Frances is Mikawaya's President and CEO, as well as guardian of the secret family mochi recipe. Under her leadership, Mikawaya has developed a strikingly diverse line-up. In addition to hand-formed Japanese-style wagashi sweets that Ryuzaburo would recognize, Mikawaya produces cakes, pastries, and gelato in a modern Los Angeles factory.

Introduced in 1994, mochi ice cream is now Mikawaya's best known product. A ball of ice cream encased in soft rice dough, mochi ice cream is an elegantly simple hybrid of Japanese and Europe traditions. Seven flavors are now on the market; Mikawaya asked fans to vote via Facebook for flavor number eight and the winner was pumpkin. When the new treat appears later this year it will epitomize the melding of Japanese, European, and indigenous American tastes.

Torrone

Torrone

Antica Torroneria Piemontese, $14.99

Torrone is a feather-light Italian nougat typically made with sugar, honey, and egg white (although this brand uses gelatin rather than egg); toasted nuts or dried fruit are added to the mildly sweet matrix. Like its relative meringue, torrone's texture can range from gooey to brittle, with some regions or companies specializing in one format or the other.

Antica Torroneria Piemontese is based in the Langhe, a hilly rural area in northern Italy's Piedmont region. The area is noted for a number of agricultural products, among them the particularly delicious hazelnuts that make their way to many of Antica's confections.

At Antica Torroneria Piemontese they still do most steps in the process by hand, producing both hard and soft torrone. The base mixture cooks in a bain marie for at least seven hours, during which time the nuts are carefully toasted. Although the idea of torrone has been around for centuries--perhaps millenia--and the list of ingredients is short, making it continues to be hard and skilled work. The timing the final steps is particularly critical, since the mature torrone sets up quickly.

Known as montelimar in France and turrón in Spain, nougats of the torrone family are found all over the Mediterranean region as well as in far-flung former colonies; a few varieties even enjoy special trade protections under EU law. While many of these treats are associated with the Christmas holidays, the Catalan version, torró, plays a role in a particularly colorful tradition.

In many Catalan households, Christmas decorations include a short section of log propped up on two stick legs, decorated with a cheerful face, and draped in a blanket. The tió de Nadal or "Christmas log," is also known less formally as the caga tió or "pooping log." Children beat the caga tió with sticks while singing songs urging it to poop. When parents judge that the caga is whipped, they remove the blanket and reveal the treats that the children have beaten out of the log. Among these is usually a bar of torró, which is shared by all the celebrants.

Want to introduce a Catalan touch to your own family holiday? Check out this radio story on Catalan Christmas at PRI's The World.

Fig Jam

Fig Jam

Thinking about the holidays in England tends to make me swoon with false nostalgia for things I either never experienced at all or only saw on TV: cheerful churchyards and stately homes, snow-dusted cobbles and fires in cast-iron grates, pub sing-alongs and Scrooge smothering the Crachits in a group hug. When my imaginings snowball into something so ridiculously perfect that I'm tempted to run for the airport and the first flight to Heathrow, all it takes to bring me back down to earth are two little words: Christmas pudding.

And just like that, a sodden Seattle Christmas starts looking pretty good.

As a picky eater and pretty-much-vegetarian, I've never gotten too excited by the main thrust of holiday meals--but at least on American holidays, dessert saves the day. July 4th means blackberry cobbler, Thanksgiving is classic pumpkin pie, and Christmas, my mom's Frangelico-topped custard. And since I haven't eaten much else, I get usually get more than my share of dessert!

My first Christmas in England, I discovered that the traditional holiday meal is a succession of foods that I have no interest in eating, capped off by a dessert that I don't even like to look at. "Christmas pudding" is a venerable concoction of dried fruits, spices, treacle, alcohol, and suet (that solidfied fat that keeps birds from starving over the winter), steamed or boiled, and served either on fire or dribbled with runny white sauce. I want to like it--it's archaic and labor-intensive and oddly chewy--but I just don't.

Yet there's something about the short dark days of mid-winter that makes me hunger for the combination of booze, spices, and dried fruit, so I went on the hunt for Christmas pudding's more palatable cousin. On Heidi Swanson's blog, 101recipes.com, I found a recipe for "fig butter" borrowed from Kim Boyce's cookbook, Good to the Grain. The original calls for cloves, star anise, cinnamon, and port, but I made the following substitutions, then stuck to the recipe:

scant 1/2 c sugar
12 black peppercorns
3 cardamom pods, bruised
1 c red wine
1/2 cup marsala wine
12 oz dried Black Mission figs, destemmed
4 oz unsalted butter, softened
pinch of salt

The result is like the Christmas pudding of my dreams: rich, earthy fruit given a festive warmth by spices and wine. Straight out of the fridge it's dense and stiff and best eaten by the spoonful; at room temperature it's a toast spread, crepe filling, or a partner for cheese and crackers.

Yuzu Marmalade

Yuzu
Uwajimaya, $14.99/6

Yuzu is a delicious and distinctive Japanese citrus fruit that I will consume in almost any available form. Early last winter I heard rumors that fresh yuzu had been seen in the produce department at the Uwajimaya Grocery. I rushed right down but was too late. The produce guy explained that only a few growers in California sell yuzu commercially; most of their small output goes to local restaurants, with a few extras occasionally making their way north to Seattle. His advice: "Try again next year." I marked my calendar.

Come early fall I started calling Uwajimaya every week. One week it was too early for yuzu; the next week they'd just sold out and weren't sure if more were coming. Finally, the guy on the phone said he was expecting a shipment the next day, probably the last of the season. When I called around lunchtime there was only one pack left.

Knowing how much work I'd put into tracking these things down, the produce guy tried hard to give me an out: "They're expensive, you know, and to be honest, this pack is kind of small...you sure you want 'em?"

I did.

When I stopped by the produce counter and gave my name, the guy handed me a styrofoam deli tray swaddled in plastic wrap. Inside there were six small balls,
rock hard and dark green. I resisted the urge to ask the produce guy if he was joking.

At "12 items or less" the teenaged checker did an indignant double take at my purchase; "What kind of limes are these?"

She rolled her eyes as I tried to make my case for why yuzu are so special; she'd clearly seen her share of crazies.

I was still rambling when she barked out my total: "Fourteen dollars and ninety-nine cents for six...yuzu. You need a bag for those?"

As I blushed and tucked the package into the pocket of my windbreaker I heard the guy in line behind me mutter, "Those better be some good limes."

At home with my booty, I began to feel twinges of buyer's remorse. Out of the wrapper, my yuzu were even smaller, harder, and greener. Worst of all, they smelled like nothing. A scratch-n-sniff sticker would have been more enticing. Discouraged, I stuck my yuzu in a corner and forgot about them.

As the weeks went by, the fruit began to come to life. As they softened and turned yellow, I cheered up enough to start looking at recipes. My original plan had been to candy the peels and drink the juice, but I just didn't think the yield would justify the fuss involved in candying. Remembering a homemade yuzu marmalade I'd had in Japan, I started to lean in that direction, but all the recipes I found called for a particular number of yuzu, as if "one yuzu" were a uniform unit of measurement. Fond as I was becoming of my little yuzu, I suspected that they were well below average.

Eventually, my fruit grew fragrant and I found a simple and sensible marmalade recipe based on the volume of raw fruit. The recipe can take up to three days to complete, but with the exception of one tedious chore (deseeding) the work is easy. I just did a step first thing each day, leaving the fruit to simmer while I did all my usual morning stuff, stirring whenever I happened to walk through the kitchen. It terms of its demands on your attention, marmalade is the outdoor cat of cooking projects.

Yuzu Marmalade

ingredients: yuzu, sugar, water

De-stem, halve and de-seed the fruit (seriously, this the most arduous part of the process; get through it and you're golden). Slice thinly or grind in a food processor. Add 1 1/2 c water for every cup of fruit and let the mixture stand 8-24 hours. Simmer in a heavy saucepan until the peel is tender (1-2 hours). Let the cooked mixture stand at least 8-24 hours. Add a scant cup of sugar (I used light brown evaporated cane juice; that hint of molasses mellows the citrusy sharpness just a little, without making it oversweet) for every cup of fruit, and cook just until the fruit jells. Cool and seal in sterilized jars.

Yuzu marmalade is amazing on buttered toast, and divine in full-fat plain yogurt with toasted walnuts. You can also make a restorative drink by stirring a spoonful into hot water, and I'm toying with the idea of making a small sachertorte and substituting yuzu marmalade for the layer of apricot jam.

If you share my out-of-season craving for yuzu, check out the products at Yuzu Passion.

Happy Goat Caramels

Caramels
Happy Goat, $7/small box

San Francisco's Happy Goat company makes luxurious caramels that they characterize as "Better for You." By blending high-quality flavorings and organic sugar with milk from goats rather than cows, they deliver an artisanal treat that's lower in fat and friendlier to lactose-intolerant consumers.

Goat milk tends to be one of those love-hate things. Its gamey tang is aggressive in cheese, more delicate but still unmissable in baked goods or chocolate. And in caramel? Happy Goat's trendy chocolate and sea salt caramel is powerful enough to drown out any undertones, while the flavor of the more delicate vanilla bean variety (freckled with real vanilla seeds) shares the stage with soft but distinctive goaty notes.

Fine & Raw Chocolate

Crystals + Sea Salt Raw Chocolate Bar,

Fine & Raw, $7.99

In the past year and a half, I've tasted something like 200 different kinds of chocolate. Call it palate education, or snobbery, or whatever, but the simple fact is that many treats that once stoked my chocolate-loving furnace now leave me lukewarm. Worn down by all that chocolate, my tastes have been honed to a fine--and totally subjective--point.

It's very possible that if I had tried Fine & Raw eighteen months ago I might not have cared for it much; today it's one of the few chocolates I just can't get enough of.

Based in Brooklyn, Fine & Raw uses organic Ecuadorian cacao to make a range of raw chocolate bars and confections. "Raw" chocolate, as I discussed in a previous post, is manufactured using specialized techniques that don't allow it to get too hot, the idea being that high temperatures drive off many of cacao's natural nutrients. It's a fast-growing subset of the luxury chocolate industry, and, as trail-blazing pioneers are wont to do, many raw chocolate makers wander off into the wilderness, delivering a mealy, mucky product that I could just bring myself to gnaw on if I were snowbound and had already eaten the lint from my pockets.

I have no idea how they manage it, but Fine & Raw consistently makes raw chocolate that is buttery-smooth, flavorful but balanced, and a joy to eat. My favorite of the range is the Crystals + Sea Salt bar, a 70% dark chocolate. The bar is sweetened with crystals of palm sugar (derived from palm tree flowers) and made savory with a pinch of sea salt; this combination gives the chocolate a nicely gritty texture and a lively flavor, enhancing the fruity-earthy flavor of the cacao.

Panda TIle Cookies

Panda Tile Cookies

Kirakudo Honpo

Another treat from my Hyogo Confectectionery Event gift bag: a set of three crispy honey-sweetened cookies seared with the image of an adorable panda.

While cookies curved like ceramic roof tiles are pretty common in Japan (baked yatushashi for example) and the practice of branding sweets with icons or logos goes back a long way, the cuddly cartoon distinguishes Kirakudo's version of a run-of-the-mill sweet.

Custard Pumpkin

Custard Pumpkin

My first-ever Thai meal was at Sawatdee in St. Paul, MN, and I capped off a good dinner with a great dessert: a slice of rich, spongy custard embedded with diced pumpkin. Since that day I've rarely passed up a chance to eat Thai custard, preferably cooked inside a hollowed-out pumpkin, and served by the slice with a side of coconut black sticky rice.

Since I don't always have a retail source, I resort to making my own about once a year, usually around Thanksgiving when the prevalence of pumpkins acts as a mouth-watering reminder. My results have been mixed. True Thai custard calls for duck eggs and palm sugar, so my chicken egg and cane sugar version is bound to be a bit off. For such a short recipe, it also contains a daunting number of variables, from the size and moisture content of the pumpkin, to the volume and freshness of the eggs, to the eccentricities of whatever ersatz steaming contraption I've rigged up. Added to that, I tend to try a different recipe every time, which I realize is not the best approach in terms of trouble-shooting. Accordingly, over the years my "custard pumpkins" have overflowed, fallen, or failed to set--and on one dramatic occasion, the pumpkin sprang a leak and bled out all over the steamer.

But still, this stuff is so good and--theoretically--so simple, that by the time pumpkin season rolls around I'm always ready to try again. Here's what I tried this year:

Slice the top off one smallish kabocha or sugarpie pumpkin (for reference, that's a salad-sized plate in the photo above) and scoop out the guts. Pop the pumpkin into whatever steamer you prefer (I set it on a steel steamer basket inside a crockpot), add water and get the steam going. If you have room you can put the pumpkin lid as well. Mix 1c coconut milk, 1c brown sugar, 1/2 tsp vanilla extract, and 1/2 tsp cinnamon. In another bowl, whisk 4 eggs until foamy. Gently combine the eggs and coconut milk mixture and pour into the pumpkin; ideally the liquid should be pretty close to the top of the opening (the contents will rise and then fall) but I'm never sure what to do if it isn't. Steam until the custard is completely set and the pumpkin is soft but not mushy. Cool, slice into wedges, and serve.

Custard pumpkin 2010 might have been a little short and oddly lumpy, but it was quite delicious. I already have my eye on this recipe for custard pumpkin 2011.

Black Sesame Cereal

Black Sesame Cereal

Greenmax, $6.79/16 servings

With my demanding sweet tooth, instant desserts always seem like such a good idea. Embarrassingly often I come home from the store with boxes or sachets or envelopes full of magical powder that requires only water to transform into jelly, pudding, gruel, or some species of thick, sweet beverage for which there is no word in English.

Unfortunately, my sweet tooth is almost as discerning as it is demanding, and once I've welcomed them into my home, most of these over-sweet, artificially-flavored, and additive-laden treats languish in the cupboard until the packages are as dusty as their contents.

The one big exception to this rule is Black Sesame Cereal from Greenmax, a Taiwanese company that has been making seed- and grain-based convenience foods since the 1960s under the banner "Make Healthy & Beautiful Wish". Since Greenmax shuns colorings, artificial flavors, preservatives, and non-dairy creamer their sesame cereal looks like sun-bleached asphalt but tastes like the real, comforting, and delicious things from which it is made.

Black sesame cereal contains just eight ingredients: sesame, black beans, brown rice, Job's tears (barley), wheat germ, medlar seed, licorice root, and brown sugar. Amongst my entire collection of just-add-water treats, this is the only instance in which sugar comes anything but first on the list of ingredients.

A little hot liquid renders each packet into a creamy and respectable breakfast with 143 calories, 2.6g of protein, and 4.7g of fiber, plus 11 vitamins and minerals including calcium and iron. Mixing it with coffee instead of water intensifies the nutty, roasty flavor--and adds a little kick.

Flavigny Violet Pastilles

Anis de Flavigny
Maison Troubat, from $3.50

When I was growing up in Tennessee, a trip to Disney World was a sort of middle school rite of passage. In the weeks leading up to my family's pilgrimage, I pored over guidebooks and drafted daily schedules that would maximize my time on the park's best rides.

But as we all know, even the best-laid plans change. In this instance, Epcot Center was my undoing. At the time, I hadn't yet been to any of the countries represented by the pavilions in Epcot's international area, and I found even those lite versions more intriguing than roller coasters. I spent hours wandering the souks in "Morocco," pawing through trinkets in "China," and drinking sweet, milky tea in "England".

It was in "France" that I first tried Flavigny pastilles, small round white candies packed in floral-print tins. The hard sugar balls clacked against my teeth like tiny marbles, discouraging any attempt at crunching down. I learned to wait patiently for the flavored sugar to dissolve before biting into the single, tiny aniseed hidden in the center for a hit of herbal flavor. Whenever I was able to tear myself away from Epcot's gentler pleasures for a ride on Space Mountain or Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, I perfumed the air with anise-scented screams.

It turns out that Anis de Flavigny are even more evocative than my 12-year-old self could have imagined. If you've seen the film Chocolat, you've seen Flavigny, the picturesque village in Burgandy where the candies have been made for more than a thousand years. In some sense their history dates back even further, to a period more than 2,000 years ago when Roman soldiers introduced aniseed to territory they'd won from the Gauls, and a retired general called Flavinius settled on the hilly site that still bears his name.

Like so many dainty and labor-intensive delicacies, Anise de Flavigny were once produced by a religious community. The Benedictine monks of the Flavigny Abbey made their pastilles from the most exotic and expensive ingredients, including perfumed oils and distillates that required tons of herbs or blossoms to produce. Their candies found an enthusiastic following among the French aristocracy; Madame de Pompadour was one famous fan. Following the dissolution of monastic communities during the French Revolution, a number of local candy makers took up pastille production.

Today anis de Flavigny are made by a single, secular company, La Maison Troubat. The third generation of candy-making Troubats work in buildings that were once part of the Abbey complex, and use a recipe that dates from 1591. They offer Anis de Flavigny in a range of 10 all-natural flavors: plain anise, blackcurrant, lemon, orange blossom, ginger, tangerine, mint, liquorice, rose and violet.

The technique used to make anis de Flavigny is known as panning. This ancient process has an almost pan-global history; it has been used to make sweets as diverse as Portuguese confeito, Japanese konpeito, Jordan almonds, and Boston Baked Beans. Placed in large copper kettles over gentle heat, the aniseeds and flavored sugar syrup are tumbled together so that the sugar slowly builds up on the seed. It takes 15 days of careful spinning for to grow a pastille to the size of a pea.