As you all know, I have a love for macarons.  Naturally, on my trip to Paris, one of my main missions was macaron tasting.

Before I left, I read loads and loads of reviews of Pierre Hermé macarons and pastries.  Imagine my excitement when I finally made it to the patisserie!

a review of Pierre Hermé

When you walk into the store, you are greeted with a sight of this…

French Macarons

and this… ooh, la la!  There were a lot more pretty pastries at the counter but they only allowed us to take pics of the macarons.

We were on a mission: try as many macarons as possible!

French Macarons

In fact, we *may* have gone there a few times and tried different flavors…

french macarons

Before I start reviewing each individual macaron flavor, I NEED to talk about the best pastry I’ve ever had. EVER. #bestpastryever.

See this below. Yeah, that croissant. Yeah yeah, it looks like a croissant with bacon sprinkled on it. This is NO ordinary croissant.  It is the ROSE ISPAHAN CROISSANT!!! (yes I’m yelling with excitement!)

So what is it?  It is a buttery croissant that is perfectly baked with a crunchy outside and a buttery inside. The outside is covered in a rose-flavored almond cream with candied rose petals sprinkled on top.  The inside is filled with a raspberry flavored litchi pate.

Before I went I wasn’t *too* excited about this croissant.  I don’t like rose flavored stuff and I am not a fan of litchi.  But when I tried it, it was like a little piece of heaven from the pastry gods.  It is really just so good, I can’t sing enough praise.  Here’s a hint: get one before noon because 1. they sell out and 2. the shelf life of a croissant is only 4 hours after it is baked.

the famous Rose Ispahan croissant from Pierre Herme

Ok, moving on to the macarons…  All of his macaron shells are perfectly baked.  They have a smooth top with perfect feet. They have the perfect crunch when you bite into them and then a little chewy in the center.

The Mosaic macaron… 

It is a pistachio, cinnamon, and cherry macaron and I LOVED it.

Mosaic macaron

The “Huile d’Olive a la Mandarine” aka Mandarin Olive Oil Macaron…
This was my favorite macaron.  The flavors were so interesting and really went well together.  I highly recommend trying this one.

Mandarin olive oil macaron

The Infiniment Caramel aka Salted Caramel Macaron…
This macaron was one of my family’s favorite.  The salted caramel was *perfect*.  If you are new to macarons, this one you MUST try.  Or if you’re a macaron mad like myself too.

salted caramel macaron

The infiniment Rose macaron…
this was a rose flavored macaron.  It was okay.  I’m not a huge fan of rose flavored dessert because usually it seems like I’m eating roses. I would skip on this.

rose macaron

The Envie macaron aka vanilla, violet, and blackcurrant…
This macaron was SO GOOD.  I just loved the black currant flavor with the vanilla and violets.  It is an unusual flavor and one you don’t taste very often.  I highly recommend it!

vanilla, violet, and black currant macaron

Infiniment Vanilla macaron…
This vanilla macaron was made with pure vanilla beans.  It was extremely rich in vanilla flavor.  It was the best vanilla flavored macaron I’ve ever had.

vanilla macaron

We also tried the Celeste macaron, which is a passion fruit, rhubarb, and strawberry macaron.  The picture I took of it was really blurry, so there is no picture. As far as the macaron flavor, it wasn’t my favorite.  I didn’t really like the flavor of passion fruit with the almond shell.

Okay, moving away from macarons and onto a last minute decision to try this citron tart!  When you enter the store, there is a whole row of pretty looking pastries, so this lemon tart caught our eye!

This lemon tart was SO delicious.  The lemon flavor was really strong but not in a bad way.  The candied lemon skin on top was really nice.  The crust was good.  Normally I don’t eat tart crust but I did on this one! This was just a really good lemon tart!  I highly recommend trying one!

Pierre Herme Citron tart

Okay, last patisserie we tried was the Rose Raspberry Ispahan Macaron.  It is one of the pastries that Pierre Herme and Laduree are famous for.  It is raspberry macaron with fresh raspberries with rose buttercream inside.  It is a rose petal on top as garnish.

Now, ironically, while this is the prettiest looking of all of these sweets, this one was my least favorite!  It wasn’t BAD, it just… wasn’t as good as everything else!  It sure does look pretty!

the beautiful Raspberry Rose Ispahan Macaron by Pierre Herme

My FINAL review for Pierre Herme:

All of his creations were absolutely delicious.  The macarons were perfection.  His flavors were interesting but really good.  When going to his store, I HIGHLY recommend the rose ispahan croissant, followed by a macaron flavor of your choice.  I’m sure if you chose another patisserie it would likely be delicious as well!  I strongly recommend you stop by his shop if you are in Paris, even if you are only there for a day!

Macarons from Pierre Herme in Paris, go ahead and use this as a cell phone background!!

Now, time to answer the big question…
Which macarons are better, the ones from Pierre Herme or Laduree?
First of all, let’s talk about the shell:  Pierre Herme bakes his macarons using the Italian method while Laduree uses the French method. This website explains the difference.  The end result: both shells taste the same to me.  Every macaron that I tasted from both macaron houses had perfectly made shells with perfect feet.  They know how to make macarons.  The difference comes with the flavors…

The flavors are definitely different at both places.  Pierre Herme makes more intense unusual flavors like… olive oil and mandarin.  As you’re eating Pierre Herme’s macarons, they have more notes to the flavor and are more complex.  Laduree’s flavors tend to have one note to them… but that note is very good.  But when comparing the same flavor, for instance, the salted caramel macaron, it was very good at both places.  So, I would consider it a tie when comparing the same flavor.  If you are looking for more interesting complex flavors, head to Pierre Herme.  If you’re looking for more standard flavors, head to Laduree.

Now, I have to choose a winner.  I really want to say it’s a tie.  Because really, it feels like a tie.  But that’d be lame. I hate ties.  I must choose a winner… so I would say the winner is Laduree.  And this is why I choose them: I thought to myself, if I could only choose one macaron to eat and could only go to one store on a very quick trip to Paris, which one would I choose?  I would choose Laduree’s orange blossom macaron. It is just that good.  But in reality, if I go to Paris again, I would head to both stores multiple times.  However, the rose ispahan croissant at pierre herme is better than any of the macarons. so there.

HELPFUL HINT: I highly recommend bringing plastic utensils with you to Paris so that way you can enjoy your pastries in the park without making a huge mess.

If you’ve missed a Paris trip post, catch them ALL RIGHT HERE !

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As you all know, I’ve been a little bit obsessed with Laduree’s macarons.  One of my top priorities when visiting Paris was to visit the Laduree tea salon on the Champs Elysees.

Not only do I have their Sweets Recipe book, I had poured over numerous websites trying to decide what I was going to eat when I arrived!  Now settle in, I have a lot to say about Laduree!

a review of Laduree Paris

We had made a reservation for breakfast at the Laduree’s tea salon on the Champs Elysees in the morning.  We made it around 9am in the morning, which I guess according to how empty the salon was, it was *much* to early to eat breakfast.  However, for these jet-lagged Americans, 9am was perfect timing.  We made a reservation through this website. 

We knew we had arrived when we spotted the pretty green metalwork outside.  How cute!

Although Easter had already passed, they still had their Easter displays up complete with cute chocolate chickens.  While we were there, they did change their displays to a Mikimoto display, which I forgot to take a picture of.

We bypassed the row of viennoisseries and patisseries and headed up the stairs to the tea salon.

We were seated next to this beautiful antique French clock.

I did not take too many pictures of the upstairs as I was trying to be discreet.

Below is a picture of the (free) bread they give you… and wrapped up in that pretty green package is not candy but… butter!

Now, deciding what to order was a bit difficult.  The menu was pages and pages long.  I *highly* recommend looking at the menu before you go.  You can browse through the menu here.

The Tea Room Experience

We had both coffee (which was good) and the Melange Laduree tea. The Melange Laduree tea is the house signature tea which is a mix of black teas, rose petals, and essence of orange, caramel, vanilla, cinnamon, bergamot, and black currant.  If you like Earl Grey, you will like this tea!  I loved it so much I bought some to bring home.  (The tea is for sale downstairs)

To eat, we started off with some pastries.  We had a little pastry with raisins, an apple turnover, and a chocolate croissant.  They were yummy!

For breakfast, we had the plain French toast, raspberry French toast, and an omelette.  The plain French toast was very good; it was a nice brioche with pure maple syrup.  But then I tried the French toast that had fresh raspberries with raspberry coulis… oh boy, that was SUPER good.  I highly recommend trying that.  But, what I really loved was their omelette.  It was perfectly cooked.  It also was very thick but fluffy at the same time.  It was the best omelette I’ve ever had!  I think they probably use more yolk in their omelettes (With all of that macaron baking, they will have a plethora of extra yolks).  I read some poor reviews about the omelette about it being cold and I feel sorry for those people because mine was delicious!

 After the waiter allowed us to enjoy the salon for several hours, we headed downstairs.  A note about dining in Paris – you must ask for the bill.  They won’t present it to you automatically.  It is considered rude to force someone out of their seat, so the waiters will wait for your signal.  A lot of Americans think that the waiters are being rude and ignoring you, when in fact, they are being nice to you and not rushing you through the wonderful dining experience!  Imagine it from their view: you are paying top dollar to dine in a fine tea salon on the most famous street in the world! No rushing here!

We headed downstairs after eating to the store.  Enjoy some eye candy…

After staring for a while at all of the sweets, we eventually we were able to choose some macarons to take back and enjoy later.  We arrived early in the day to the tea salon and store which I highly recommend!  Later in the day, i.e. in the afternoon, there will be a VERY long line to get in to not just the tea salon but the store downstairs.  We had no line.  That was around 11am.

 I highly recommend choosing a pretty box so you can take it open as a souvenir!

Laduree Paris Macarons

Macaron Tasting Reviews

For all of the macarons we tasted, they all had perfectly baked cookies with perfectly smooth tops and perfect feet.  We did not have a single one that was bad.  They are fragile and got beaten up a bit as I carried my loot around Paris all morning, but that’s okay.

Laduree salted caramel macaron

Salted Caramel Macaron – The salted caramel macaron as delicious.  It was one of my favorites.  I have nothing bad to say about it.  You MUST try this one.

Laduree cherry blossom

Cherry Blossom Macaron – The cherry blossom macaron was very pleasant.  It tasted, like, well, cherry blossoms!  I didn’t know what cherry blossoms would taste like, but if I were to go and eat them I am guessing they would taste like this!  This one is not a must-try.

Laduree pistachio macaron

Pistachio macaron – The pistachio macaron was very very good.  The shell had pistachio in it to give the pastry more pistachio flavor.  The pistachio cream inside was very pistachio tasting as well.  Sometimes other places’ pistachio macarons do not have enough pistachio in them for my taste.  This one was VERY good.  Must get this one if you love pistachios!

Laduree orange blossom macaron

Orange Blossom Macaron– Onto my *favorite* macaron from Laduree… the orange blossom macaron!  This is one of their original and signature flavors.  It really does taste like an orange blossom.  But it isn’t too floral.  It is REALLY good. REALLY REALLY GOOD. You MUST try this one.  You can also check out my blog post which features their recipe if you can’t wait ’til a trip to Paris.

Laduree lemon macaron

Lemon Macaron – The lemon macaron was okay.  There wasn’t anything special about it.  It wasn’t bad, but… there are other flavors that are more amazing that I recommend!

Laduree raspberry macaron

Raspberry Macaron – The raspberry macaron was really good.  I love raspberry macarons.  The tartness from the raspberries go really well with the almond shells.  Can’t go wrong with this one.

Laduree Lily of the Valley macaron

Lily of the Valley Macaron – I was surprised at how much I loved the Lily of the Valley macaron.  I bought it as a last-minute decision… and I ended up just loving it.  It has a really nice refreshing taste.  It does taste like the smell of lily of the valley.  This flavor was just REALLY good.  I’ve tried to find a recipe for it online and haven’t yet…. I guess I’ll have to make my own essence of lily of the valley.  This is a must-try.

Laduree macarons

Other Flavors that we tried but I forgot to take pictures of because we ate them too fast…

Mikimoto Macaron – this is a rose lychee macaron and was okay.  I don’t love rose nor lychee things, so I didn’t expect that I’d love it.  However, Pierre Herme’s rose lychee ispahan croissant is to-die-for.

The Marie Antoinette Macaron – the blue one in the picture above.  It tastes like an Earl Grey tea.  If you like earl grey tea flavored desserts, than this one is for you.  I just felt like they had other flavors that are worth your money and calories that you should try first.

Ice Cream Review – Yes, we tried their ice cream.  I shouldn’t call it ice cream, it’s more like a sorbet. It got hot one day and naturally we had to try it.  We tried both the raspberry and lemon flavors.  They were REALLY good.  The raspberry was very intense in raspberry flavor.  The lemon was tart but sweet at the same time.  I feel like their glaces do not get enough praise.  If it is a hot day in Paris, it is worth getting some!

FINAL THOUGHTS – What is not to like about the perfectly packaged patisseries from Laduree?  People have complained they are over-priced… um, yeah, duh. I wasn’t headed to Paris with bargains in mind.  Are there other macaron bakers in Paris that are good? yeah, sure.  But do they come in cute little boxes? No. Do they have an orange blossom macaron? No.  I HIGHLY recommend going to Laduree on your trip to Paris.  They have several tea salons throughout the city and then several macaron selling carts scattered about in popular areas… including one in the Louvre museum and another in the airport so you can pick some up to bring home to your friends (oops, then you eat it on the long 12 hour plane flight, sorry friends!)  You don’t have to do dine in the tea salon to get the experience… it was just something special I wanted to do.

My 6 recommended macaron flavors to purchase for your perfectly packaged box are: salted caramel, orange blossom, lily of the valley, pistachio, raspberry, and oh, another orange blossom!

I’m reviewing Pierre Herme next and will also try to answer the burning question… Which macarons are better, ones from Pierre Herme or Laduree?

If you’ve missed a Paris trip post, catch them ALL RIGHT HERE !

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