Barcellos Salon Sucré, Pastries, Kreuzberg

SucreéBarcellos Salon Sucré is open 4 days a week, from Thursday to Sunday.  On those days, Eric Muller wakes up at 3 a.m. and works 14 hour days.

When I visit on Saturday, he is scooting around frenetically.  Having baked most of the pastries on display earlier that day, he is now in serving a steady flow of customers.  Most of whom speak French and appear to be regulars.  Muller addresses everyone with Monsieur or Madame and it seems to be part of the treat, for French customers to interact in their own language and non-French to resuscitate forgotten snipets and fragments.Normally, I don’t make people aware that I will be writing the visit up for my blog.  In the spirit of  preserving my instinctual reactions rather then getting muddled between liking the people versus the restaurant or whatever.  But in this case, photography is forbidden without permission so I begin to speak to Muller.

“Let me explain my philosophy” he quickly interjects.

“Life is short and money is not the most important aspect of it.  My wife and I decided to open this place.  She has her hair salon, I have the shop.  4 days a week, we work hard, close to each other.  The rest of the week we are free to spend quality time together.  And, December and January we close and go to Brazil (where Katia Barcellos is from) and spend time exploring.”

I’m winded by such a sensible awareness of life, of how to best parcel it up so that you are almost able to eat your cake and have it too.  I mean we all – somehow – are aware that life is short.  And  just as that awareness sets in, life ups the pace, so that it feels like you are stationary and it is hurtling past.  But kids, deadlines, mundane things keep you from stepping off to the side for a moment or two and thinking of where you are actually trying to get to.

Croissants and Meryl

I finally got my DVD store membership the other day. To celebrate I rented “It’s Complicated” with Meryl Streep – whom I adore! There is one scene where she makes fresh croissants. Cue montage with Meryl,music and croissant triangle faux bikini top – rent it, you’ll see what I mean.

My “monkey see / monkey do” button switched on and I thought “Heyyyyyy…. I could eat some fresh homemade croissants right about now…” I immediately began to fantasise about Ottolenghi like, perfect croissants. Croissants with so many layers that they shatter into slivers when you take a bite. You find shards of crisp croissant hiding in the the oddest places for the rest of the day, and you have such fond memories that you eat said shard even if the place it was nestled in was less then ideal.

But between the craving and the eating lay 24 hours.