After more than eight years of a gruelling work schedule, Patrice Pâtissier is closing Saturday because its owners wanted their life back.
Joshua Fazio-Mariani drove in from Laval on Thursday to pick up the order from Patrice Pâtissier he’d made online. He has been a fan of the Little Burgundy pastry shop since he tasted one of its confections five years ago and “fell in love.”
“‘Oh, my God,’” he remembers saying. “‘This is the best thing I have ever tasted.’”
Sign up to receive daily headline news from the Montreal Gazette, a division of Postmedia Network Inc.
A welcome email is on its way. If you don’t see it, please check your junk folder.
The next issue of Montreal Gazette Headline News will soon be in your inbox.
We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again
Julien Bouchard also drove in from Laval for his order. Jennifer Chan came in from Toronto.
Patrice Pâtissier, one of the city’s best — and most beloved — pâtisseries, will have its last kouign amann, canelés and lemon tartlets picked up on Saturday, as it closes its doors to customers for the final time.
Not that the closing is news: Its owners, pastry chef Patrice Demers and Marie-Josée Beaudoin, his partner in work and in life, announced in March on social media that they would close their Notre Dame St. W. pâtisserie at the end of summer. It’s not that business was bad: In fact, it was really good. But after more than eight years of a gruelling work schedule and the myriad demands of running a business, they wanted their life back. They wanted to relax, to have some fun.
As the closing date drew near, Patrice Pâtissier grew busier and busier. The shop has a loyal base of regulars “and we have had lots of customers who are here for the first time,” Demers, 42, told the Montreal Gazette this week.
“Last week, the lineup would start earlier and earlier. We open at 10:30 — and the first customers were there before 9 a.m. The line ran to the end of the street, people were waiting as long as 90 minutes and, by the time those at the end of the line got to the front, everything had been sold.”
In four days last week, 5,000 desserts were sold: That’s more than they sell during the traditionally busy Christmas period. On Saturday, they sold out in two hours.
Demers and Beaudoin decided that the best solution was to make all orders online for the final three days. As of midnight Sunday, Aug. 14, customers could order from the online boutique — and pick up their orders at the shop on Aug. 18 through 20.
Nearly 4,000 desserts were available for sale at midnight last Sunday. Within minutes, they were all spoken for.
“I stayed awake,” said Bouchard, who managed to score some desserts. “I thought I was buying tickets to a concert.”
Mitra Thompson was able to order a breakfast box containing a few types of pastries and cakes, although, like Bouchard, the Little Burgundy resident said that trying to order online felt like “getting tickets to a rock concert.”
Not all customers were as lucky. One chocolate-chunk cookie fan set out to order two dozen of the cookies for pickup the following Thursday, but by the time she’d provided her credit-card and other relevant information, “the order form had reduced the number to 16, then to nine and eventually told me that the cookies were gone. I moved to the next available day — and each time the cookies escaped me. By 12:09 a.m., all the chocolate-chunk cookies were gone.”
Chan, who visits Montreal frequently from Toronto, discovered Demers and his incredibly creative and inventive desserts when he was pastry chef at the now-closed Old Montreal restaurant Les 400 Coups. So did Bouchard.
“I’m sad,” Chan said of the closing as she enjoyed one of the shop’s signature desserts on a bench on Notre Dame: le Vert, a frozen layered dessert whose ingredients include green apple, olive oil, cilantro, green apple granita and pistachio.
“But I know Patrice will do something else — and it will be awesome.”
The treats in her brown cardboard box included a dozen kouign-amann: They freeze well, she said from experience, as do the canelés.
Jackson Leung, who drove from the east end for his order, said he is sad to see the shop closed because “it produces such excellent-quality desserts: My kids and my wife love it.”
Since the couple announced the closing, many have asked why they’re closing, Demers said. But most of their friends are chefs, sommeliers — Beaudoin was sommelière at Les 400 Coups when the couple met — and servers, and they understand “how the work can be exhausting and how we want a break.”
Since opening the shop, the couple has had three Saturdays off — one for their wedding. They’ll take a month-long vacation in Italy this fall and, beyond that, have no firm plans.
“For the next year, we want to have fun, to do collaborations with chefs and pastry chefs,” Demers said. “We love to travel and with the shop it was something we couldn’t do.
“I have been in the milieu for 22 years. I want to enjoy life — and to be motivated. The entrepreneur part of running a business means you can lose the passion,” he said. Having to call the plumber and search out staff is part of running a business, he said — a reality people forget.
Demers was in his early 20s in 2003 when he became a co-owner of Les Chèvres, a superb Outremont restaurant with an emphasis on vegetables back before they were a buzzword. Although it was a critical success, it was “catastrophic economically,” he said. “For a long time, I didn’t want to have another business.”
But with Patrice Pâtissier, “we have had a good business and it will be ending in a positive way. I am very proud of what we have done.”
Postmedia is committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion and encourage all readers to share their views on our articles. Comments may take up to an hour for moderation before appearing on the site. We ask you to keep your comments relevant and respectful. We have enabled email notifications—you will now receive an email if you receive a reply to your comment, there is an update to a comment thread you follow or if a user you follow comments. Visit our Community Guidelines for more information and details on how to adjust your email settings.
365 Bloor Street East, Toronto, Ontario, M4W 3L4
© 2022 Montreal Gazette, a division of Postmedia Network Inc. All rights reserved. Unauthorized distribution, transmission or republication strictly prohibited.
This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.