Benoît Castel, world's best pastry chef, opens in Paris
Weeks after winning the UIBC's top pastry title in Singapore, the Breton chef opens his fourth Paris address, splitting the day between coffee, lunch and pastry.
Benoît Castel, named World Confectioner of the Year by the UIBC in July, opens his fourth Paris address in mid-September, an all-day café, bakery and restaurant at 6 rue Paul-Bert in the 11th arrondissement.
The Breton-born pastry chef, 54, received the title in Singapore on 14 July 2026, the international union's top honour for the craft. He runs the new address with his daughter Margot and head baker Romain Montbabut, alongside two shops in Ménilmontant and one on rue Jean-Pierre Timbaud.
"I have a mission: to be the world champion every day in my shop for my customers," Castel said after the award. "Our work is no trivial matter, every day we make things that people put into their bodies."
A title changes what customers expect, not what he puts on the counter.
Coffee, lunch, then pastry
The rue Paul-Bert address runs from 7:30am to 8pm and changes register through the day: specialty coffee in the morning, a seasonal lunch menu at midday, then the bakery-pastry counter for the afternoon. It is Castel's most ambitious space yet, built to hold three different services rather than one.
Castel is best known for a chocolate choux pastry he jokes would cause riots if he ever stopped making it, and for finishing each creation with a small scalloped shortbread biscuit, a nod to his native Brittany. Fruit and vegetables from his family's own gardens and orchards there are delivered to the Paris shops.
From Hélène Darroze's kitchen to his own ovens
Castel trained under Hélène Darroze, at the Hôtel Costes and at La Grande Épicerie de Paris before launching his own venture in 2012. He wanted to be a chef from the age of seven, then switched to pastry at ten after watching a sugar-sculpture demonstration.
The new address puts his own produce and his daughter's name on a fourth storefront in a city with no shortage of decorated pastry chefs. Castel's bet is that the title changes what customers expect to find behind the counter, not what he puts there.
Paris keeps adding reasons to eat by neighbourhood rather than by name: for the wider picture, see our guide to what to eat in Paris, or the technique behind his neighbours' morning trade in our croissant lamination guide.
