Sur le Pain D'Avignon

One of the things I love most about Farmer's Markets is that they allow for personal relations to be built between between the sellers and buyers while offering you an array of goodies that would otherwise be impossible to find on your lunch break...or at least without a considerable amount of motivation to travel out to their farms and brick and mortar locations.

Pain D'Avignon, est. in 1992 is located in Hyannis, Cape Cod.  That's not the easiest place to get to when you live in the South End and don't have a car...luckily, at the Farmers Market at Boston's City Hall on Mondays, this European bakery makes a regular and anticipated appearance. 

 

 This past Monday, a break in rehearsals during the day made a quick trip possible and I was taken on a beautiful, mini-tour of their stand.  Not being the only bread-featuring bakery at the Market, Pain D'Avignon is careful to distinguish themselves and as Priscilla and her daughter showed me, they do this easily with the array of products they offer:

 Sliced loaves ranging from pumpernickel-rye to sourdough are available, but so are individual, rustic rolls, brioche rolls, and multi-grain squares, all perfect for grabbing and enjoying with a salad for the business lunch crowd.

Pain D'Avignon is particularly proud of its raisin pecan bread, which it offers in loaves, rolls and baked, bread crisps.

 Something entirely different and special is their biscotti, which comes in five different flavors; fig, cranberry almond, chocolate, lemon and anise. This bakery is committed to providing for a variety of needs, you can purchase biscotti individually, or in packets of four...or in little containers of assorted biscotti bites:)

No bakery could call itself European without a patisserie selection.  Priscilla proudly pointed out their daily selection of delectable treats: butter, almond, ham and cheese and chocolate croissants and sugared brioche.  

For those not into the sweet stuff, ready made sandwiches are also offered at their stand, by the time I got there though, they were all but sold out - for obvious reasons, market go-ers have made it a point to get here early and grab their loot:)

 My absolute favorite was their raspberry streusel croissant - an amazing basket filled with little knobs of crescent roll dough, infused with cinnamon and topped with homemade raspberry jam, crumble and icing.  The one I made away with did not last longer than the bus I caught back to the studios...
Despite its brick and mortar location in Hyannis, Pain D'Avignon has built itself an impressive following all over Massachusetts, selling to grocers and restaurants and offering a mail order delivery to individuals.  Pain D'Avignon also has a 'Bread of the Month Club', where you sign up and get a different, seasonal loaf every month.  (For more info on this project, call: 508-778-8588.)
For those of us here in Boston, we can now get an immediate fix at the Pain D'Avignon stand every Monday at Boston City Hall...and perhaps we can even hope for a more permanent presence in the not too distant future?