Although Brioche Pasquier has been around for nearly 90 years, the Symphonie Pasquier brand for catering professionals was only created four years ago.
This French signature complements the expertise of chefs and restaurant professionals, ensuring the highest possible service and the satisfaction of guests.
The brand is an ambassador of the classics of French pâtisserie, bringing a taste of France to the rest of the world.
Matthew Grenter, Foodservice Sales Manager at Brioche Pasquier UK, tells Wholesale Manager what trends are driving the market and how being a family business benefits the brand.
Tell us a bit about the history of the company?
It all started in 1936, in the small town of Les Cerqueux, in France. It was there that Gabriel Pasquier; the baker of the village began building his local reputation through the craftsmanship and quality of his Brioche. In 1974, 5 of his sons officially took over the family business and founded Brioche Pasquier, driven by a shared passion for traditional baking and a commitment to preserving the values of family heritage. Since then, the group has continued to grow, always staying true to its roots by offering authentic recipes.
For nearly 30 years, the Brioche Pasquier Group has also been serving the catering industry, offering professionals a wide range of products tailored to their needs. This work is backed by the group’s baker and pâtissier savoir-faire.
In 2021, a new signature was created, Symphonie Pasquier, a brand exclusively for catering professionals. Designed to complement the skills of chefs and restauranteurs, Symphonie Pasquier brings together convenience, reliability, and impeccable French pâtisserie.
Can you give us an overview of some of the products in Symphonie Pasquier’s pâtisserie range?
We have a large range of French Pâtisserie in the Symphonie Pasquier brand, everything needed to create amazing desserts. From smaller bites, such as Macarons & Petits Fours that are perfect for Café Gourmand, to pre-portioned desserts across our range of Tartes, Tartelettes, Entremets, and Eclairs.
Tell us about the flexibility of the range and how it meets different need states?
Due to the wide range of products available, we are able to suit many different eating occasions. The smaller sizes of Macarons & Petits Fours, mean they are perfect for buffets, conferences and larger catering occasions, but also work as part of an afternoon tea, or paired with cocktails.
Our Entremet bars are the best examples of flexibility, as being in a larger bar format, these can be sliced to a variety of portion sizes for either a single dessert, smaller ‘trio of desserts’ when mixed with other bars, or smaller portions when served with coffee.
And finally, our Tartelettes are great fully finished desserts, needing just to be plated, with a small garnish on top to be ready to serve.
What are the benefits of using frozen food?
There have been many benefits listed for using frozen food, but the key advantage for our range and the foodservice sector, is convenience. It’s fully finished so needs minimal preparation and also helps with portion control and wastage. As most of our range is pre portioned there is no chance of product going to waste. In today’s foodservice environment, with staff shortages, our product is ideal as anyone can simply plate our products, add a simple garnish and serve. Our products also stay fresh after defrosting, for up to 48 hours so do not have to be consumed straight away.
What occasions can pâtisserie be used for?
Any occasion at all! From elevenses, to after lunch, afternoon tea, or dinner service as well as conferences, banquets, and buffets of all sizes. Our range can help to drive additional sales and profit by encouraging customers to order a dessert.
What trends are driving the market?
The Café Gourmand trend is starting to come over from France. Picture the scene, you are at a restaurant in a group of people, not everyone will take a dessert course due to many factors, such as cost saving or they are already full, but with the option to take a coffee and a small sweet plate of ‘something extra’, e.g. Macarons, or Petits Fours, we can help fill this gap. It also allows the operator to up-sell a coffee offering to enhance margin. And… people will remember the last thing they’ve eaten, and this will generate repeat visits if their coffee was better or offered something extra than somewhere else!
For many years, there has been a lack of skilled Pâtisserie staff in the market and the cost of hiring a skilled Pâtisserie chef to prepare desserts is a challenge to a smaller business, so being able to purchase fully finished, high quality dessert products is where our Symphonie Pasquier range fits into the market.
How does being a family business benefit the brand?
Being a family business means Symphonie Pasquier is built on strong values, and a deep respect for tradition. This heritage ensures consistent quality, authenticity, and a genuine commitment to customer satisfaction.
How does the company seek to reduce its impact on the environment?
• Zero waste to landfill
• 100% of our cardboard boxes are recyclable
• Removal or optimisation of packaging across our range
• Eliminate the use of landfill for final waste and recover energy from it
• Refurbishing our factories with photovoltaic installations.
• Partnering with local suppliers
• Reusing treated effluent water from our refrigerated system rather than drinking water.
• Any food waste that cannot be donated, we recycle it into animal feed.
What marketing activity is supporting the brand this year?
We attended HRC earlier in the year and plan to attend again next year as this gives us a great opportunity to meet customers and sample our products. We also sponsored the Hotel Magazine awards in 2025 and supplied our Petits Fours after dinner, a great way for venues to try our products in action! Last month, we collaborated with Chef Debjit at The Zetter Hotels to create some stunning plating ideas for our range. We covered afternoon tea, a café gourmand and of course Christmas. A particularly stressful time for our industry so we wanted to show the different options we can offer to help with a festive menu. The link to the video we’ve created is here www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnI-dxPZ8R0
And we have been busy sending out our promotions to our contacts and to new contacts so as many businesses as possible can try our products for less. Our promotions are very popular, and we have a strong response to our emails.
Do you have any NPD to talk about at the moment?
We’ve launched a few products this year.
For the summer months our L’Agrume Mandarine Nougat de Montélimar added to our much-loved collection of Entremets. Layers of airy almond sponge, crunchy Montélimar nougat, velvety vanilla mousse and sweet mandarin puree, finished with juicy mandarin slices, this is a delicious dessert and even after defrosting, its flavours and textures retain their freshly made appeal. Each Entremet is hand finished by our pâtissiers, so caterers can simply thaw and serve with minimal preparation. As the final part of a meal or a sweet treat, desserts complete your customer’s experience. We recommend serving a small portion of our new L’Agrume Mandarine Nougat de Montélimar along with our other entremets to offer a dessert tasting plate to customers who can choose to share or not! Curated from authentic French recipes and quality local ingredients, our expertise complements every restaurant, café or hotel for a delicious finish to every meal.
We also added more products alongside our classic dessert and a British favourite, the Tartelette Citron with two new delicious variants. The Tartelette Fruits rouges Meringuée ‘À I’italienne’ and Tartelette Passion Meringuée ‘À L’italienne’, created exclusively for foodservice. Featuring tangy redberry jelly and cream encased in an all butter shortcrust pastry with Symphonie Pasquier’s signature Italian meringue topping, the Tartelette Fruits rouges Meringuée ‘À I’italienne’ arrives perfectly frozen and requires only 4 hours in a fridge to defrost ready for service. The Tartelette Passion Meringuée ‘À L’italienne’ comprises a tart passionfruit jelly with cream enveloped in an all butter shortcrust sweet pastry, balanced with the signature Italian meringue topping and again, only requires 4 hours in a fridge to defrost. Our Tartelette Citron Meringuée has been incredibly popular this year, it is our bestselling, award winning tartelette and we have taken this success and built a range of different meringue fillings. People want a little indulgence when they eat out and a visually delightful dessert is crucial to the experience. The way our Pâtissiers create this dessert, with the complex Italian meringue recipe means it freezes and then defrosts to perfection. This type of meringue has been specifically chosen for our desserts due to the stability it affords our products, and it is made to a traditional recipe of egg whites, water and sugar. The meringue is light, shiny and provides the ideal complement to the tangy fruit. And now with a range of three fruit variants to offer to customers, the dessert menu just became incredibly beautiful and also incredibly easy for an operator to deliver. No matter the level of skill in the kitchen, anyone can defrost the tartelettes and serve the individual portions with a small garnish on the plate or even a scoop of ice cream.
How do you work with wholesalers to help them grow their sales?
At Symphonie Pasquier we are keen to form partnerships with customers and not just sell products. As Foodservice Sales Manager, I am available to assist any wholesaler’s teams to help sell our products to their customers. I have created unique promotional plans to capture new customers and drive sales, organised demonstrations to wholesaler sales teams so that they understand the key benefits/attributes of our range, attended wholesaler shows and events and there are presentations or leaflets available to share. I’m here to help with anything needed.
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