Le Nelson sur Saint-Etienne

Excellent service, delicious pastries (with gluten-free options)! I highly recommend it!

As regular customers of the pastry shop for years, we ordered two Yule logs for Christmas, which are usually excellent: the Ardèche and the Purple. The Ardèche, with its new recipe, was a major disappointment. Both logs share the same base and construction, presumably for ease of preparation and assembly during the holiday season. The chestnut cream was practically nonexistent, and the blackcurrant insert overpowered all other flavors. There were also very few chestnut pieces. It would have been better to replace the vanilla mousse with chestnut mousse to make it a true Ardèche. This was a shame, given the price of the logs and Nelson's reputation, as the chestnut flavor was simply not there. On the other hand, the Purple was excellent, with a lovely crunchy element. We particularly enjoyed the blueberry mirror glaze, which paired beautifully with the lemon. The tea room is very pleasant and the individual pastries are very successful, especially the revisited Paris-Brest.

Before ordering a Yule log for Christmas, I decided to try different flavors. Today, I'm testing the Ardèche cake and its new recipe. The cake is very good, but the chestnut flavor isn't prominent enough. The blackcurrant overpowers the chestnut mousse, which is too small. There are very few pieces of candied chestnut. The vanilla mousse is good. One expects a strong chestnut flavor from the Ardèche cake, which it doesn't.