Sweet Paris: A life of cakes and pastries

Meet Frank Adrian Barron, an American baker in Paris (better know as Cake Boy Paris).

He is this week’s guest on The Earful Tower podcast and he talked how he made it as a baker in the city, sharing his sweet treats on social media, and his book Sweet Paris.

The Earful Tower podcast

Listen to the episode below, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keep scrolling for more from Frank and from this week’s episode.

What is Frank’s book Sweet Paris about?

The cookbook features 59 seasonal dessert recipes with American and French influences. The book includes advice on hosting with French flair, as well as a bonus chapter on baking for those special occasions when you want to pull out all the stops.

Find out more about the book here.

How did Frank start baking in Paris?

Frank moved to Paris from San Francisco in 2012 and found that he “was missing American-style cakes”. He realised that if he wanted to eat these cakes, he needed to be the one to bake them.

He said: “You can’t help but be inspired when you live in Paris as you’re exposed to all the beautiful pastries.” Soon enough, he began baking American-style cakes and sharing them among friends, some of whom happened to own coffee shops. Once they started selling the cakes in their cafes, the rest was history.

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Why is beauty so important to Frank?

A striking aspect of Frank’s cookbook, his social media presence, and even his home is the inherent beauty. Frank attributed this to his background of studying art history, saying that “for years this is what I was involved with, and so looking at things was what I was fascinated by, and often times, when I make a cake, the most fun I have is the mise-en-scène“.

When he composes the scene to photograph his cakes, he said that “sometimes I’m even inspired by famous paintings”, he pointed out that the images shouldn’t just “include just the cake, it includes all of the stand, the plate, the flowers in the background.”

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A post shared by Frank Adrian Barron (@cakeboyparis)

How did moving to France help Frank celebrate seasonal baking?

Frank highlighted that in France, you’re compelled to embrace seasonal eating due to the limited availability of certain fruits and vegetables throughout the year. This made for a start contrast to his home state of California. He recalled moving to Paris and asking for strawberries in winter, prompting a flabbergasted French shopkeeper to say “ce n’est pas possible, c’est janvier!”

Frank added that he now loves eating and baking seasonally. “I look forward to mirabelle season at the end of August to the beginning of September, when, for just two and half weeks, we have this magic little plum that is in season and you’re just going to eat it all the time – you have it in tarts, jams and make a cake with it and then you’re going to wait a year until it’s mirabelle season again!”

Interested in finding out more on Frank?

Find out more about Frank and his work via his Instagram page @cakeboyparis, his website, and his book.

This week’s Earful Tower podcast episode

Below, again, is the podcast episode with Frank Adrian Barron. Enjoy! And if you like what you hear, please consider becoming a Patreon member on the link below.