This is the fourth time that Japan has won the World Pastry Cup since its creation in 1989.
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Thanks to its chocolate centerpiece, Japan won the World Pastry Cup on Saturday January 25, ahead of France and Malaysia, thus retaining its title at the end of two days of competition near Lyon. “It’s incredible!”launched the Japanese team by reaching the first step of the podium, a fourth consecration since the creation of the competition in 1989. The latter traditionally takes place during the International Exhibition of Catering, Hotels and Food (Sirha).
Eighteen teams from all over the world, from Argentina to South Korea via Mauritius, competed in this final. Each team, made up of a chocolatier, a sugar expert and a master ice cream maker, had nine hours to complete three tests in accordance with a common theme: putting their country in the spotlight.
They had to prepare three frozen desserts based on fruit puree, a restaurant dessert prepared on “a la minute” plates, and finally, a shower of small chocolate-based creations, to be enjoyed like “finger food”. Three artistic pieces, real works of art assembled in parallel (one in sugar, one in chocolate and one in sculpted ice), completed the whole.
Those of the Japanese team represented an imposing Japanese theater character, traditionally made up in red and white, a Japanese lantern, candy canes, again in the colors of the land of the rising sun. “What really made the difference was the chocolate coin”commented to AFP the famous French pastry chef-chocolatier Pierre Hermé, also president of the competition, welcoming a team with a “real power, a real desire to win”.