EVERETT — A chou is a bun, a cream puff, a cabbage, a term of endearment. Only the French would have such a word.
So downtown Everett’s new bakery, Choux Choux (pronounced shoe-shoe and denoting two plurals) must be many cream-filled pastries and many sweethearts. Or maybe multiple cabbages?
Choux Choux bakes and serves up a lovely variety of breads and treats. Go check it out. It’s been open just two weeks.
The bakery, set in a corner of the new Potala Place apartment building on Grand Avenue between Wall and Hewitt, is a perfect mix of rustic and relaxed in a big-windowed, sunny modern space.
In the back of the room is an old stereo turntable surrounded by dozens of old vinyl LPs. My husband put on an Ella Fitzgerald record. It was perfect.
We ordered sandwiches for $6.50 each. I had the caprese, with lucious soft mozzerella, tomatoes and basil with a whisper of basalmic vinegar. The baguette was rustic. It was fresh, buttery, satisfyingly chewy and better than any store-bought French bread I’ve ever had.
My husband had a sandwich of Italian ham, salami, provolone, caramelized onion and fruit relish, and dijon mustard, also on a short baguette.
The bread is rustic, the croissants are rustic and even the lemony madeleines are more like a rustic pound cake than some whispy thing trying to emulate a madeleine.
I think owner/baker Rachel Schreffler has a winner. Everett is lucky.
On the Choux Choux website, she blames it all on her mom, who had an affection for baking at home. Schreffler had a great education at Seattle Central Community College. And then she worked at some pretty swanky places.
The bakery serves Dave Stewart’s Vista Clara coffee and espresso from Snohomish. The bakery also offers lots of DRY sodas and a root beer that’s rumored to be the best ever. And there’s iced lemon water in a glass dispenser on the buffet.
The day we visited, the breakfast offerings included a slice of quiche Lorraine for $5.25, a rum-soaked scone for $3.25, a cinnamon roll for $4, a ham and cheese croissant for $4.50 and a variety of other croissants. (The chocolate-hazelnut, our dessert that day, was delicious.) The online menu also lists a Norwegian breakfast sandwich, which has goat cheese, bacon, caramelized apple or pear and lingonberry jam butter.
Lunch offerings included a turkey, Havarti and cranberry sandwich, also $6.50, and a slice of margherita pizza for $3.50.
The most beautiful round loaf of bread I have ever seen, hazelnut, was $7. I had to have it. I might have bought a loaf of Nutty Hippie bread, too, but it seemed a little dark on the day I visited. We took the hazelnut loaf home and made delightful toast.
When we were at Choux Choux, very few items in the display case were super sweet. We got some madeleines, $1 each, which were a perfect little dessert.
But you must check out the website. The array of colorful pastries is amazing. Pies, cakes, tarts, French macarons and cookie bars of all sorts.
Eclairs, profiteroles and hazelnut puff pastries, oh, my. Choux choux indeed. I will be back.
Choux Choux Bakery
2900 Grand Ave, Everett; 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily except Tuesday; 425-322-5805; chouxchouxbakery.com.
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