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Arnaud Valade runs Arno’s Fine French Pastry in Edmonton. From cakes to croissants to eclairs, from cookies and chocolates to macarons, his products have a playfulness and creativity that are indicative of Arnaud’s distinct style.
You can find Arno’s Fine French Pastry at many Edmonton area farmers’ markets including Old Strathcona Farmers’ Market, St Albert Farmers’ Market, and the French Quarter Farmers’ Market. You can also enjoy Arnaud’s fine pastry at the Fairmont MacDonald Hotel and Cafe Bicyclette. To find out more and see where to find Arnaud’s pastry each week, follow him on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.
How Arno’s Fine French Pastry began:
Born and raised in France, Arnaud trained to be a master pastry chef in his home country achieving diplomas in pastry, chocolate, candy, and ice-cream making. While relatively new to Edmonton, Arnaud and his wife lived for ten years in Montreal before working in Australia and then ultimately deciding to return and make Canada home. They found themselves in Edmonton because Arnaud secured a job as head pastry chef at Bon Ton Bakery. He worked there for three years before starting his own business in 2014.
Arno’s Fine French Pastry products:
All Arnaud’s baked goods are typically French in style and are characteristically not super sweet. He has found a great reception for this French style of baking in the Edmonton community. Everything he makes is from scratch. For example, in his macaron, Arnaud uses only real fruit for the flavour. In a climate where fresh fruit has a relatively short peak season, this means getting the fruit at the height of its flavour and processing it into purees that can be used throughout the year. While his croissants are a best seller, macarons are his favourite pastry to work with because they’re so versatile. He usually has twelve different flavours of macarons available at farmers’ markets each week.
Arnaud doesn’t have a routine line of items he brings to market. Instead he lets his creativity dictate his menu. He finds that his customers love seeing new options and trying new products. He doesn’t just limit himself to sweet pastry either. Arnaud makes use of many herbs like basil, rosemary and saffron to create savoury pastry options as well. This creativity won him the gold medal for pastry at the 2015 Canadian Food Championships.
His connection to the community and customers:
While he still orders many of his tools from France, his ingredients are sourced from local vendors as much as possible. Arnaud finds that local options are as high quality as many of the French ingredients he used in his training. He makes both gluten free and nut free pastry options and finds that there is a niche demand in the community for these products.
Both Arnaud and his wife work the farmers’ market table and they love the one-on-one interaction with customers. They think it’s a fantastic way to see what products are a hit with the local community and it gives them a chance to talk more in depth with customers about Arnaud’s style of baking.
Arnaud does a lot of custom orders as well. Whether it’s special epiphany cakes, Christmas logs, or pastries for birthday and anniversary celebrations, he loves to apply his creativity to meet the needs of his community.
The future of Arno’s Fine French Pastry:
Working out of the commercial kitchen built onto their home, Arnaud also hopes in the future to offer pastry courses for interested community members.
Arnaud’s long-term goals include running his own café but he will continue to keep up his presence at farmers’ markets. He loves the sense of community he finds there and believes that his product plays an important role at the markets he attends.
“My menu is really big and I love to be really creative with it!" - Arnaud Valade
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