The Best Thing I Ate All Week: Roulé Jambon Fromage from Merci Boulangerie

We’ll say this for Merci Boulangerie: the name choice isn’t exactly SEO-friendly. In fact, a Google search for Natalie Cumberbirch’s bakery sends me to a few different places in Quebec while trying to translate the page to French.

But Vancouverite Cumberbirch has clearly been influenced by her time in France (at renowned Mamiche, no less), and has brought that authenticity and flair back to her hometown.

Operating out of East Van’s Coho Commissary (right behind Andina Brewing on Powell St.), Cumberbirch started doing deliveries and pickups last week and has apparently been overwhelmingly busy.

No wonder. I nicely stopped by and picked up a couple of treats for my partner and I to enjoy, though I’d dropped them off with her before I had a chance to try any of them. She said she’d leave half of the chocolate chip cookie for me.

That is not half! What kind of monster… Ok, I’m going to stop. I’m over it, I swear. In any case, I probably wouldn’t have cared much if the cookie wasn’t one of the best I’ve had in this city.

But the star of the show was the roulé jambon fromage ($5.25), which is really just a fancy way of saying “delicious cheese and ham thing”. And man, it lives up to that new name I just gave it.

A perfect, buttery croissant, gruyere cheese, honey ham, herb de provence-infused olive oil, are you frickin’ kidding me? The only complaint is that I’m not currently eating it. And that now I need one of these every morning. 

Sometimes, it’s a very good thing my partner is vegetarian.

Merci Boulangerie

150-1507 Powell Street
merciboulangerie.com