A buttery brioche with coffee ‘craquelin’ on top was a part of my childhood.
When I was in junior high, I was going to school from 7 in the morning and got out at 5 in the afternoon. And yet the day still would not end there. As any other kid after school I went straight to extracurricular classes that started around 6pm and only finished around 9pm. My father picked me up at my day school, and on the way to the next class we always stopped at this small pastry shop that sells only papparoti, the coffee buns, which was the fastest and cheapest dinner option I could get with all the traffic and time I got.
But I love it. I love the coffee and buttery aroma that I could smell from 2 red lights ahead. I love how it was filled with butter inside, lighted salted, that bursted out full of flavor after the first bite. And it was my dinner, just like that, 3 days per week, sitting behind my father’s back on a 15 year-old scooter, in the hustle life of our city for all adults and kids.
Now everytime I want papparoti, it’s not just about the flavor and its own goodness but I also want to remember the good old days being a kid behind my father’s back on an old scooter. Especially when he’s gone, the memories became even more precious.