Le Peche Gourmand’s pastries are renowned in Creswick and beyond and are often sold out by the afternoon. 

But owners Paul and Marie Williams say they have no desire to sway from their ‘small is best’ attitude and old, classical French style. 

“The things we do here are not done anymore in France,” Mrs Williams said. 

“Like everywhere else they are looking at doing things faster and cheaper and not having to use as many staff. There are a lot of things we do here that take a lot of time.

“It’s a shame, but I like we are keeping with those old traditions that no one wants to do anymore.”

The couple say the Creswick community embraced their introduction of a little slice of France when they first opened the shop in 2012, but now they have seen a gradual increase in visitors from around the state.

They expect visitation to increase with new visitor opportunities in Creswick and promotion through the Made of Ballarat tourism campaign. 

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“When we first opened a good 80 per cent of our customers were locals within 20 minutes drive. We are now more than 50 per cent customers who drive two hours to come,” Mrs Williams said. 

“People like good food, so they are willing to travel for it,” Mr Williams said. 

There’s good reason for people to travel. It is likely Mr Williams is the only baker in Australia using some of Le Peche Gourmand’s traditional French baking methods. 

“There probably wouldn’t be anyone who makes brioche like I do in Australia. There are brioches but the style of brioche Marie and I do is specific to where she comes from. Where Marie comes from is known for brioche,” Mr Williams said. 

“Choux pastries are rarely made by hand anymore, quite often it is made by machine these days,” Mrs Williams said. “We never try to do anything fancy or modern, that’s not us. It is just simple and traditional.”

Mr and Mrs Williams are embracing the opportunity to capture a growing number of visitors to Creswick, which will continue to expand with the creation of a mountain bike trail network. 

Le Peche Gourmand is expanding its opening hours to include Sunday, more public holidays and time they usually take off over summer. 

They hired a new baker this week to help balance work with family life. Mr Williams has been starting work in the kitchen at 11pm to bake goods fresh every day. 

In terms of food, the Williams will keep offering what it does best – classical style French patisseries from their small business that proves ‘big is not always better’.  

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