Sétois Jean-Marie Fabre, who kept the Pouget biscuit on the Quai du Bosc alive for 40 years, passes the torch to Tony Merenda, 20, and his mother Patricia, both former customers of this historic boutique on the island. Singular.
“There is no such thing as chance, just encounters.” These are the words of the poet Eluard that Sétois Jean-Marie Fabre, 71, borrows to tell how he was able to save the Pouget biscuit factory, 110 years old this year, from permanent closure. “When things need to be done…”
After 40 years of work and passion, helped by his wife “Minouche” (Marie-Thérèse), to make his delicious biscuits, torches, wafers, squares, madeleines, chocolate cakes, macaroons, without forgetting the famous shuttle, night and day. cetoise which smells of lemon, anise, orange blossom, cinnamon… it is to Tony Merenda, 20 years old, that Jean-Marie Fabre passes the torch of know-how, all created by hand by the Pouget family.
“To take it all back, you have to be crazy”
He had some suggestions for covers. “But when I said “to get everything back you have to be crazy”, they took off running a bit.” smiles Jean-Marie Fabre, who trained in catering in England. Her day starts around 3 a.m. and ends depending on the demand for the cookies. “It’s a steady pace,” confides the man who has spent his entire career working continuous days, without a meal break. The madeleines are still cooked on baking trays and in an oven dating back to… 1913, giving them this cooking and this charm that is so special and dear to the hearts of customers, some of whom come from all over France.
“Some came 20 years ago and tell me that they rediscover the smell of their childhood. I never wanted to break this history, this period atmosphere, this artisanal tradition, I am not in the idea always more, that’s also what people come looking for”. Jean-Marie Fabre understands at the time of his retirement that “it’s not my biscuit factory, it’s that of the Sétois”. The idea of this story ending brought tears to some eyes.
Like Patricia Merenda, Tony’s mother. The biscuit factory is his Proust madeleine, his guilty pleasure. “I came to the biscuit factory when I was little. My great-grandfather was related to the Pougets. We had our torches every Sunday. I remember Mother Pouget who made the wafers and she always gave me the brisins (broken pieces).” As an adult, she of course bought packets of chocolate madeleines for the children’s snacks… and her own.
Jean-Marie Fabre chose the Merenda family, Tony and his mother Patricia, former clients, to take over the biscuit factory that he ran for forty years.
“Some came 20 years ago and tell me that they rediscover the smell of their childhood”
It was last summer that Patricia learned that the business was up for sale and that without a buyer, it would close. “She passed 20 minutes before closing, that day, she had changed platforms to go to my sister’s nail salon, because it was too hot,” says Tony, his son. Patricia rushes to warn him. “I only thought for one day before calling Jean-Marie back”, continues the 20-year-old Sétois, who had worked for three years with his father in the air conditioning field. But the entrepreneurial spirit has been itching for a while.
“When I was little, at the biscuit factory, he was the man in the shadows, always at the back in the workshop. I spoke about it to my parents when I was a teenager, I told them that I would like to do that if one day it sells. I too work with my hands and I’m a loner, I like being in my bubble like Jean-Marie, in the morning when it’s still dark, it’s calm, that suits me “delivers the brand new biscuit maker Pouget, who will be assisted by his mother Patricia on the sales side.
“I admire him”
For a month, Jean-Marie (who stopped the sale last Sunday at Les Halles) has been teaching him the tricks of the trade and his precious manufacturing secrets. “who make the difference”. But beyond the knack for rolling the shuttles, the two men above all had a human connection. “It’s impressive how we get along,” goes so far as to say the Sète apprentice, despite the age difference.
“I admire him, when he welcomed me into his home, we first talked about work then about something else, he is like I would like to be. And he recognizes himself in me when he was 20 years old. This It’s not just a recipe that he passes on to me, it’s a whole thing.” Tony, who will soon be flying on his own, is already imagining “enormous potential” what can the jewel that Jean-Marie has just entrusted to him offer, before a greatly deserved retirement.
2023-11-16 12:23:07
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