Cedric Grolet at The Berkeley

We’re about 90% sure that Cédric Grolet is secretly a wizard who merely moonlights as a pastry chef.

After all, at his bakery in Paris he specialises in creating pastries that look exactly like real fruits, with a sweet (sometimes surprising) filling encased in a perfect, cake-like shell. Each photo he drops seems to score around a 10.0 on the Instagram Richter Scale, and if you didn’t know better, you’d be forgiven for thinking those fruits were the real thing. Frankly, some black magic has to be involved.

And now he’s come to London to open his first international outpost, at Knightsbridge’s Berkeley hotel.

Calvin Courjon

It’s basically a kind of dessert showroom, with gleamingly clean white walls & white countertops – almost to the point of sterility – all serving as a perfectly blank canvas to allow the vibrant colours of the treats on display to pop out.

Naturally you’ll find all the French pastry classics (eclairs, croissants, mille-feuille, you name it) on offer here. But you’ll see those fruits, too, with lacquered cherries, perfectly textured lemons, shiny green apples, and more – together with his equally famous ‘flower cakes’ for the first time. There’s even a UK special, the illusory scone…

Calvin Courjon

You can pick up a pastry to take away – perhaps on a stroll through Hyde Park – or sit in the Berkeley’s elegant 60-seater café, where you’ll be lavished with a menu of Grolet’s ‘best hits’, alongside cake’s natural drinking partner… Champagne.

Calvin Courjon

But the best seats in the house are at the chef’s table, which functions as a kind of “pastry theatre” where you can watch the masterpieces being forged from the comfort of countertop seating that overlooks it all.

Even when it’s packed, it’ll be desserted.

NOTE: Cédric Grolet at The Berkeley is open daily, 8am-6pm. You can find out more, and book for the chef’s table (£135pp) at the website right HERE.

Cédric Grolet at The Berkeley | The Berkeley, Wilton Place, Knightsbridge, SW1X 7RL

Looking for fancy pastries? Behold our list of Japanese bakeries…