Macaron Taste Test!

Macarons are one of my favorite treats in Paris, but also one of the most expensive, so I rarely venture out to try new shops.  So when I found out that I would have to do a 10 minute presentation in my French class on anything relating to France, I figured what better reason for a macaron taste test?!

The results were pretty unexpected and eye-opening!


Five lovely ladies agreed to help me in this project, and I sent everyone to a different store to buy 3 different flavors of macarons: chocolate, pistachio, and salted caramel.

After collecting our macarons we all met at my apartment for a fun afternoon of tasting, laughing, (and feeling a little sick by the end)!  The stores that we taste-tested were: famous Ladurée, Pierre Hermé (famous with Parisiennes), Gérard Mulot, Jean-Paul Hévin, Carette, and McDonald's (yep, that's right!)

Take note of the different packages...when you read about the prices,
come back and look again!  Pretty interesting!

We went for the blind taste-test approach, and after tasting 1/3 of every macaron from each shop, everyone rated the macarons from 1-6: 1 being the best, 6 being the worst.  For every flavor, we then gave each store an overall score by adding up the total of everyone's ranks.  Therefore, lowest score=best score!

Notes galore!

And the results?!?

Chocolate:

1st: Carette (7 points total)
2nd: Gérard Mulot (19 points)
3rd: Jean-Paul Hévin (21 points)
4th: Pierre Hermé (22 points)
5th: Ladurée (25 points)
6th: McDonald's (32 points) **for me, Ladurée was even worse than McDonald's on this flavor!**

Pistachio:

1st: Carette (7 points total)
2nd: Jean-Paul Hévin (16 points) **Jean-Paul Hévin doesn't have straight pistachio, so this was a combo of pistachio and chocolate with a bit of a crunchy texture**
3rd: Pierre Hermé (18 points) **Pierre Hermé  doesn't have straight pistachio, so this was a combo of pistachio and raspberries**
4th: Gérard Mulot (22 points)
5th: Ladurée (27 points)
6th: McDonald's (36 points)

Salted Caramel:

1st: Carette (8 points total) **Many thought this was the best macaron of the entire day**
2nd: Jean-Paul Hévin (13 points)
3rd: Gérard Mulot (21 points) 
4th: Ladurée (22 points)
5th: Pierre Hermé (25 points)
6th: McDonald's (36 points) **McDonald's doesn't have caramel, so this was orange-chocolate, which we all agreed was the most terrible macaron of the entire day!**

Overall ranking, averaging placements of 3 flavors:

1st: Carette (1.70E/macaron)
2nd: Jean-Paul Hévin (1.50E/macaron)
3rd: Gérard Mulot (1.85E/macaron)
4th: Pierre Hermé (2.05E/macaron)
5th: Ladurée (1.95E/macaron)
6th: McDonald's (0.83E/macaron)

Hands-down, Carette was the clear winner in every flavor and many points ahead of the second place contender.  I think we all agreed that it was the perfect combination of cookie (crunchy outside, chewy inside) with a lot of filling, and the flavors were excellent.  And at 1.70E each, it's hard to go wrong!  Bobbie also tried several other flavors from Carette, all of which were reportedly great, especially cassis!

Jean-Paul Hévin was also consistently in 2nd place, and with a price tag of 1.50E, I definitely plan to go back there!  Pierre Hermé, which used to be my favorite because I thought it was so much better than Ladurée (which clearly most everything is!) did not fair very well, and with the most expensive price, I can't say I will be going back anytime soon!

McDonald's, MacDo as the French say, well, it consistently placed last, but aside from the chocolate orange, I would say if you really just want a macaron at a cheap price tag, it's an okay place to go.  While it doesn't compare with some of the others, I would say it's not that far off from Ladurée!

Such a fun way to enjoy some of Paris's specialties...thanks for helping out ladies! :)  Can't wait to see what our next blind taste test will be!