Photo Essay: The Singing Baker of Mougins

Christophe Boutes left school and became a baker to fund his musical education. Baking by morning, and studying music by day and night, he made two dreams come true.

Christophe Boutes takes fresh Baguettes out of the oven, April 11, 2019, Mougins, France (photo/Charles Daly)

His La Mouginoise des pains Mougins has been featured in the Gault et Millau guide four years running, and he appeared on the TV show, “Le Meilleur Boulanger de France, “ (The Best Baker in France.)

The yellow seal of Gault et Millau (center) is displayed with pride, indicating that this is one of France’s best bakeries. April 11, 2019, Mougins, France

As a singer, he now tours and gigs around Europe under the name Christophe Davy, crooning with passion in a style as characteristically French as any pastry.

A baker’s day begins around three or four in the morning. Baking continues all day to keep warm bread on the shelf through lunchtime. Starting at age 15, Christophe would follow this taxing schedule music lessons, practice, and gigs into the night.

Bruno tends to the basement oven (left). The bakery goes through up to 200kg of flour each day — some of it ends up all over Bruno.

When I visited Cristophe’s bakery, Easter was around the corner. The chocolatier, Frederic, was at work making chocolate eggs of all sizes.

Frederic uses a hot metal sheet to melt the edges of two halves of a molded chocolate egg to bond them.

Gregory (left) serves customers. Christophe (Right) uses walkie talkies to coordinate the bread making.

Christophe’s daughter admires Frederic the chocolatier’s work. That egg man is about to lose his hat.

I shot these images on a Fujifilm X100T and used Fuji’s Classic Chrome film simulation. For more of my pictures, check out photos.dalyprose.com.