Barcelona bakery wins award for best croissant in Spain

Barcelona pastry chef Toni Vera, from Pastisseria Canal bakery, won the Barcelona pastry guild's award for Best Artisan Butter Croissant in Spain for the third time .

The prize comes with a monetary award of €1,000 and was announced in an event in the Catalan capital on Tuesday.

During the ceremony, Vera thanked his team at the bakery and said that such good results would not have been possible without them. 

"Good flour, good butter, good machinery and a good process result in an intelligent and very profitable way of working, which allows us to produce a quality product in a very short time," Vera told French cream brand Elle & Vire. 

The judges panel was made up of nine pastry chefs including Elies Miró, Maria Evans, Manel Corbalan, Santiago Luna, Andrea Besuschio, as well as Antonio García, from the Panem bakery in Madrid, the winner of the 2021 contest.  

Judges chose the winner from a blind tasting of croissants from the 54 participating pastry shops, which presented 12 craft pieces without any decorations or filling, and with butter as the only fatty ingredient.

The judges said that Vera’s croissant flavor was the winning factor. The chef, who also won the contest in 2016 and 2019, defines his croissant as "crispy with a great taste of butter." 

According to event organizers, the goal of this contest is to encourage and reward the skills of artisan pastry chefs,  as well as to recognize the country’s bakery work as opposed to industrial or pre-frozen dough products that are advertised as homemade or handmade

Canal , mixing traditional and modern baking

Canal bakery was founded in 1970 by Xavier Canal and is currently run by his nephew Lluís Estrada. 

It has establishments at 566 Muntaner street and 15 Calvet street in Barcelona, where the bakers sell classic and contemporary pastries and provide catering services.

Canal bakery also has an online catalog that includes the awarded croissants, both plain and with different fillings that vary according to the season, as well as other French and Catalan sweets and pastries.