C'est Gourmet Pastries

C'est Gourmet.

It sounds ... fancy.  And french.  And what is C'est Gourmet?  It is, uh, the slightly-French skewed product line of baked goods from Boston Gourmet Chefs, a wholesale speciality food distributor.  They produce fairly standard pastries: danishes, croissants, cinnamon rolls, etc, along with some savory appetizers like caramelized onion or fig brie en croute.  It was their turnovers and hand pies however that drew me in, slightly more unique offerings.

Turnovers

The turnovers are actually vegan, and are available in apple and cherry versions.

Vegan Cherry Turnover.

I started with a cherry turnover.  It was ... not very good.

The pastry was fine, it was flaky, it was not strange and "oh, that's vegan", if you know what I mean.  But, it wasn't anything special.

The insides are what ruined it though.

Cherry Turnover: Inside.

This is what lay inside.

Cherry ... gel.  There were no berries, no bits of berries, just, gel.  Goo.  Sometimes goo can be tasty, don't get me wrong.  When its a runnier style, I really do love cherry pie from a can filling, but, this ... was a solid mass of goo.  Really not good at all.

*+.

Hand Pies

Hand pies are made in classic apple, strawberry, and cinnamon varieties year round (the last two of which are glazed - and strawberry one is topped with little sprinkles, making them look exactly like gourmet pot tarts!).  They also make seasonal flavors like pumpkin.

Unlike the turnovers, these are not vegan.

Pumpkin.

The hand pies were fine.  Large size, fairly classic hand pie shape.  Golden brown exterior, garnished with pearl sugar.

The pastry was decent enough, flaky, but not remarkable.

Seasonal Pumpkin: Inside.

Inside was filled with a mashed pumpkin, which actually tasted more like sweet potato to me.  It is blended with cream cheese and evaporated milk, creating quite a creamy consistency, which was nice.  However, the seasoning was too strong on the "pumpkin spice" (nutmeg, clovers, ginger, cinnamon) for my taste, but, I have a particularly low tolerance for nutmeg.

It was well filled.

Overall, I found this "fine".  The pastry was fine, but not great, the filling was fine, and had its highlights and lowlights. I wasn't really tempted to have another, but I'd love to try the iced varieties.

***.

Pumpkin (November 2019).

When "pumpkin season" rolled around again the next year, I tried it again, actually forgetting that I had previously reviewed it.

My new review is nearly identical to before - decent pastry, flaky, fresh, but not particularly notable, and good amount of filling, more sweet potato like than pumpkin, but again, just too spiced for my preferences.

They seem like a quality product, just not the one for me.

***.