Queen of Jam / Queen of England

I started collecting Christine Ferber jams (miniatures only) in 2008.

It took me longer to taste the real jam. 

Though now she is known as the jam fairy and queen of French jam/"la reine des confitures", when Christine Ferber was  8 she wanted to become a veterinarian.

Coming from 4 generations of boulangiers this was not an option at Maison Ferber. 

She was allowed to go study pastry but it was not possible to study in Paris. 

There were no stages/apprenticeships available for women at the time. Christine went to school in Brussels for 2 years, won a pastry contest and found a place/stage in Paris with the top patissiere, Lucien Peletier, founder of the international Relais Desserts. 

Training is intense and consists of achieving expertise in the 5 arts: PÂTISSIER, CONFISEUR, CHOCOLATIER, BOULANGER, TRAITEUR, GLACIER, TRAITEUR. Everything in the shop is hand-made. Ferber personally fills every jam jar (to the absolute brim). She works 24/7 starting her day at 5:00 am, ending at 10 pm. Only seasonal fruits (mostly Alsacian 80% from vendors she has worked with for 20 years) are used. And no frozen fruits.

Christine is master of all 5 skills as evident in her shop,  Au Relais des Trois Epis in Niedermorschwir.

Naturally I asked Christine about the adorable famous Ferber bonnets/red polka-dotted hats on the jams. She started experimenting with making jams but her father thought is was a waste of time. Ha! 

She researched and found the unusual red dotted fabric, tied on a white bow, and put jars in the shop window simply for display. Pretty soon customers made inquiries. They wanted to buy her confiture and history was made. Maison Ferber has 250 distributors world-wide, Japan being their biggest customer. I believe 140,000 jars are sold annually👏🥂❤️ 

You could say Elizabeth II, Queen of England and Christine Ferber are “joined at the hip” so to speak.

They are both queens and they both love jam. Especially strawberry 🍓 jam.

Queen Elizabeth was eating ‘jam pennies’ since she was 5. What are jam pennies? Two small (British penny size) rounds of white bread with strawberry jam inside, always eaten by the queen daily at afternoon tea. 

We know the queen loved Corgis though she had no aspirations to become a veterinarian. She got her first Corgi, Dookie at age 7. 

And Queen Elizabeth was absolutely mad for color 🎨  

Friday, on the train to Colmar to visit Christine’s shop, I saw this lovely picture of the queen and was inspired to get out my watercolors. 

But I could not make a good royal purple. Fortunately in Colmar, a small craft shop had a lovely cobalt violet and a mauve from Daler-Rowney (my new favorite brand) to repaint the queen properly.

❤️I’m Carol Gillott, an artist living in Paris. Every month I send out beautifully illustrated letters that capture the true Parisian experience. Sign up to receive these whimsical treasures in the mail.

Thanks for reading PB ❤️

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