The 21 Best Pastry Shops in Montreal

Jeffrey Finkelstein of Hof Kelsten and pastry chef Suyin Wong first launched this concept at Time Out Market before giving it a permanent home. Wong's path to the role is worth knowing: originally from Singapore and raised in Vancouver, she left a finance career to train in Paris before joining Finkelstein's team. The shop reflects her sensibility, with pink ceramics and large windows softening an industrial frame. The menu stays focused: viennoiseries, loaves, and baguettes, executed with the precision you'd expect from two people who've been building toward this for a long time.

Hidden on a quiet corner of Saint-Henri, Bernice is Jami Liverman and his architect partner Carlos Miranda's homage to Jami's late grandmother. Miranda's design gives the space a warmth that feels intentional rather than decorative, and the baking follows the same logic: nostalgic without being lazy. The counter runs from s'mores cake with graham crumble and chocolate caramel fudge to cappuccino cake layered with Tia Maria cream, with classics like carrot cake with lemon mascarpone frosting holding their own alongside the showier options. Third-wave coffee and bread from Guillaume round out a spot that's become a genuine neighbourhood fixture since opening in 2020.

Mélilot fits into Laurier Ouest like it's always been there, which is partly a function of who's behind it. Aurélien Kerzerho, formerly of Maison Boulud and originally from Brittany, opened the shop alongside Vincent Gagnon-Boisvert of Leméac and Clémence Corbière of Candide. The name comes from sweet clover, a local plant with an almond-vanilla aroma that runs through Kerzerho's floral, precise approach to pastry. Some offerings rotate with the seasons; the signature mélilot tart anchors the menu year-round. Individual portions and larger-format cakes are both available, as are savoury options like quiche and sandwiches. The terrace catches good afternoon sun, the espresso holds up, and everything here feels like it was made by people who knew exactly what they wanted to open.

Zébulon Vézina trained at the ITHQ, worked in Helena Loureiro's kitchens, and spent time with Christophe Michalak in France before opening this plant-based pastry shop with his sister Alice on the busy corner of Saint-Denis and Mont-Royal in 2021. The menu is short and sharp: a gluten-free exotic cheesecake layered with coconut mousse and passionfruit confit, a brownie-sablé hybrid topped with hazelnut praline and whipped ganache. Everything is made fresh daily with local, seasonal ingredients. Vegan or not, the level of finesse here makes the distinction feel beside the point.

Bertrand Bazin is a French pastry veteran who has trained some of the better pastry chefs working in Montreal today. In 2017, he and restaurateur Antonio Park opened this Westmount bistro-café as a space that lets the work speak for itself. Half the room is an open kitchen, so you can watch the team fold, whip, and plate while you settle in. Mornings run on viennoiseries, eggs, and coffee. Lunch leans classic French: vol-au-vent, boeuf bourguignon, Parisian gnocchi with bacon and pine nuts. Desserts, including crème brûlée, tartelettes, and financiers, are elegant without being fussy. The whole operation is designed to feel personal rather than performative.

Pâtisserie do Rosário has been at this for over four decades, and the numbers reflect it. The Machado family, Antonio, Agostinho, and Danny, now run the Plaza St-Hubert shop, where close to 20,000 pastéis de nata leave the ovens each week, landing in cafés, grocers, and caterers across the city. The shop offers a range of handmade Portuguese baked goods, but the egg tarts are the reason people come. Rotating nata flavours are baked fresh daily in full view, and coming straight to the source is worth it for that alone.

You can smell it before you see it. The scent of caramelized sugar and yeasty dough floats down Rachel Street from Montreal's first brick-and-mortar kürtőskalács shop, where David Sebestyen bakes the chimney cakes he grew up eating at street festivals in Transylvania. Sebestyen spent years refining his family recipe before hitting the festival circuit in 2018; Ol' Sweet is the permanent version of that. Coils of lemon-scented dough are wrapped around a wooden spit, rolled in sugar, and roasted until crisp outside and soft within. The toppings shift with the season: walnuts and coconut in winter, Nutella and ice cream cones in summer. Central Europe's most underrated street pastry has found a good home in the Plateau.

La Cornetteria has been holding down a corner of Little Italy since 2006 with eight seats, a glass case of golden pastries, and a husband-and-wife team that hasn't wavered from what they do. Stefano Cicali, originally from Florence, runs the kitchen; Cinzia Persechino handles the front with the kind of ease that makes a quick coffee run feel unhurried. Their namesake pastry, the cornetto, is a soft, custard-filled cousin to the French croissant: lighter, chewier, and increasingly rare even in Italy. The case also runs to Nutella-stuffed cronuts, biscotti, seasonal zeppole, and some of the city's best cannoli. Everything is made in-house, and Stefano's custom coffee blend ties it together.

Aube opened on Rue Sainte-Catherine Est in Hochelaga in April 2023 and has been busy since day one. The project brought together David Ollu, who runs operations at nearby Hélicoptère, with longtime friends Stéphanie Gagnon-Laberge and Adrien Allard: Stéphanie handles pastry, Adrien bakes the bread. Behind a glass-enclosed kitchen, Allard turns out a pain de campagne worth going out of your way for, while the pastry counter runs from croissants and financiers to scones, biscuits, and a well-regarded gluten-free brownie. House-made jams, blueberry lavender and rhubarb honey rosemary among them, and chocolate from Qantu round out the offer. The space is spare and warm, with just enough room to linger over a coffee from barista Daphnée Meilleur.

After a decade away in Laval and Marché 440, Olivier Potier's return to Montreal landed in Old Montreal with a boutique that combines French pâtisserie, gourmet épicerie, and a serious pastry counter. Millefeuilles come in seasonal iterations: raspberry, lemon, passionfruit. Croissants are made with P.E.I. butter. Confections layer Zacapa rum and housemade caramel with the kind of precision that comes from someone who has been doing this a long time. Chef Cédric Deslandes oversees the savoury side, which includes curated cheeses, deli items, and farm-fresh vegetables. It's a shop that rewards browsing.

Mariana Martin grew up in Mexico City, trained under Elena Reygadas at Rosetta, and studied culinary sustainability in France before opening Carlota at the edge of Mile End. The conchas, vanilla and chocolate, are light and deeply fragrant. The guava-cheese roulés are precise. Seasonal breads like pan de yema and rosca de reyes are made with genuine reverence. Beyond the baking, Carlota operates as a cultural space: workshops and collaborations with local artists are part of the program. Martin's path to this storefront spanned three countries and a pandemic, and the work reflects all of it.

Since 1968, this Little Italy institution has kept the focus on old-school Italian pastry without shortcuts. Still run by the Caldarone family, it sits across from the Madonna della Difesa church and hasn't changed much since Vittorio and Maria moved the original shop here in the seventies. The cannoli, made using Vittorio's original recipe, are filled fresh to order with ricotta cream that lands the balance of sweet and tang. The case also holds code d'aragosta, biscotti by the kilo, sfogliatelle with a citrus kick, and summer granita. No indoor seating, but the park across the street handles that.

Martin Falardeau, formerly of Le Pain dans les Voiles, and Dina Dagher opened this NDG bakery in 2017 with a straightforward premise: mill the flour on-site and let the bread reflect it. The result is loaves with real depth, from lentil-rich sourdoughs to kamut batards and focaccia, all cut to order. The baguette earned top honours in Quebec, but it's not the only reason to come. Fridays through Sundays, pastry chef Kevin Poitevin takes over the counter with éclairs, tartlets, and seasonal one-offs. The space, designed in part by Falardeau himself, offers a view into the baking process and just enough room to sit with a coffee from Café Union.

Afroditi has been serving Parc-Extension since 1971, balancing French pâtisserie standards with Greek desserts that speak to the neighbourhood's deep Hellenic roots. The bakery was renamed after the goddess of beauty when Anestis Karagiannidis took over in the nineties; his son Vasilios now runs it alongside him. The sweet counter covers syrup-soaked baklava, honey-drenched melomakarona, and iced cakes topped with jewel-like fruit. The savoury side runs to spanakopita two ways: flaky filo squares and rustic hand pies. Olive oils, honeys, and jams round out the shelves for anyone going full Mediterranean. Most regulars are in and out with boxes and loaves, but a few seats by the front window offer room to stay.

French pastry chef Daniel Fourne opened this Mont-Royal East shop in the early nineties around a single Breton pastry, and Normandy-born baker Nicolas Henri has kept that focus intact. The kouign-amann here walks the line between croissant and caramelized fever dream: butter, sugar, and time, done as close to textbook as you'll find outside Brittany. The croissants, chaussons, and other viennoiseries are worth the visit on their own, but the reason people queue in all seasons is that unmistakable smell of butter and sugar meeting heat. The space is small and the rounds sell out fast, so arriving early is less a suggestion than a strategy.

Mahrousé has been on de L'Acadie since 1970, when a Syrian pastry chef with roots in Aleppo opened the original shop. When cousins Khaled and Anas Rankoussi took over in 2017, they expanded into a two-level space with seating, parking, and a terrace, without losing the precision that built the business. The cases hold rows of hand-folded pastries, syrup-drenched semolina cakes, and jewel-toned loukoum. Ice cream and savoury bites round out the offer, but sweets are the main event. On busy afternoons, four languages fill the room, often spoken by newcomers who now work behind the counter.

François Barrière, a former banker, and Riccardo Arnoult, a baker from Toulouse, opened Le Toledo on Mont-Royal around a vintage scale discovered during the fit-out, which ended up giving the bakery its name. The airy, light-filled space runs on Quebec organic flours and slow fermentation, with buttery almond croissants and Scandinavian-style smørrebrøds among the draws. The sourdough loaves are as much a reason to visit as the pastry counter, and the sandwiches and breakfast chaussons hold up on their own.

Matthieu Virloget trained at Ferrandi Paris before opening on Avenue Mont-Royal in 2016 with a straightforward ambition: make a proper French croissant. Aurélie Baravian joined shortly after to handle operations. The menu is built around the croissant in its many forms, with sweet options running from raspberry to chestnut to almond-hazelnut praline, and savoury and seasonal variations rotating alongside. Dough is made with long fermentation times and ingredients sourced from Quebec producers where possible. The name is not a typo.

Fous Desserts has been on the Plateau since 1995, under the care of pastry chef Carolle De Boisvilliers and Hiroko Fukuhara, who previously ran a tea shop and now curates an exceptional list of imported teas under her label Chanoya. The shop blends classic French pâtisserie with Japanese nuance: matcha mousses, pepper-spiced ganaches, and just-sweet-enough cakes built on seasonal, often organic ingredients. Signature desserts include the Croquant, dark chocolate mousse with hazelnut praline and almond meringue, and the Gargamel, milk chocolate mousse with caramel and nut-studded nougatine. The croissant, available in organic form, is among the better ones in the city. Come winter, there's panettone and bûches de Noël. The hot chocolate holds its own year-round.

Daniel Jobin named this bakery after a joke between friends, opened it steps from Marché Jean-Talon in 2012, and handed it off to two former employees, Jean-Baptiste Gil and Thibault Delouis, in 2021. Bread is made with organic flour, slow-kneaded at low temperature for an open, moist crumb, and sold by weight. The lineup shifts by day, with weekend specials alongside weekday staples. Signature loaves include the Castagne, made with chestnut, walnut, and apple, and the Popeye, with goat cheese and sea spinach. The croissants, credited to Delouis, are among the better ones in the city. Unsold product goes to local organizations each week.

Samos has been at this for roughly sixty years. The bakery started on Rue Roy, where the original owner delivered whole wheat bread by bicycle to the BYOW restaurants along Prince-Arthur. That bread is still the top seller today, alongside the sugar donut: no elaborate fillings, no unexpected flavours, just soft, yielding fried dough done exactly right. Prices are low, portions are generous, and the window display of oversized danishes and twists tends to make the decision for you.