Clement Faugier
Clement Faugier are one of the oldest food brands in France (140 years old!) and renown world wide for their marrons glaces and crème de marrons de l’Ardeche. As they are one of our key French food suppliers (for marrons glaces), a little about this iconic company! There is a wealth of information on the French Clement Faugier website (you have to be able to read French!) and we have just selected what we found most interesting!
1882 Creation Of The Clement Faugier Company
Clement Faugier were founded in 1882 by Mr Clement Faugier in the Ardeche region of France, a region well known for it’s abundance of chestnut trees. The young man had the idea of commercialising this abundant raw material to make on a middling large scale, marrons glaces (candied chestnuts), which had until then not been manufactured on a commercial scale and were only made by local confiseurs.
This coincided with a crisis in the main industry of the Ardeche region, which was the textile industry, especially silk. As a result there were many unemployed people looking for work and a ready make workforce!
1885 Development of the Creme De Marrons De l’Ardeche Clement Faugier
As a by product of marrons glaces production (it is a tricky process with quite a few chestnuts wasted in the process), the founders had the idea of using the broken pieces of marrons glaces to create a new product, crème de marrons (sweet chestnut cream).
This is made by taking the broken pieces (brisures) of marrons glaces, crushing them and mixing them with savoury chestnut spread, sugar, glucose syrup, and a little vanilla. And the result is the delicious Crème De Marrons Clement Faugier! And to this day, the recipe and presentation of the tins have never changed! No need to!
1890
The development of the marrons glaces sous vide! Marrons glaces until this point were only enjoyed at Christmas as they had very short shelf life. The chestnuts were picked in Autumn, prepared, and then sold for the festive season.
Clement Faugier pioneered marrons glaces sold in “sous vide” (air tight) presentations stretching there shelf life to a couple of years.
1938
The creation of the Clement Faugier logo/ mascot (a chestnut figure called Marono!), which we know today and which you will see on every Clement Faugier product.
1950s To Present Day
The creation of a number of chestnut based specialities as the company sought to diversify (savoury cooked chestnuts, chestnuts sweets and more) as well as a multiplication of new presentations to match changing consumer trends (such as the creation of the 78g creme de marrons in tube for snacking!).
1991/1992
The creation of the very large and modern Clement Faugier factory (in Privas) to be able to face world wide demand for their exceptional product range!
Clement Faugier At The Good Food Network!
Please take a look at the Clement Faugier range at The Good Food Network! For the time being we focus exclusively on their marrons glaces, but intend to re-introduce the creme de marrons.
