Imagine a strawberry plant so gigantic that it is more than twice the height of the Arc de Triomphe. It’s not a far-fetched image! It’s Maison Héloïse‘s latest sweet extravaganza. On Wednesday April 23, at the Argenteuil ice rink, a 121.88-metre-long cake went down in history – certified a world record by Guinness. The photos are as impressive as they are mouth-watering.
Youssef El Gatou from Maison Héloïse sets a world record
It all began in the mind of a passionate man: Youssef El Gatou, founder of Maison Héloïse. Fascinated by the Guinness Book of World Records from an early age, he dreamed of making history with an oversized pastry. Italy held the record for the longest strawberry cake since 2019, at 100.48 meters? No problem: Youssef set his sights on 120… without announcing it. The result: 121.88 meters of sponge cake, mousseline cream and French strawberries. Youssef is now a member of the Parisian pastry pantheon.
The world’s largest strawberry cake: a pharaonic sugar project!
Nothing was left to chance. More than 25 people took part in the adventure, including pastry greats such as Nicolas Bernardé, Meilleur Ouvrier de France, and young apprentices. Volunteers came from Tokyo, Beijing, Marrakech… A veritable culinary ballet that would have been at home in the Hall of Mirrors, with its precise gestures and meticulous organization. It took a whole night and a whole day to assemble this colossus on the ice of the ice rink.
In terms of ingredients, it’s the kind of list that would make a supermarket’s head spin: 350 kilos of strawberries (French, of course), 4,000 eggs, 560 kilos of mousseline cream, 30 kilos of mascarpone, 150 kilos of sugar, and many other sweets, including edible flowers for decoration. But beyond quantity, the real technical challenge was uniformity. To the naked eye, the cake had to look like a single piece, with no visible seams. Guinness also imposes a minimum size: 8 cm wide and high, and of course, a traditional recipe. Even a surveyor was on hand to measure everything to the centimetre!
And while the world’s largest strawberry plant may taste sweet, it comes with a hefty price tag: the project cost around 30,000 euros, including 6,000 invested by the town council. But this record had to meet another vital condition: no waste. The dessert was shared with the public, then donated to the fire department, the Red Cross and the Restos du Cœur. Because the greatness of a feat is also knowing how to share it. As well as being a great publicity coup for Argenteuil, this marvel also served a number of good causes. All the tastier for it.