The French Bakery

One of the first bakeries I was taken to when I arrived in Seattle, I loved it. Freshly made loaves of bread (get it early or they WILL run out) to pastries, I love it all.
The Kirkland location is an quick walk to the waterfront and easy to find. Staff was friendly, and although there’s a few more tables, lounge chairs, and stools, seating is a little cramped. It’s a little difficult to get around people when they’re sitting. Compared to the Crossroads location, this place has seating, but compared to the Bellevue location, this place is stuffy. It all depends on what you’re looking for.
Pastries wise, they’re on par with their other locations. When I went, staff was friendly and quick. Sometimes the line would go out the door and there would be only one staff working the front. Even then, it wasn’t too bad of a wait.

Been going to the Bellevue location for years. Love how close this place is to my house and the baguette sandwiches are delicious. My girlfriend gets the tomato mozzarella sandwich and I usually get the ham and Swiss. Love how simple and flavorful they are. The coffee and pastries are delicious too. Love the crepes. Definitely a great spot with friendly staff!!!

The food is always fresh, and everything is wrapped to go in front of your eyes. On top of the delicious pastries and breads, they also have fantastic sandwiches and coffee. I usually order a latte with a pastry.
Don’t be afraid to get new thing to try– everything is worth it, but of course, in moderation, otherwise your waistline and wallet won’t thank you. ;)

Went here with a friend for a crêpe. We both got crêpes and I picked up two Napoleon pastries. I must say I was quite underwhelmed by the crêpe. I have had many crêpes, and some in Montréal, so this one was very chewy and bland in my opinion. I got a cinnamon crêpe and it was just that, cinnamon inside of a crêpe. Very dry and didn’t taste very good. The Napoleon pastries were quite good, very flaky and the custard was flavourful. Would go back for their pastries. Cute little location, but not much seating even during the day

The people that are working at the place are strange. Half of their menu is out during the winter time. They didn’t have bananas, or strawberries. They were also almost out of Nutella. But they still have everything on their menu. The service was okay. I wouldn’t recommend to go here during the winter time of the year.

It’s a nice place with nice food unless you have the guy as your cashier. If you ask him for a to go box, he rolls his eyes, if you ask for another sandwich, he rolls his eyes. Basically he can ruin your morning.

I really like the French Bakery at Crossroads, so I figured I would check out the Kirkland location. It’s a lot smaller – the kitchen, pastry cases, seating area, everything. If I hadn’t been to the Bellevue one, I wouldn’t think anything of it. What I do compare is the efficiency of getting people through the line (and it didn’t help that they weren’t particularly friendly).
Around 1 p.m. on a Friday is when I came in. There were two parties in front of me, and I was in line for 6 minutes before getting to the cashier. It seemed a little disorganized and hectic, even though there wasn’t even a long line of people.
Not a bad place, and maybe a situational experience, but I don’t plan on going out of my way to visit here. There is a small parking garage for the whole building behind the French Bakery, and there’s limited street parking. I would hate to be here while it’s busy. Too small, and it doesn’t seem like a place that’s set up for a large crowd.

Great prices and service!

Sarah H, I also love love this place!
David C, I see you have 10 checkins, I think I probably have 100: P
I love their coffee, food and service. Every single employee there seems really friendly and helpful. I get a latte every time I go there. For pastries I get croissants and turnovers. For food I get quiche and crepes. Everything is very tasty. I also took family and friends there and this place never disappoints.
I was trying to think if there’s anything one would not be happy about but I couldn’t come up with any. Well, there is one thing — their door seems backwards for summer when you want to go outside to eat because the door needs to be pulled from inside and that’s not easy when you are carrying your coffee and food. Fear not though! The customers here are also helpful — if you are in that situation I am pretty sure someone will help you out :-) So yah, 5 stars!

I have only been here once and fell in love with the place! I have a friend who lives super close to this bakery and she introduced me to their crepes! Their crepes are definitely different than other crepes I’ve had, because the wrapper was thicker. Almost like it was coated in eggs and then fried. I ordered their Roasted Turkey and Havarti which has cranberry spread and turkey meat! I don’t order savory crêpe, so this was definitely different for me.
We came here super early and the staffs were super friendly. You can tell they love working for this place!

Had a great experience there. Ate a delicious Croque-​Madame and the coffee… Ohhh the coffee I had was a marvelous Italian espresso with real Italian bean. Will definitely go back.

I LOVE crepes from Kirkland location!!! If you have a choice, go to Kirkland, not Bellevue!

If you find espresso to constantly taste bitter, look no further than the French Bakery to rid you of that problem! I live just up the street from this cute little café and enjoy taking all my friends and family here when they visit. From their baked goods to their customer service there is literally no better place in downtown Kirkland. No I know you may be asking yourselves, «well what the heck, why only four stars?!» The reason behind that is because for someone like me who lives on a budget the French Bakery cannot be a highly reoccurring thing… It’s a little pricey (I understand it’s not a chain and charging higher prices is how they survive). If you’re looking to treat yourself to some, well… treats. This is your place.

Nice coffee beside that… The pastries is not too bad but not too French. The pain aux raisins was very dry and doughy as well as the croissant aux amandes. Plus, some one forgot the almonds inside!!!
In France you used the one day croissant and stuff them with an almond paste: that is a croissant aux amandes

The food is ok, service is awful!
Éclair is not traditional, it doesn’t say that on a menu, it has some super sweet yellow lemony artificial gello in it

Our weekend ritual caps the morning walk with a stop by the French Bakery for a croissant sandwich for breakfast. Light flaky croissants with thick slices of turkey or ham, avocado, fontina cheese and a touch of pesto — delicious! (And basically negates the walk but who cares).
The place is always packed and I take that as a good thing. The line moves quickly and the staff is always warm and friendly.
Also, try the crepes and great coffee too!

Coffee is good. But I’ve noticed a lot of places in Kirkland have great coffee. A bit pricey, but it is a French bakery. Disappointed in the food. Almond croissant literally just had almonds (no almond paste) and it certainly wasn’t the best croissant. Maybe just a tiny bit above average. Cinnamon roll wasn’t great. They did a good job on the spinach and eggs. Lots of spinach and the grilled bread that came with was the best thing there. That was very good. Reminded me of what can be so great about bahn mi bread. Good service.

Good quality espresso drinks, smooth and rich. The savory croissant was very good. It was flaky and buttery with tasty ham and Swiss inside.

I’m glad I don’t live close enough to this place to go there as much as I want or else I’d be super fat…
The pastries are delicious. We got the bear claw and it had a really delicate almond flavor, with lots of flaky pastry. Yum. I also got the apricot cream cheese danish, and it was tasty but I wasn’t a super huge fan of the filling. The apricot bits were neon orange, and I’m not sure what kind of filling would make it that color.
The sandwiches are also good; the baguette they use is crispy on the outside with a soft, chewy texture.
I’m not a fan of the salads here. The one we got (Waldorf I think?) was described as having «fresh and dried fruit» in it, in addition to the other ingredients, where the fruit ended up being various chunks of melons (which I’m allergic to, and when I asked about it was just told the salad had «fruit» in it). The rest of the salad was okay though.
The staff are friendly, and there’s a good rotation of pastries daily. Yum!

Three words: pear almond tart. Try it, it’s my favorite thing to get here and you’ll love it. Guaranteed. If you’re sharing and want more variety, get a croissant too. The almond croissant and the chocolate almond croissant are really, really good! To be honest though, those are the only items I always get. so my rating is really just for those two things, in addition to the few different lattes and the Thai iced tea I usually get. I can’t imagine trying anything bad here though, I just know what I love so the pear tart and croissant are what I end up getting all the time :)
PROS:
— Friendly staff.
— Delicious pastries at reasonable prices.
— Convenient free four hour parking in the lot/​garage diagonally across the street.
CONS:
— Shop is on the small side, and does get busy. However, whenever I come here– with coworkers, by myself, on a date, with a friend. I’m able to find a table. Maybe I’m just lucky or I think maybe it can seem «crowded» from people in line just buying goodies to go. I think that’s what most people do, as this place isn’t particularly cute or somewhere I’d want to spend hours at.
— Closes pretty early every day, so it’s more of a weekends or quick lunch break place to go.
TIPS:
— Make sure you get a punch card! Buy 12 pastries, get the 13^th free! :)
— If you want to order an entire tart, call a day ahead and they’ll have it ready and boxed up for you when you go to pick it up. Also, if I remember correctly, it’s a few dollars cheaper than buying the equivalent amount of slices individually.