What the Puff?

A catabasis into the world of people who really, REALLY love their pastry plushes

My odyssey into one deeply weird corner of the internet began when I was browsing the kids’ section in the MoMA online store for holiday gifts for my kids. (Why MoMA and not, like, an actual toy store? Am I insecure about not being a ~cool~ enough mom? Let’s not dig too deeply into that. MOVING ON.)

One item in particular caught my eye: a stuffie shaped like a chocolate croissant. My five-year-old adores chocolate croissants and would live on them exclusively if he could. We brought him to France for two entire weeks last year, and croissants are literally the only thing he remembers from the trip. Unfortunately, the stuffed pain au chocolat was out of stock, so I bought myself an Ed Ruscha-inspired sweatshirt and called it a day.

But the idea of the stuffed chocolate croissant stayed with me. I love puff pastry – so much that I make extended metaphors about it, as my brilliant agent Anna Sproul-Latimer documented in her own wonderful newsletter:

If you don’t want your publishing career to turn you into a quivering goo-ball of resentment and self doubt, remember the Puff Pastry Rule.

I used to regularly make my own puff pastry from scratch. A while ago I made s’mores croissants with graham flour puff pastry, and I think they’re probably my greatest accomplishment ever.

JUST LOOK AT THIS BEAUTY

Since the stuffed croissants were sold out in the MoMA store, I decided to go directly to the source: the Jellycat website. And there, in the reviews of it and some other puffed pastry stuffies, I discovered some comments I have not been able to stop thinking about.

I guarantee that you’re not ready for the comments on the pain au chocolat or croissant, so let’s start slow with the pain au raisin. Based on the comments, I’m starting to worry that he’s a little needy:

The top comment has the subject line “My Best Friend,” and the bottom comment reads, “Right scrumptious mate, and my best friend! Absolutely love my little raisin best friend. I eat breakfast with him and he's my best friend. 10000/10 stars!!!!”

Anonymous, blink twice if the pain au raisin is just offscreen threatening you if you don’t say it’s your best friend.

Now we’re ready to move to the pain au chocolat, where things get weirder.

“Pain Takes The Pain Away: Pain au chocolat (pain for short) brings me more joy than I ever knew possible. From his smol smol smile to his chocolate holes on the side, I am forever indebted to his existence in this otherwise lonely world”

Ok, to be fair, I don’t NOT feel that way about him. Fine. I’ll allow it.

“I recently bought this snuggly pain au chocolat. I named him Crunchy Kevin. He is very soft and fluffy. I love him. Crunchy Kevin is slay.”

This review boggles my mind. How old is “Zoe”? The cadence of the sentences suggests 11, the phrase “Crunchy Kevin is slay” suggests that I’m an ancient wizened crone and should probably yeet myself into the sun.

Also: the name “Crunchy Kevin” weirds me out. I assume that Crunchy Kevin himself is… not crunchy, since that would be an undesirable trait in a stuffie. But a true pain au chocolat is crunchy. So what relationship is implied between the signifier and signified here? And now I’m reminded of how I never felt totally confident that I understood what Lacan meant by “the bone in the throat of the real,” so let’s move on to something less upsetting, like these people using the comment section here as a dating website:

Top comment includes the phrase “She’s about as big as my (23 female) hand” and the bottom one starts with “I am a 21-year-old man.”

It’s weird that they included their ages and genders, right? Right? Or am I the weird one? Honestly, I’m starting to lose track.

Nothing I’d seen so far could have prepared me for the reviews (of which there are more than one hundred) on the Jellycat croissant. One even has its own instagram!!

“The Light Of My Life Is My Croissant Jean-Paul: Got jean-paul pastry (jpp) for a birthday and my heart has never been so full. His smiling face is the best thing I’ve ever seen. The cutest lil guy to sleep next to (and I’ve slept next to lots). Couldn’t recommend highly enough.”

What is the referent for “slept next to lots”?

“My Cutest Best Friend And Partner: The best thing that happened to me. I fell in love 2020 and bought my first little croissant. From this day, every day is so much better, when I look in his cute little smiling face. He travelled all around the world with me and is my favorite partner. Now I got 6 more, because I can’t get enough. Never saw something this cute in my life before. My croissant family is now 1 big and 6 small. I can’t be happier. All of my friends and family love them as well. Thank you!”

It’s the tacked-on “all of my friends and family love them as well” that gets me. Listen, Anonymous, we all know the croissants ARE your family now. You don’t need to pretend. You’re still not the weirdest person in this comments section. I mean, consider these people:

“Seb Our Child: bought this lil goofball seb for my future wife. He has Brought us so much joy and happiness and is coming up to his first birthday. His mum cut his hair for the first time today and, boy was he looking fresh. lil goofball. We could not live without little seb in our lives as he brings us together. From your mother and I, we love you sebby.”

“He Is Our Shining Light: Becoming parents to our tiny boy was the best thing that ever happened to us. For two years, little Crolbie has accompanied us on trips to Europe, America, all over the UK. He even learned how to swim in Spain. I often cry when I think of his tiny corduroy legs swinging in the breeze. He has the purest heart on this earth and the loudest giggle. Please make croissant clothing. We cannot thank you enough for giving us our Crolbie”

I am so confused with the level of anthropomorphizing happening here!! “Cut his hair”?? “Loudest giggle”???

Even though my face is now permanently frozen in an expression of wide-eyed wonder/horror, I can’t help feeling these people have found the Meaning of Life™. As established in this perfect Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, true happiness is about getting weird about the thing you’re weird about. These people have achieved true joy. I mean:

“Unconditional Love Is Real: Some days life is tough. Maybe work was hard. Maybe there was a lot of traffic. Maybe I dropped my ice cream. But when I come home to my little croissant's smiling face, I know everything will be alright. When I feel his softness, it eases my troubles. He touches my heart and warms my soul. I never thought I could know a love this pure. I am changed person, a better person, now that I have this croissant in my life.”

I don’t have anything I feel that way about, which is probably why I started this newsletter. I’m hoping this can be a space where I can be as weird as I want to be about what I’m weird about (overanalyzing and mocking random shit?) and make a nest in that closed loop of happiness.

Also, I got a croissant for my son. He immediately adored it and would die for it and named it “croissanty,” so maybe I can learn the meaning of life from him.