Le fournil Bakery — Restaurant in Alberta

Last winter I left the Trans Canadian to stop in here most weekends to pick up a couple of ham sandwiches for myself and my two young boys on our way to the ski hill and again on the way home to pick up a coffee with macaroons. They would cut one of the sandwiches in half for my boys to share. This winter my wife is returned to skiing from her knee injury and so I was excited to introduce her to Le Fournil Bakery in Canmore a couple of weeks ago with the plan of buying 3 ham sandwiches between the 4 of us.

They refused to cut one of the sandwiches in half stating that it is their new policy never to cut sandwiches that are take out, regardless as to whether or not the customer has made such a request. I explained the reason for requesting one of the sandwiches to be cut. The manager/owner came out of the kitchen which I thought would result in common sense being applied; sadly not. Having worked in food retail, I simply don't believe in the expression, "le client est toujours raison", however, the way that we were treated on this occasion is at best idiotic and at worst rude and demonstrates a degree of contempt.

Rather embarrassing having bigged-up this establishment to my wife only for her to experience incredibly poor service on her very first visit.

Please could the owner demonstrate a little more consideration towards children who might wish to eat the lovingly prepared food.

For those people on their way through to LAKE LOUISE, there is an AMAZING DELI serving fresh salads, sandwiches, delectable pastries and beautifully hand crafted petits gâteaux and flavourful coffees at the FAIRMONT HOTEL by the edge of the lake. Their staff are always friendly, prices are surprisingly lower than you might expect for the high quality AND they will cut a sandwich in half for your young...

The pastries and coffee here are unquestionably excellent but be warned: the staff can be curt and seem especially keen to establish how they expect you to order, reminding me of one of my favorite Seinfeld episodes involving soup, IYKYK.

Today I popped in just to grab a latte. There were three staff members behind the counter. One was assisting a couple with many pastries, and as all I wanted was coffee, I stepped ahead to the two staff members who were standing at the till — both of whom were chatting with another customer who had completed ordering. They continued that conversation and didn’t acknowledge me, which was fine, I was not in a hurry and was happy patiently wait. When the first staff member finished packaging the couple’s pastries, she spoke to me and asked if I was only ordering coffee. I said yes, assuming she was ready to take my order and that the other two staff members would then ring in the couple’s pastries. Instead, she told me I still needed to wait in line behind the couple and that I budged in front of them and that they were there first and needed to pay before I’d be helped.

This felt completely unnecessary and lacking in customer service. Her curt tone made me feel like I was being reprimanded for bad behavior.

I didn’t leave with a latte and I won’t return to Le fournil again— supporting local business is important to me and I will only support businesses that appreciate my patronage and do so with great customer service skills.

If you can get past the lack of warmth (and survive the “ordering test”), you’ll be rewarded with great coffee and delicious baked goods. Just make sure you follow the how-to-order rule book or potentially risk “no...

Le Fournil is located in Canmore, about an hour from Calgary. It has a definite French style, with all product labels written en français, including bread styles, "Baguette", "Épis", "Pain de ménage" and "Pain montagnard".

We arrived at 8:00 AM and we're able to sample four different pastries, as well as purchase a loaf of bread. There is no indoor seating, so we ate on the chairs in front of the shop, facing the mountains. Very pretty.

All four pastries appeared to be made from the same dough.

The tastiest was the blueberry Danish. The blueberry flavor was unusually tasty and good. The Pain aux raisins" was good, but a bit sweet, as it was sprinkled with confectionery sugar.

In all cases, the dough had a shortening aftertaste which I did not expect. In fairness, the bakery did not make any claim of using only butter, but I expected at least that much, from a bakery with such pronounced French overtones.

The sour dough bread, "Pain montagnard" that we tried, ticked all the boxes, crusty on the outside, chewy on the inside, with a genuine artisan (as opposed to supermarket) look and feel.

All things considered, I may visit Le Fournil again, but I would not describe it as a...