The strangest thing happened the other night. I was volunteering at a Beaujolais Nouveau party and Alliance Française de Santa Rosa fundraiser with Jean-Claude and Sabine, when I overheard someone mention Trader Joe’s Chocolate Croissants.

I might not have given it another thought, but I’d been taking pictures that night and discovered on the camera some photos Stephanie had taken recently of those very croissants. In her estimation, they are the most accurate pains au chocolat she’s ever had in the US, indistinguishable from her memory of the “real” thing. She had taken pictures of the croissants at each step of the cooking process for an eventual blog post.

Thus I felt compelled to ask the man, “You make the Trader Joe’s Chocolate Croissants?”

“Yes” he said, and introduced himself as Jean-Yves Charon, Founder & Pastry Chef of Galaxy Desserts in Richmond, CA. I went on to tell him, “You’re not going to believe this, but I’ve got pictures of your croissants on my camera,” which of course I showed him, and which I think blew his mind. I learned that he also makes a lemon tart for Trader Joe’s, soon some mini croissants, as well as desserts for the likes of Dean and Deluca and Williams Sonoma—you know those Molten Baby Cake kits? Yup, that’s him.

I’m totally stealing this blog post from Stephanie—with her permission, she said she might do a post in French, if she ever gets a break from dancing. For your mouth-watering pleasure, here are the pictures she took at the various stages of making Trader Joe’s, (I mean, Jean-Yves Charon’s) fabulous chocolate croissants: