Local French Orange Fruit Cake by Bonne Maman - Unexpected Authentic Gourmet Discovery

This French snack is called "Petits cakes aux fruits" or "small fruit cake". This fruit cake had a very normal-looking packaging, but you could probably tell that they would be good by the ingredients list. Only butter used! (Click to enlarge the ingredients list.)

I then did some digging into the company Bonne Maman (French for "good mom"). It was founded in a village in Southwest France, known for the quality of its fruit. Its product list features a lot of fruit products, such as preserves, jams, spreads and pie fillings. Its pastries all feature fruits prominently. But now, the brand seems to be under Andros, a French food MNC, and Bonne Maman is its leading brand that focuses mainly on jams, so this fruit cake seems to be a region-limited offering.

It turned out to be a really premium and gourmet find, living up to its homey "good mom" branding and packaging.  

They were delicious. Little mouthfuls of bliss! Each one was very moist and had a strong buttery flavour indeed.

What impressed me the most was the strong orange fragrance that permeated the petite cake. I don't normally notice such a strong flavour in local fruit cakes, which are more about the liquor, raisins and floury taste.

It's also the first time I have consciously noticed that an orange-rum combination works very well! It is traditionally paired only with raisins... although I once had an awesome thick chocolate rum cake, which convinced me that rum and chocolate was also a good combination.

The rum was also strong, and I could feel the warmth of the liquor spreading down my throat.

Apparently, this was bought at some small shop near a rest stop along the coach journey. Pretty impressive for "convenience store" style shopping eh?