Christine Ferber

Christine Ferber (born 11 May 1960 ) is a French pastry chef and chocolatier, who co-owns La Maison Ferber in Niedermorschwihr, Alsace region of France. She sells over 200,000 jars of jam a year across the world. a medieval town five miles (8 km) apart from her village Niedermorschwihr. Her great-grandfather moved to Alsace from Germany in 1870. Her great-grandfather, grandfather and father all worked as pastry chefs. Her father Maurice opened La Maison Ferber in 1959, in a seventeenth century traditional French building called Au relais de Trois Épis (At the post house of the Three Ears). Ferber's mother died in March 2020.

Career Aged 15, Ferber moved to Brussels in order to complete a three-year apprenticeship as a confectioner and chocolatière. Afterwards she spent a year in Paris to study with the renowned French pastry chef Lucien Peltier. Peltier was considered one of the most creative pastry chefs of his generation in the 1980s, his work inspired by the nouvelle cuisine was a reference for all professionals.

In 1979, she won the French Cup for patissiers. She moved back to Alsace in 1980, despite the resistance of her mother. In 2005, she produced a cookbook Alice's Little Kitchen in Wonderland, in reference to Lewis Carroll's book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. In 2018, the building was awarded the Prix AMO architecture prize in the category "lieu le mieux productif" (most productive place).

Ferber makes over 200 varieties of jam, Ferber sells 200,000 jars of jam per year, In Tokyo, her jam jars are sold in Isetan department stores, and are wrapped in red cloth and with a white bow. and he sells Ferber's jams in his shop in Paris.

Ferber has also taught in France, Italy, Japan and the US. She has taught at the French Pastry School in Chicago, US. In 2013, British newspaper the Daily Mirror reported that Brad Pitt had become obsessed with Ferber's jams, and had flown to Alsace to meet her. However, Ferber claimed that she had never seen Pitt in her shop.

Honours

In January 2018, Ferber was awarded a Chevalier (Knight of the Legion of Honour.

Works Ferber, Christine, Mes aigres-doux : Terrines et pâtés, Payot, 1999. Ferber, Christine, Mes Confitures: The Jams and Jellies of Christine Ferber, Michigan State University Press, 2002. Ferber, Christine, Ma cuisine des fruits, Marabout, 2003. Ferber, Christine, Mes Tartes: The Sweet and Savory Tarts of Christine Ferber, Michigan State University Press, 2003. Ferber, Christine; Model, Philippe; Winkelmann, Bernhard, La petite Cuisine d'Alice au pays des merveilles (Alice's Little Kitchen in Wonderland), Chêne Jeunesse, 2005. Ferber, Christine, Tischlein deck dich!, Gerstenberg Verlag, 2008. Ferber, Christine, Le Larousse des confitures : gelées, compotes, chutneys avec les conseils techniques et 40 recettes inédites de Christine Ferber, Larousse, Paris 2009. Ferber, Christine, Leçons de confitures, Chêne, 2009. Ferber, Christine; Bernhard, Winkelmann (photos), Die Marmeladen-Bibel, Christian, Munich 2010.