France reclaims title for world's longest ever baguette

A team of French bakers rolled out a 140-metre-long baguette on Sunday, breaking the existing record held by neighbouring Italy by 10 metres. 

The 18-member team in the town of Suresnes, west of Paris, set a new Guinness World Record on Sunday by baking a baguette measuring 143.53 metres – about 235 times longer than the traditional one eaten by millions of people in France each day.

The previous longest baguette of 132.62 metres was baked in the Italian city of Como in 2019.

Ninety kgs of flour, 60 litres of water, 1.2kg of salt and 1.2kg of yeast went into making the necessary 152kg of dough.

Members of the French confederation of bakers and pastry chefs began kneading and shaping the dough at 3am on Sunday, before putting it in a specially built slow-moving oven on wheels.

Olympics-inspired baguette

"A record for the longest handcrafted baguette requires true spirit and collective sportsmanship," said the confederation's president Dominique Anract.

“In this year of the Olympics, congratulations to all our artisan bakers.

“Bread is an engine of performance, our baguette is an essential part of our gastronomic heritage.”

Anthony Arrigault, one of the bakers said everyone was "very happy to have beaten this record and that it was done in France".

Part of the baguette, which had to be at least 5 cm thick throughout, was cut and shared with the public.

The rest was given to homeless people.
The traditional French baguette must be about 60 cm long, be made from wheat flour, water, salt and yeast only, and weigh about 250 grammes, according to the official regulation.

(with Reuters)