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Centre-Val de Loire
Beneath its crisp sugar shell, a soft praline heart: the forestine bears the name of its inventor, the Bourges confectioner Georges Forest.
Confectionery from Centre-Val de Loire.
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In 1869, Georges Forest took over a Bourges confectionery shop, "Au Bienfaisant", whose sign had already existed in 1825, and kept it. Drawn to confectionery from the age of 13, he trained in Nevers then in Moulins and completed his apprenticeship in Paris; he learned how to make liqueurs, dragées, and chocolate, but dreamed of creating his own sweet, hard on the outside and soft on the inside, and designed and built his equipment himself. The sugar industry organisation describes him as a former compagnon du Tour de France, a confectioner-pastry chef and occasional liqueur-maker.
On 24 December 1878, Christmas Eve, he filed a patent in Bourges for a new sweet that would be called the Forestine, after its inventor. Sources date its creation variously to 1879, and to 1878. Forest showcased his invention at international exhibitions and fought to secure the patent so that foreign confectioners would not seize it, the sugar industry reports; his idea of coating a soft centre in sugar was hailed as a true revolution in confectionery.
For Jean-François Tavernier, a fourth-generation confectioner, it is "the first filled sugar sweet in the world" — and his house is, he says, the only one to make it. The Berry tourism agency also presents the forestine as the very first filled sweet in history, created in Bourges.
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In 1884, the workshop and shop moved into a large building on the corner of rue Moyenne and place Cujas: the "Maison des Forestines" was born. It was, seemingly, a major local event, as the Journal du Cher devoted several pages to it on 20 December of that year.
The building is in the Haussmann style, and it is above all the interior that is striking, decorated in the style of Parisian department stores, with a ceiling of Gien earthenware. Six large cartouches bear the names of the sweet delicacies invented by Georges Forest, and the sweet-box décor recalls the Belle Époque.
Around 1929, the building was donated to the Centre hospitalier de Bourges. In a report broadcast in March 2025, France 2 noted that the historic building was closed, whilst a temporary shop continued to attract the curious and the sweet-toothed.
In 1896, after some thirty years in confectionery, Georges Forest changed career and became a municipal councillor for Bourges; the business changed its name and passed to Georges Tavernier. The France 2 report specifies that Forest handed over to Jean-François Tavernier's great-grandfather. Forest passed away in 1935 at the age of 88; from 1951, Marie-Claire Tavernier ran the business, before handing it over to her son Jean-François. Berry Province counts four generations of the Tavernier family at the helm of the house.
The forestine has received medals at universal exhibitions: silver in Paris in 1900 and gold in 1931 at the colonial exhibition, according to Berry Province; the Bourges encyclopaedia adds a medal in 1889. Georges Forest also invented other confections: Amandines, Châtaignes, Noisettes, and Richelieux, a nougatine filled with an almond and pistachio cream. The same encyclopaedia summarises the sweet's place in the town: forestines are to Bourges what pralines de Montargis or calissons d'Aix are, still made on site and by hand.
Appearance
A small sweet in the shape of an elongated rectangle, slender and plump. It emerges from the press like a string of small cushions stuck to one another, which are easily separated. Its boiled-sugar shell comes in several colours: brown, white, pink, and blue according to the sugar industry, green, pink, and white according to the Bourges encyclopaedia.
Taste
A heart of almond and hazelnut praline flavoured with chocolate, with, according to the sugar industry, "an inimitable taste of chocolate as the finishing touch". A gastronomic directory of the Indre describes it as having a base of chocolate, hazelnuts, and almonds.
Texture
Both crisp and melting: a boiled-sugar shell encloses a soft praline filling. The shell is made of satiny, crisp sugar.
over an open flame, up to 150 °C. The France 2 report describes the confectioner leaning, from dawn, over copper pans.
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The forestine is sold in "old-fashioned" metal tins. Berry Province ranks it among the unmissable specialities of Bourges to take away with you. A gastronomic directory of the Indre recommends it to confectionery lovers.
No official quality sign (PDO (AOP), PGI (IGP), Label Rouge) covers the forestine. The local encyclopaedia of Bourges notes that it is listed in the national heritage inventory of French confectionery, chocolate and biscuit specialities: a recognition of heritage, not an appellation.
No producer is listed for this product yet.