French Bakery Near Me in Potrero Hill: Le Dix-Sept's Beeswax Canelés

Le Dix-Sept Pâtisserie is open Wednesday through Sunday at 455 Carolina Street in Potrero Hill, inside the Mason on Mariposa building, and its signature box of six vanilla bean and rum canelés is $28.50 for pickup. Google Maps lists 8 am to 3 pm Wednesday to Friday and 9 am to 4 pm on weekends. For a french bakery near me on the east side of the city, this is the canelé specialist.

Michelle Hernández grew up in the East Bay, studied at Cal and saved for years, taking French classes at night, before moving to Paris in 2008 for Le Grand Diplôme at Le Cordon Bleu, according to Mission Local and the SF Standard. She stayed to cook in Michelin-starred kitchens on both the savory and pastry sides. The bakery's name, Le Dix-Sept, refers to the 17th arrondissement, the Paris quarter where she lived.

She started the business in 2011 as a street vendor, selling pastries at a Friday pop-up outside a gallery at 22nd and Guerrero, then at the Noe Valley Farmers Market, Mission Local reported. She also helped Dandelion Chocolate develop a chocolate canelé. Her first shop opened on 18th Street in the Mission in 2020, and the Potrero Hill location opened on the first weekend of November 2024. The website now directs customers to Carolina Street.

The SF Standard's Sara Deseran called Hernández the city's queen of canelé, and explained why the small Bordeaux cake is hard to get right: beeswax lines expensive fluted copper molds, the batter rests for two days, and the crust has to caramelize to just short of burnt. Hernández collects the molds and has bought them directly from the Mauviel factory in Normandy. The result is a nearly black shell with a rummy, custardy, honeycombed center.

Hernández describes Le Dix-Sept as botanically inspired, working flowers, herbs, teas, honey and cacao into her pastry. The About page names the signature items as nougat, canelés, brioche, focaccia, love knots, gluten-free almond tarts and celebration cakes. The almond tart with passionfruit crème, which is gluten free, is $17 for two pieces on the pre-order shop, and the buckwheat brownie cookie with white sesame and cacao nibs is $14 for two.

Regulars on Google Maps keep returning to items that are not on the pre-order list: the pistachio croissant, which one reviewer called her favorite lately, the pandan bread, a chocolate brioche, and drinks such as matcha, pistachio milk and a hojicha cloud. The savory side is the 8-by-11-inch vegan focaccia slab, seasoned with olive oil, oregano, red pepper and sea salt, $24 to take home for a dinner party.

When the SF Standard visited the opening, it described lilac walls, brasserie-inspired chandeliers, pink and cream tile floors and gold and bronze accents, a jewel-box design that makes the shop feel more like Paris than the surrounding mixed-use block. Google reviewers mention cute outdoor seats, and the owner answers reviews herself, thanking regulars by name. Expect counter service, a short line on weekend mornings, and a team that will explain each pastry if you ask.

The press shelf is unusually long for a small neighborhood bakery. The homepage links a clip of Phil Rosenthal tasting his first Le Dix-Sept canelé and calling it the best one ever, a KRON4 segment where Hernández demonstrates one of her specialties, an Eater feature and an episode of the Radio Cherry Bombe podcast about her move from corporate fashion into pastry. She has also been featured in the Wall Street Journal and San Francisco Magazine.

Pre-ordering is the way to guarantee canelés and tarts. As of October 2026 the online shop already lists its Thanksgiving menu, with an $80 pumpkin speculoos tart, a $65 passionfruit almond tart and a $100 pistachio cake, and a holiday menu with a $75 dark chocolate and cacao caramel tart. Celebration cakes are the high end, starting at $400 for a six-inch, six-layer cake. The homepage says the team was honored to make a birthday cake for Jacques Pépin's 90th and is baking the cake for Claude the Alligator's 30th birthday party at the California Academy of Sciences.

The shop is closed Monday and Tuesday, and weekday hours end at 3 pm, so plan a morning visit. Weekends open an hour later, at 9 am. An honest note for first-timers: skip the merch shelf of T-shirts, mugs and hair clips, unless you collect bakery souvenirs, and put the money toward a second canelé. If the case runs low, Parachute Bakery's award-winning croissants at the Ferry Building are the nearest serious alternative, a short drive or rideshare north.

Potrero Hill rewards a walk after pastry. Jackson Playground is a block north, near 17th Street, and the streets climbing south toward 20th Street open up views of downtown and the Bay Bridge. Keep going to Vermont Street between 20th and 22nd, the hill's own crooked street, which has the switchbacks of Lombard without the tourist traffic, and come back down via the small 18th Street shopping strip around Connecticut Street, where the neighborhood keeps its cafés and corner stores.

Address: 455 Carolina Street, San Francisco, CA 94107, in the Mason on Mariposa building. Hours on Google Maps: Wednesday to Friday 8 am to 3 pm, Saturday and Sunday 9 am to 4 pm, closed Monday and Tuesday. Online pre-order prices: six canelés $28.50, two passionfruit almond tarts $17, two buckwheat brownie cookies $14, vegan focaccia slab $24. Order through ledixsept.com for pickup.