Showing posts with label pastry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pastry. Show all posts

Monday, January 12, 2015

L'Amande Bakery: A Little Parisian Haven in Beverly Hills

L'Amande On Santa Monica Blvd in Beverly Hills is a charming bakery called L'Amande. What looks like a normal storefront from the outside leads into a bright and lovely space. High ceiling, spacious, charming decor.

Now, the baked goods themselves. I think this bakery makes one of the baguettes in town. They make them throughout the day so you can always get one still fresh and warm from the oven!

L'Amande
I couldn't stop eating these baguettes. I got one fresh from the oven and it was perfect. The only baguette that might be better in town is the one Chef Ludo uses at Petit Trois, but you can't really buy those retail. As far as baguettes that you can just go and buy whenever you want, these may be some of the best in town.

As far as other baked goods go, one of their signature items is the Raspberry cream cheese croissant

L'Amande

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Pumpkin Kouign Amann at B Patisserie (San Francisco, CA)

Because fall is the season for pumpkin desserts, I'm reminded of the absolutely amazing pumpkin kouign amann that I had last year at Belinda Leong's b.patisserie in San Francisco.

B Patisserie
In the first place, I love kouign amann. It's better than a sweet croissant (well, maybe). It's better than a cronut (yes, I had the real thing). It's a pastry folded with butter and sugar and baked until the sugar caramelizes.

Secondly, the kouign amann at B Patisserie is really, really good. It's better than Dominique Ansel's DKA, if I can be so bold to say so. Top all that off with the fact that sometimes you'll find seasonal fillings. Like pumpkin. Like delicious, creamy pumpkin filling.
B Patisserie

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

A Breakfast Tour of Downtown LA's Grand Central Market

Grand Central Market in downtown Los Angeles is one of the most exciting food destinations lately, with tons of new vendors opening up shop. I was recently invited to a breakfast tour of some of these vendors, new and old. Since it's breakfast, we of course started with G&B Coffee.

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Not only do they have amazing coffee and cappuccino (with almond milk!), you can also get Donut Snob's amazing donuts here.
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Our next stop was Sticky Rice.
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What we had for breakfast was actually a snack that they will have in the afternoons, Kanom Krok. They have a special pan to make these delicious little coconut custard cakes.
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Saturday, March 16, 2013

Eastbound Food Caravan, Part 1: Taza (Arcadia, CA) and Falafel Me(Azusa, CA)

I wouldn't typically consider going all the way to Azusa, not to mention Upland, but when Carl, the PR for Falafel Me, offers to pick up and drive me along with other bloggers, my answer was "why not!"

Our food caravan started with coffee and breakfast at Taza: a Social Coffeehouse, in Arcadia.

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Taza is different than most "coffee shops" in Arcadia and SGV. Instead of boba drinks, they serve Handsome Roaster coffee.
On the weekends, the place gets even more special with pastries and croissants from Sharon Wang's Sugarbloom. Sharon, who comes in only on the weekends to showcase her pastries, had worked for Thomas Keller.

My favorite of her creations was the Spam musubi croissant. It isn't cheap at $4, especially for SGV standards, but it wasn't only the novelty of spam musubi, the croissant itself was perfectly buttery and flaky. I think it's definitely worth a try and worth returning for.
Spam Musubi Croissant

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Perfect Croissants and More for Brunch at Luca on Sunset

About a month ago, e*starLA blogged that Luca on Sunset has the best pastries in West Hollywood, so when I got invited for a brunch tasting, I was quite excited. Little did I know I would be in for an eight-course brunch!

Our brunch started with a spread of the pastries we couldn't get enough of:
croissant, almond croissant, chocolate brioche, scone, apple danish, blueberry muffin, sweet potato speck biscuit, citrus poppy seed muffin

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The pastry chef at Luca, Rebecca West, apparently was a runway model in France, where she lived off of coffee and croissants. When that career had to end, she thought making croissants was the logical next step!
Well, it's true. The croissants are definitely some of the best I've had from the buttery plain croissant to the flaky chocolate brioche. I had been looking for a good pain du chocolat or something similar ever since Bite Bar closed, now I've found one.
If I didn't have the menu of the other seven courses in front of me as a reminder, I would eat all of them. ALL.

Unlike the muffins at most bakeries where they drop a few blueberries at the top so they're visible but there's nothing inside, Luca's muffin is chock full of blueberries inside!
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Thursday, July 21, 2011

Mini Tarts, Mini Arts at Früute

Cupcakes are old news and cookies are ubiquitous. It's time for delicately crafted mini tarts with creative flavors. Welcome Früute in West Hollywood.

Früute is a collaboration of two sisters and their mother. The mother develops the recipes for the tarts, the daughter (at least one of them) brings her experience in branding. It's a tiny shop on Santa Monica Blvd serving gorgeous tiny tarts like this Wasabi with blood orange center, frangipane in pistachio crust, garnished with mint leaf tempura.

Wasabi Tart
There are more than a dozen flavors now, which you can check out on their website (the photos there are beautiful). The mini tarts go for $3 each, which I initially considered expensive for the size, but considering that  a cup-sized cake dough and a piece of cookie these days go for $3, these meticulously crafted tarts are of better value.

Friday, March 18, 2011

La Monarca Bakery: Pastries, Lunch, and Cakes to Save Monarch Butterflies

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This East LA institution has finally moved west with its opening of La Monarca Bakery Santa Monica. This place fits surprisingly well with the Santa Monica with its healthier pastries (low butter, low sugar, nothing is fried, vegetarian options) and the price is lower than most bakeries in the area.

The executive pastry chef Alain Bour is actually a France native and trained, and he combines classic techniques with Mexican flavors, like their croissant filled with guava paste or dulce de leche. Browsing their pastry case may be overwhelming (it's self-serve), so here are some suggestions.
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Make sure you try the tacos de guayaba,a sugar-dusted puff pastry filled with guava and cream cheese ($1.50).
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It's a different style but it gives Porto's guava cheese roll a run for its money. The pastry shell isn't the flaky type and I do think I prefer the guava paste here. One is never enough.

Their pan de elote is a sweeter version of corn bread and also worth a try.

Also try the Cafe Oaxaca ($3.75), made with espresso, mexican hot chocolate, and steamed milk.
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They have free wi-fi and you can count on me coming here to work over some cafe oaxaca.

For the lunch crowd, there are different types cazuelas (Mexican claypot stew) served as sandwiches. Choose between Poblano chicken mole, Salsa Verde braised beef, or even a vegetarian chorizo, then choose your bread size.
Cazuelas

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Huckleberry: Pastry Gastroerotica

You wait in line for 5-10 minutes along the pastry case to place your order, staring at all the pastries. How can you not buy pastries? Staring at these:
And these:

I came in for brunch. I came out stuffed, carrying leftovers and a box of pastries to go. ("You know you want me," they were saying!)

Putting off eating the pastries, I chowed down on the Green Eggs & Ham (La Quercia Prosciutto, housemade english muffin - $12.00)
Poached eggs. Pesto sauce. Prosciutto. Arugula. A combination that I'll never turn down anywhere. Nicely poached eggs, good prosciutto. Pesto sauce was also great, flavorful but not overwhelming. English muffins were nicely toasted, except that the bottom became too hard to cut easily with a regular knife and so some were left on the table. I can eat this any day and be happy.

My friend had the Niman Ranch beef stew, which was a special that day, served with some baguette.
Hearty, and delicious! the beef was moist and tender and full of flavor. The stew was a little salty but eating it with the baguette (which was also great by itself) was just perfect.

Portions here are quite generous, I certainly came out full.

Back home, I munched on some pastries, including this Kouign Amann ($1.50)
Crispy, flakey, moist and nicely dusted with cinnamon & sugar. It wasn't too sticky nor too sweet. A great little treat. Now I just need my tea and I'm set.

The donut was also quite good. It was right in the middle in terms of dense vs. fluffy.
These pastries aren't anything 'fancy' but they are all made very well with high quality ingredients. They're also not cheap but you sure get what you pay for (although, no, I haven't been able to get myself to buy the $8.50 crostata. Can't pass that "What? $8 for pastry?" barrier). I haven't had a single disappointing thing. Yet. But again, ain't cheap (the cooked food, in comparison, was actually relatively inexpensive).

Huckleberry Cafe
1014 Wilshire Blvd.
Santa Monica, CA 90401
(310) 451-1322
www.huckleberrycafe.com
Huckleberry on Urbanspoon

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