Category Archives: Bakeries

Sweet Breams Are Made of This…

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Something fishy is going on...

Who am I to disagree

Travel the world and seven seas

Everybody’s looking for something…

as cute and precious as these.

With apologies to the Eurythmics, I just couldn’t get that song out of my head when I visited this unusual Japanese bakery in San Mateo, Sweet Breams. It specializes in taiyaki — tiny, filled waffles shaped like fish that are made to order.

When I taught a class recently at nearby Draeger’s, Cooking School Editor Cynthia Liu told me I had to stop by Sweet Breams. Good thing I listened.

Owner Tara Wong, who lived in Tokyo for a spell, got hooked on these adorable snacks as a child when she’d visit May’s Coffee Shop in San Francisco’s Japantown, where they also are made.

Traditional taiyaki are about 5-inches long. Wong thought there would be an even greater appetite for smaller ones. Hers are about 2 inches long, and made with waffle irons imported from Japan. There are four waffle irons. Each is named after one of the Beatles. And yes, she laughs, “Paul” is the most consistent one.

Azuki- and Nutella-filled fish.

She opened her shop about six months ago, and word is already spreading about it. Folks have come from as far as Sacramento to get their fix of the dainty, crispy, warm treats made from a smooth batter of both all-purpose and cake flours.

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New Dessert Shop, New Kids’ Menu, New Wine

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Frozen yogurt with Valhrona chocolate rice pearls and sunflower seeds. (Photo courtesy of Chill).

There’s a chill in the air in San Francisco — in more ways than one.

Chill is a new dessert cafe, 125 Kearny St. in downtown San Francisco across the street from the Crocker Galleria. Owner Trang Nguyen, who sports an MBA and work experience at Kraft Foods and Revlon, serves up unique sweets with global influences.

Low-fat, all-natural frozen yogurt comes in flavors such as original tart, black sesame, and rooibos red tea. There’s also vanilla frozen custard to give you goose bumps. Choose from toppings such as chocolate agave, black sugar, and dulce de leche.

Crispy crepe cone with frozen custard and strawberries. (Photo courtesy of Chill)

Or enjoy those offerings in concoctions such as Black Sesame Fig ($5.25), a mix of fig puree, grape syrup, organic condensed milk, and black sesame fro-yo, all on a bed of shave ice. Or have it all stuffed in a crispy crepe cone. How about Banana Walnuts ($5.75), a crepe cone filled with banana chips, walnuts, dulce de leche syrup, and frozen yogurt?

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Bouchon Bakery Donuts — For Early-Risers Only

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I’d known about these elusive donuts for awhile. I just never managed to get to Bouchon Bakery in Yountville early enough to snag any.

Until last Sunday.

You see, in addition to the usual variety of baguettes, nutter butter cookie sandwiches, and flaky-beyond-belief croissants, the bakery makes a limited quantity of donuts only on Saturday and Sunday mornings. It amounts to a mere couple dozen of each type of donut offered each day.

They are made in the fryer at next-door Bouchon Bistro before it opens for lunch. Once the doors to the bistro open, the fryer is tied up with orders of irresistible frites instead.

When I arrived at the bakery about 9:40 a.m. last Sunday, there were already about half a dozen people in line, and another half dozen sitting at outside tables, sipping coffee and noshing on brioche and macaroons.

As I inched my way through the doorway, I spotted them — three different types of donuts on the wooden back shelf where all the bread was. There were only about nine donuts left. My heart sank, thinking the people in front of me might buy them all.

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Trick Or Treat Time With Sprinkles Cupcakes

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Halloween cupcakes (Photo courtesy of Sprinkles)

Sprinkles Cupcakes fans will be glad to know that through Oct. 31, they can buy a boxed dozen that will guarantee a frosting-filled Halloween.

The “BOO” box features three of the bakery’s most popular flavors: vanilla milk chocolate, black and white, and red velvet — plus limited-edition caramel apple cupcakes. The cupcakes come decorated with cute little ghosts, too.

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Cupcake-itis

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Clockwise from back: Strawberry-filled vanilla, chocolate, peanut butter-filled chocolate, and marble cupcakes.

I blame this on Nate of the House of Annie blog.

After returning from my Los Angeles vacation, where I made the rounds of bakeries, I thought I was done with nibbling on cupcakes. At least for a little while.

But then Nate had to tell me that one of my favorite South Bay bakeries had started making cupcakes.

Darn him. Darn him.

So, of course, I had to try them.  Calories be damned.

Off I went to Sugar Butter Flour’s original location in Sunnyvale (there’s a second one in Campbell now, too). Last year when I was still writing for the San Jose Mercury News’ food section, I had picked Sugar Butter Flour’s pastry chef-partner, Irit Ishai, as one of the top pastry chefs in the South Bay. Consider her resume: Former pastry chef at Sent Sovi in Saratoga under then-Executive Chef David Kinch; former pastry chef of Kinch’s subsequent restaurant, Manresa in Los Gatos; and an apprentice at Fleur de Cocoa in Los Gatos, owned by Pastry Chef Pascal Janvier, whom I also singled out in that same story as a stellar pastry chef.

Sugar Butter Flour’s cupcakes are $3 each. I picked one of each available that day to cart home: a strawberry-filled vanilla cupcake, a marble cupcake topped with chocolate buttercream, a chocolate cupcake with a white squiggle a la Hostess, and a peanut butter-filled chocolate cupcake with peanut butter buttercream.

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