If you know me, you know that I love to bake. What I love about baking is the creativity behind it. I can bake a cake and decorate it and then by the time I'm done I have no interest in eating it. The lack of interest has nothing to do with whether or not it will taste good, but everything to do with the fact that I already did the fun part! I'm artsy, what can you do? I always love going to bakeries. I enjoy trying new things and looking at the work that others do. When someone else has made it, I enjoy eating it as much as I do looking at it. Also, since being pregnant I have been craving sweets like nobody's business! So, while here in San Antonio, I have been scanning through my trusty urbanspoon app and have discovered several places I want to try. Today is the glorious, bakery-hunting, day! Joey is off, it's a beautiful (and by beautiful I mean as hot as the place below!) day, and we are both in the mood for some goodies!
Our first stop was Lily's Cookies. This place was so cute! It's a bakery dedicated to all things cookie related!
They had a cookie bar, which had around fifteen different cookie jars on it! Every jar held a different kind of cookie and you could make your own mix. They had everything from red velvet crinkle cookies to Mexican wedding cookies, chocolate chip to ranger cookies! Seriously, cookie heaven. I couldn't get a real great picture of the cookie bar but there is an awesome picture on their website. From the cookie bar, we tried a Mexican wedding cookie, Texas honey, and toffee almond crunch. Each of them was delicious. The Texas honey surprised me the most. What surprised me was it tasted a lot like a spice cookie and was very soft. Lily's sells their cookies from the jars for just $0.65 each or $7 a dozen. That little detail, coupled with their delicious variety and taste, makes this bakery very dangerous!
Lily's also had a case full of decorated cookies. There was just too much cuteness to describe! Today, the cookies in the case were to celebrate the San Antonio Zoo's 100th birthday. They change from week to week I believe. Either way, they were super cute! I chose the pink hippo. I couldn't help myself! I have been wanting to try to make frosted cookies like these for a while now. When we are settled (we're in a transition phase) and all of our kitchen things are in one place again, I will be trying this and more than likely sharing the experience on here. More to come on iced cookies. I left feeling very inspired though.
As though cookies were not enough, they also had a few different kinds of dessert bars. We tried the lemon bar and the snicker's brownie. Oh. My. Goodness. Lemon bar = heaven! The crust was amazing! It had no powdered sugar on top, so I didn't choke by accidentally inhaling it, which was a plus. Everyone does it. I am not ashamed. The Lemon bar tasted like lemon meringue pie with out the meringue. Yummy. The snickers bar? Super sweet, but amazing! I'm sure Joey will be asking me to figure out how to make those soon. He loves his peanut butter and chocolate! My favorites were the lemon bar and the iced cookie. I will definitely go back at least once more while I'm here. The only downside to Lily's Cookies was the hours. They close at 5:30 during the week and are only open until 3:00 on Saturday. We caught them just before they closed and I am so glad we made it!
Our second stop was unplanned and also right at closing time. Joseph's Storehouse and Bakery was on our way back home from Lily's and claimed to be the best bakery in San Antonio so we had to stop in.
They were closing but still had a decent selection. Joey chose the snickerdoodle and I chose the danish. First of all, please notice the size of these things! HUGE! You can hardly see my fingers around the cookie when I hold it! The danish was a cheese danish and was amazing. It reminded me of the one my mom buys from Emerson's back in Kentucky. The dough you could tell was made from scratch. So yummy. The snickerdoodle was also quite yummy. I only had one bite though. By that time, there was probably enough sugar in my body to sink a ship. I didn't totally fall in love with Joseph's or get the feeling that it was somewhere I HAD to go again, but it was still yummy. Another downside was the customer service wasn't great. We waited a rather long time while one employee was on the phone and the others were just walking around not really doing anything. Overall, not crazy about it. I could find a better bakery. That's just what we did!
The last stop of the day was a cute little place called Nothing Bundt Cakes.
As soon as you walked in the door you could feel the energy. It was bright, cheerful and welcoming. The concept of this bakery was all bundt cakes. The bundt cakes came in all different sizes, from the normal size to "bundtlets" to "bundtinis". Nothing Bundt Cakes (NBC) had adorable artificial cakes all over the place to show you different decorating options. As soon as we walked in one of the employees offered us a sample of the cinnamon swirl flavor. It was so moist and delicious! Nine different flavors were sold as well as a seasonal flavor that changes monthly. Joey and I agreed on the white chocolate raspberry bundtlet to share and it even came in adorable packaging. We had intended to try it after dinner as our one year anniversary cake, but we were too stuffed from dinner. For dinner we went to a Brazilian steakhouse which was one of the coolest dining experiences! More on dinner later. We still have yet to try our cake, but if it's as good as the sample, we have nothing to worry about. NBC was a great experience all around. You could tell the designer of the store took everything into account. They even had merchandise such as, kitchen gloves with mustaches and lips, a spatula called the battter finger, and all sorts of cake picks and candles! I would definitely go back to NBC. It was such an inviting bakery!
Overall, we had an awesome time bakery-hopping! I really enjoyed spending the time together as a family sharing something as simple as good dessert. I can't wait to go back and try more new things or even hunt down other gems! For now, I need to finish my pink hippo cookie, brush my teeth, and head to bed.
I am intensely jealous!!!
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