Business & Tech
Good Looks Can't Make Up for Mediocre Taste
Le Patisserie offers beautiful pastries, but only some of them have beautiful flavor.
All of the baked goods at Skokie’s are beautiful. The problem is that some of them don’t have the flavor to match their good looks.
The small bakery at 3455 W. Dempster St. specializes in custom cakes for weddings, birthdays and other special events--some samples are prominently displayed in its window. Other products are displayed under glass or shelves inside, including boxes of cookies, cheesecake, fruit tarts and cakes shaped like women wearing fancy dresses.
The family-owned shop uses only fresh and natural ingredients and everything is made from scratch.
Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.
The store was empty when we visited, but a woman quickly emerged from the back room to take our orders at the counter. The shop stocks cookies and cupcakes along with traditional Romanian pastries, and our server was good at explaining the ingredients of the unfamiliar treats that interested us.
She was also happy to pull out trays so that we could get a better look and take some photos. There are no seats at the store, so we picked up a few things to try and headed home for a tasting.
Interested in local real estate?Subscribe to Patch's new newsletter to be the first to know about open houses, new listings and more.
The amandine ($2.80) had been highly recommended and it turned out to be a great choice. The dessert features a rich chocolate top over spongy chocolate cake, with the light base making it easy to just keep eating.
The tiramisu ($2.80) was also excellent, blending light, fluffy cake with layers of cream, cinnamon and bitter chocolate for a wonderfully layered taste.
We were divided on the honey cake ($2.80), which turned out to basically be graham crackers layered with honey and cream. I really like graham crackers, so I enjoyed it, but my friends ranked it as their least favorite of the cakes we tried.
We all agreed that the chocolate dobos ($2.80) was a big disappointment. The layered pastry’s chocolate cream was very good, but the dense chocolate top didn’t have much flavor and the cake had even less.
We also didn’t care for the rum balls ($3.50), and wound up throwing away most of those left in the box. The bite-sized balls were similar to dense chocolate donut holes covered in shredded coconut. A love of coconut was not enough to make up for the bitter cake, which only offered any good taste when you got a bite with a rum-soaked raisin.
While I’d eat a few items from Le Patisserie again, I think I'll just look at them next time and save myself the calories.