BestSweets

Best Cupcakes in the U.S.

Filed under: Dining

Luxist Readers have nominated their favorite cupcake bakeries and the top five are:

Baked (Brooklyn, N.Y.)
Crumbs Bake Shop (New York, N.Y.)
Magnolia Bakery (New York, N.Y.)
Sprinkles (Los Angeles, Ca.)
SusieCakes (Los Angeles, Ca.)

Gallery: America's Best Cupcakes

Vote for the company you believe makes the best cupcakes. Readers' Choice Winners will be announced on March 1st.

Tags: awards-main, baked, baked new york, BakedNewYork, best bakeries, best bakery, best cupcake, best sweets, BestBakeries, BestBakery, BestCupcake, BestSweets, crumbs, Crumbs Bake Shop, CrumbsBakeShop, katie holmes, KatieHolmes, luxist-awards, magnolia bakery, MagnoliaBakery, russell crowe, RussellCrowe, sprinkles, sprinkles cupcakes, SprinklesCupcakes, susiecakes, sweets-main, tyra banks, TyraBanks

Continue reading “Best Cupcakes in the U.S.”

Max Brenner: Chocolate by the Bald Man

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Take a walk along the block just south of Union Square in New York, and you'll see an image of a fictional bald man who has reshaped the face of chocolate. Though Max Brenner himself doesn't exist, the company that bears his name is up for a Luxist Readers' Choice Award in the best truffles category.

Founded in 1996 in Israel, Max Brenner bears the combined names of its originators Max Fichtman and Oded Brenner. The company opened ten stores in the Holy Land in its first three years; in 2001, Max Brenner was purchased by Strauss Group, a large food conglomerate. Five years later, the company made its first foray into the U.S. market.

Gallery: More from Max Brenner

Today, Max Brenner boasts locations in Australia, Israel, Philippines, Singapore and the U.S. Walk into a store in New York and delicacies on the menu include The Melting Chocolate Truffle Heart Cake, served with vanilla bourbon ice cream, red berries and milk chocolate ($13), and White Chocolate Truffle Carrot Cake, which comes with orange and mint salad, whipped cream, and a milk chocolate granita chaser ($12).

For those who live outside of Max's chocolatey radius, a delicious array options are available online. In the truffle department, there's the liqueur-drenched Luxury White Truffle With Coconut ($15) and the fine cocoa-imbued Luxury Gingerbread Truffle ($15), among others.

Vote for the company you believe makes the best truffles. Readers' Choice Winners will be announced on March 1st.

Tags: awards-main, best sweets, best truffles, BestSweets, BestTruffles, chocolate, luxist-awards, max brenner, MaxBrenner, sweets-main

Sweet Adeline Bake Shop: Local and Organic Cookies from the Bay Area

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Though it's a single-store operation in California and doesn't ship its wares beyond the Golden State, Sweet Adeline Bake Shop's cookies are so delicious that they've been nominated for a Luxist award anyway.

Located at the intersection of Adeline and 63rd Streets in Berkeley, Sweet Adeline is owned and operated by Jennifer Millar. A Culinary Institute of America chef, Millar gained early experience working for Jam's, Bud's and Hulot's in New York; in 1988, she moved to California and became pastry chef at Square One in San Francisco before starting Sweet Adeline.

Today, Sweet Adeline is one of the Bay Area's best cookie makers. Its offerings include the bittersweet chocolate cookie, praline cookie, ginger cookie, peanut butter cookie; beyond cookies, the bakery offers a host of breads, tarts, pies and cakes. Everything is made in small batches, and most of the ingredients used are organic and local. The bakery's fruit usually comes from the vendors at the Berkeley Farmers' Market.

Sweet Adeline also specializes in baking cakes. Favorites include The Americana, a dark-chocolate, Devil's-Food-style cake that's filled and iced with a creamy dark chocolate ganache (9-inch cake: $35) and the Rigo Jancsi, a chocolate soufflé filled with chocolate ganache and raspberry jam or fresh raspberries, glazed in chocolate (9-inch cake: $40).

Vote for the company you believe makes the best cookies. Readers' Choice Winners will be announced on March 1st.

Tags: berkeley, best bakery, best cookie, best sweets, BestBakery, BestCookie, BestSweets, luxist-awards, sweet adeline, sweet adelines bakeshop, SweetAdeline, SweetAdelinesBakeshop

SusieCakes: California Dreamin' About Cakes

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

SusieCakes is a nominee for a Readers' Choice Award for Best Cake.

The Los Angeles, Ca.-based company was launched in 2006 by Susan Sarich. The inspiration behind the company's founding was Sarich's childhood in Chicago. Each day, she used to arrive home from school to a warm kitchen filled with the smell of baking and treats fresh from the oven. Her two grandmothers, who were also neighbors, loved to bake, from frosted sugar cookies to Whoopie pies and chocolate layer cakes.

To this day, Sarich is captivated by what those desserts symbolized. "Baked goods are hallmarks of happiness," says Sarich. "Whether we're celebrating a holiday or a specific event, we want them to be as unique as the day." It was a combination of Sarich's sweet tooth and nostalgia for the homemade desserts of her childhood that led her to open SusieCakes.

Gallery: More from SusieCakes

SusieCakes is famous for its custom layer, stacked and sheet cakes, as well as its signature six-layer "Cupcake" cake. Custom orders are also accepted with advance notice.

Tags: awards-main, best cake, best cupcake, best sweets, BestCake, BestCupcake, BestSweets, luxist-awards, susiecakes, sweets-main

Continue reading “SusieCakes: California Dreamin' About Cakes”