Peninsula Bakery, Palm Springs
My daughter, Charley, calls it “the little pink box.” Peninsula Bakery, the patisserie and boulangerie on South Palm Canyon, is decidedly pink and small, though the flavors of their pastries are incredible and the aroma when one opens the door and enters is seductive. However, it wasn’t until I arrived home one day with a bakery box filled with macrons that I understood what she meant. Delicious things come in little pink boxes.
Ten years ago, Parisians Christophe and Hélène Meyer visited Palm Springs and fell in love, as Christophe says, with “the diversity of people. Palm Springs in an open city that makes you feel free.” Meyer did his pastry apprenticeship and was a pastry chef at a great restaurant near Paris, so he and his wife’s plan “was to bring a French touch by producing a product of quality…for a sophisticated American clientale.” Charley and my favorite is the Lemon Curd Tartlet with the chocolate smiley face, though we never leave the stop without a few chocolate croissants. For celebrations, it’s the Chocolate Ganache Cake. For the holidays, and especially Christmas dinner, you have to order Meyer’s traditional Yule Log (Bûche de Noël), a roll of sponge cake and butter cream that will prompt you to start your Lenten fast right after your last unctuous bite. Meyer’s perfect versions come in four flavors: Grand Marnier, chocolate, cherry amarena, and moka.
Sherman’s Deli and Bakery, Palm Springs and Palm Desert
Sure, you came for the corned beef on rye or because the temperature briefly dropped below 60 degrees, a bowl of matzo ball soup. But somehow, someway, you can’t resist something from the bakery. Is it the cherry cheesecake or the red velvet cake? We’re not telling. To assuage your guilt, you buy a bag of rughala to take home to the family. Sherman’s makes theirs in-house and it’s impossible to choose between the cinnamon, chocolate, apricot, and raspberry. So don’t. Three of each makes an even dozen. Hanukkah Sameach!
Tiffany’s Sweet Spot
Ben and Tiffany Thorpe began their business out of their home in 2012 by making decorative cookies, but as Tiffany says, “It’s the cupcakes that have become the stars of the show.” The La Quinta bakery offers cupcakes in 21 “every day” flavors and on days when they get special orders for weddings or birthdays, they sometimes churn out over a thousand cupcakes in a day with flavors like Cookies and Cream, Scotchmallow (chocolate cake, marshmallow, and caramel) or Tres Leches. During December, they rotate in a number of holiday flavors such as Gingerbread, Peppermint Mocha, Eggnog, Cranberry, and Christmas Velvet (red velvet in Christmas colors). Order in advance and deck the halls with lots of cupcakes.
