Paradise Lost

So you may remember my post where I was so excited about the Paradise Bakery opening up in my town (actually, I can't find it to link to it, so maybe I just imagined that I actually wrote it.) At any rate, this summer I passed by the "coming soon" sign almost every day, and every day my anticipation grew. Backtrack to only a few months ago, there was nowhere in my town to get good pastries and baked goods (which are the love of my life). You could go to a restaurant for dessert, but there was nowhere you could just walk in and pick up something delicious and delightful if the mood hit you. But soon came Flour Girls and Dough Boys. YUM. Their desserts are indeed delicious, especially my new fave, the chocolate tart. But they close at 8pm and sometimes I fancy something sweet a bit later, like 10pm or 2am. And I'm still on my quest for some truly wonderful cheesecake, which FG&DB's doesn't have. So I needed a back-up plan. And I was hoping the Paradise Bakery would be it. So imagine my delight when I saw the "Grand Opening" sign up the other day. I wanted to think of some way to get my husband to meet me there without any argument, so I quickly created a new email account with a sexy/slutty user name and emailed my husband anonymously to meet me at 562 W Main at 5:30 that evening. I was wondering if he would know it was me. I thought it might be kind of funny to see if he showed up. Either way, I was going to the Paradise Bakery. If I had to eat baked goods alone, so be it.

As it turns out, my husband was only confused/intrigued for a few seconds until he googled that address and saw where the location was. Then he had no doubts whatsoever about who hotbootymama99 was. So, flash forward to 5:45 (my dearest is almost always late. Plus he googled the satellite version of the map and thought I had gone to the also recently opened, right next door, Olive Garden and walked around there twice before calling me to figure out where I was) and we finally got up to the counter to order. I'm actually arriving at the point of my post here, so pay attention.... I was VERY disappointed in the Paradise Bakery!!! First of all, that place has NO right to call itself a bakery. They make cookies. that's it! Cookies. Oh, and they had some very suspect pre-sliced pieces of carrot cake . Well, I am a staunch believer that you should not use the term "bakery" lightly. It conjures up images of a room strewn with delectable desserts. Counter tops covered in cookies, cases crammed with cakes, towers of tortes, a plethora of pies, and all kinds of other alliterative delicacies on every surface. A place that serves salads, sandwiches, and soups and also has 6 kinds of freshly baked cookies is NOT A BAKERY. Even if they make their own bread, which I'm not sure of because I spent the whole time walking around in a daze of denial looking for cheesecake and tiramisu, they should be very very careful about using the term bakery.

In the end, I got a Thai chicken wrap where the whole thing was startlingly cold ( I guess I expected it to be warm) and the rice in it was crunchy and hard (EW). And I forced myself to get a piece of the carrot cake just so my trip wasn't a complete waste of time. Surprise--it was gooey with large hunks of very firm, cold, raisins and very little cake. Can you imagine anything grosser??? On the plus side, the ambiance was nice. The place was clean. And, being brand new, it was very well staffed with exceptionally perky and undertrained teenagers. But even that could not make up for being tricked into eating a Thai chicken wrap in place of something involving marzipan, cream, and chocolate ganache.

Summary: Paradise Bakery is a sandwich shop that serves cookies, may or may not bake their own bread, and most assuredly will not be seeing my face again. Unless said cookies are available at 2am. Then maybe.