Random Post: Restaurant Review - 85° Bakery Cafe in San Diego, CA

Since Josh and I like to go out on occasion and I have a penchant for photographing my food, I figured I would review some restaurants and places around town! You know, in case any of you come to visit. ;)

For my birthday a few weeks ago, Josh and I decided to get a few snacks at the relatively new 85° Bakery Cafe, a Taiwanese chain that sells coffee and desserts. This place is always really crowded, and since it's less than a year old and the next closest store is in Irvine, about 90 miles away, well, you can be sure we had to get there early!

The storefront in all its glory. Basically, what you do is you go inside, you get a tray and a set of tongs and you load your tray up with whatever pastries, sweet and savory, you want to try! When there is fresh bread, someone will come out from the back and scream "FRESH BREAD!!!" and there will generally be massive amounts of trampling and almost murder and such, but since we went at 11am on a Tuesday, well, there was no fun, but still a relatively large amount of people for that time of day. Here's what we got!

As a huge coffee fan (read: addict), a billion and one friends told me to try their sea salt iced coffee, a specialty they are known for all over the map. And so I did. I love the salty/sweet combination in desserts, but in coffee, I felt like I was drinking caffeinated ocean water, and even though I didn't hate it, it definitely was not for me. The creaminess was good, but it needed a bit more sweetness to counteract all the salt. Yikes. This must be an acquired taste.

Josh's first pick was an apple tart. Though it looks nice and sweet on the outside, don't let its looks be deceiving. Though the crust was fine and the ring of cinnamon apples on top was a welcomed site, the inside apple filling had a weird taste to it. It was mushy, like puree, which I like, but the taste was sort of bitter and salty. Pass for both of us on this one.

My first pick was the classic egg tart. I have had this before when a few friends of mine brought one back for us to try from the Irvine store. WOW. Just as good as I remembered it. Flaky crust, almost like a croissant, and an eggy, slightly sweet inside singing my name. I should have gotten 3 of these and called it a day. VERY buttery, so don't be on a diet when you eat this. A must try!!

Josh's second pick. He is an anything, everything kind of chocolate lover, so when he saw this chocolate sponge roll cake, he thought he had died and gone to heaven. Wrong. The cake was very dry and tasted kind of like the inside of a Ho-Ho, but without the chocolate and sweetness and fun. And bigger. And spongier. And nastier. The filling was like a buttercream without the powdered sugar. Another pass from both of us on this item.

My second choice. This tasty delicacy is called Milk Pudding bread and OMG. I AM ADDICTED. We haven't been back here yet, but I have had dreams about this baby every night since. Oh man. So good. The bread was sticky and gooey, reflective of its insides. A creamy, satisfyingly sweet custard after 2 sweet-duds was welcomed on my palate and oh. so. tender. YUM. I need another few hundred of these, please.

Our mutual pick: the sun tart? The sun cookie? The sun pastry? (OH! I am a genius! I took a photo of the receipt!) Either way, it was gross and definitely not for us. It tasted very chalky, even though it looks super fresh and flaky, we were sorely disappointed with this as it came highly recommended by friends. Maybe it's just a little too weird for us weirdos.

$13.20 ain't bad for all this stuff. We mostly split everything, except he let me have the entire milk pudding because he didn't like the stickiness. MY GAIN!!
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That's our first trip to 85° Bakery Cafe! Have you ever been? Anything looking good to you? Any recommendations?