Sweeten up: Harlem bakeries seek to be the icing on the neighborhood cake

After encountering disappointing cranberry muffins and other treats at Cafe 212, students may venture into the surrounding neighborhood in search of better baked goods.

Though it is the closest pastry shop to campus, a trip to Chokolat Patisserie (Broadway between 122nd and La Salle) is hard to justify. Dim and a little dingy, the Patisserie’s feeble attempts at creating an enjoyable ambience with tacky paintings and Ikea stools fall short of the mark. From the glass case, their array of inexpensive ($2-$4) tarts and mini cakes looks promising, but the price matches the quality.

Pre-made crème brûlée by definition cannot be great, and Chokolat is not the place to attempt to make it so. While the bottom is acceptably bland, the upper layer tastes curdled. Chocolate mousse is difficult to make entirely unpalatable, and in this respect, it is a solid bet at Chokolat. Their small version is run-of-the-mill creamy and sweet, but it offers nothing new, while dry and spongy crust and tasteless ganache layers do not help the cause. Students on campus might want to stick to Cafe 212, but for a cheap sugar fix after a class in Knox Hall, Chokolat can suffice.

While students must cross Morningside Park to reach Patisserie des Ambassades (Eighth Avenue between 118th and 119th streets), this shop is a better choice than Chokolat for the atmosphere alone. Burnt-orange walls and homey brown leather couches foster a lively community feeling and a cheerful din. Free Wi-Fi adds to the bakery’s versatility as a place to chat with friends or to sip coffee solo, though students who plan to do the latter should be warned that the brew tastes shamefully weak. Furthermore, the pastries, left to get stale in a plastic case, veer far from the fresh and flakey standard the shop’s cosmopolitan name implies. Come for the ambience, stay for the ambience.

As a departure from those two wannabe French patisseries, Make My Cake bakery (116th Street between Seventh and Eighth avenues) embraces its southern roots with city-renowned German chocolate and red velvet cakes and cupcakes. Worth four dollars, the generously proportioned red velvet cupcake does not disappoint, with moist and just-sweet-enough loaf and a thick coat of creamy frosting. Make My Cake will make students remember exactly why New York City momentarily became obsessed with cupcakes. Similar to the baked goods, the atmosphere flirts with sickening sweetness but never strays far from authentic charm. If the baked goods were any less moist, the “life’s short, eat cookies” sign and the hot pink and brown color scheme might seem kitschy. Instead, one cannot help but fall in love with—or at least lust after—this bakery.