Carpe Cookie

A grade-A cookie lover's account of the best – and sometimes worst – cookies around.

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Macarons at Pix Patisserie

Posted by on Apr 25, 2011 in Gluten Free and/or Flourless, Macaroon/Macaron | 0 comments

Pix Patisserie
3901 N. Williams- Portland
3402 SE Division – Portland
$2

NOTE: Passover-friendly  No flour, no leavening.  Contains only almond flour, egg whites, sugar, butter, flavoring.

I hate to begin on a negative note, but I feel the need to preface this review with this piece of information: I don’t like Pix very much.  I’ve tasted many desserts from this much raved-about Portland dessert mecca over the past several years that have been either stale or tasted like refrigerator (or both), or were just simply not delicious. (Don’t even get me started on the piece of crap “ghetto cake” (their words, not mine) that my friends and I picked up on New Year’s Eve. Unless you really want to hear about it, in which case I’ll happily explain. 

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Lemon Meringue Cookie at Proof Bakery

Posted by on Jan 26, 2011 in Meringue, Lemon | 2 comments

Proof Bakery
3156 Glendale Blvd
Los Angeles (Atwater Village)
$2

Before visiting L.A. recently, I had read that a brand new bakery called Proof (opened in December ’10) was making a cookie called a zimsterne. I’d somehow never heard of these, which is surprising because it is a cookie that is completely after my own heart. I have a soft spot for anything almond – particularly almond paste, marzipan or almond flour – the latter being a key player in the zimsterne. Also, I love cinnamon. I was sold – enough so to make the somewhat out-of-the-way drive (from where I was) to Atwater Village (not far from Silverlake).

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Chocolate Macaroon at Alma

Posted by on Sep 27, 2010 in Chocolate, Gluten Free and/or Flourless, Macaroon/Macaron | 3 comments

Alma Chocolate
140 NE 28th Ave – Portland
$1

Alma Chocolate, a tiny shop in Northeast Portland, is known mainly for their signature (edible) gold leaf-painted molded chocolate icons,  bon bons, barks, toffees and cocoa-dusted candied nuts.  The array of unexpected confections, all  made from one deep, dark single-origin chocolate or another, is stunning. But what I want to tell you about is the shop’s  more off-the-radar (at least to me) bakery items.

I seem to forget about Alma as a bakery, per se, but the fact is that they are kickin’ out some of Portland’s better cookies, brownies and cake.  And this, natch, is what I want to tell you about – a cookie.

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Almond Horn at Whole Foods

Posted by on Jul 20, 2010 in Gluten Free and/or Flourless, Etc., Almond | 12 comments

Whole Foods Market
Portland – various locations
$1.99

Is it a cookie? Or is it a confection?  It’s sitting behind the glass next to all the other cookies,  but I’d say this one sort of rides the fence being that a) it contains not a lick of flour (not that flour is a requirement for cookie classification) and b) enclosed within its thin, almond-encrusted sheath, is a dense, slightly sticky mass of sweet, sugary marzipan – behaving more like candy than cookie, imo.  Its ingredients are: sugar, almonds, almond paste, egg whites and salt.

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