Mom and I were talking about cupcakes for the baby shower and joked that we were gonna have to go around sampling different places. I had this silly idea to go buy a bunch of different cupcakes for Mother’s Day. It was silly because obvious to everyone but me, bakeries—especially those that specialize in cupcakes—are pretty slammed for Mother’s Day. And here I thought I could just show up and buy a few.

I got to Kupcakes & Co when the opened and the line was already around the corner (to be fair, it was a socially distanced line, so it appeared much longer than the wait actually was). I waited for about half an hour and successfully acquired a half-dozen sampler plus one of their cinnamon rolls. Lemme tell ya, it was hard to be in that store looking at all the flavors and not walk out with one of each. 🙂

Sugar Bakers was my next stop but they were only doing pickups/pre-orders. The website made it look like the retail location was still open but it was not. I thought about stopping by Atwater’s (which was near Sugar Bakers) but main street Catonsville was too annoying in terms of turning left and/or parking; plus I’ve been to other Atwater’s locations and as I recall their baked goods are more of the pastry variety. So I bailed on that idea.

I decided to go to La Boulangerie, which didn’t have a website but had good Yelp Reviews. It’s located in Lotte Plaza in Ellicott City so I was pretty sure it was a Korean place despite the French-y name and I was right. I guess it’s like a fusion: French-style cakes and pastries but with a lot of sweet beans. I ended up with a mango mousse cake slice and a tapioca and red bean…cookie? It was cookie-shaped but floppy. I’m sure there’s a word for it that I don’t know. Anyway, they also had “curry vegetable doughnuts” that I am very intrigued by. So I’ll be back. The tapioca thing wasn’t for me but the mango slice was good.

On the way home I drove by Breezy Willow Farms, which is not a bakery but I’ve always been curious about it and since I was stoppin’ places…it was part farmer’s market (they do CSA pickups) and part random food store. They had lots of jams, breads, some meats and baked goods, etc. With Mother’s Day still in mind, I got some figgy jam, crackers, and expensive cheese. It was a cute place but I’m not sure I’d shop there very often.

I was about to go home but Bren’s family was visiting (to play D&D lol) so I figured I’d stop to get lunch for everybody. I opted for Bon Chon Chicken, which was in the same general vicinity as Shilla Bakery. I’ve always wanted to go in there—it’s next to another restaurant we go to so I’ve often peeked in—so I stopped in while waiting for my chicken. It was similar to La Boulangerie but with a larger selection. They also had adorable cakes (that I forgot to take a pic of! :() that looked like little pandas, sheep, chicks, etc. The cakes were the original reason I was intrigued to go in. This time I just got a little vanilla roll cake—it’s good but “not too sweet” which is a plus for some people but a negative for me. 😉

I can’t sample the cupcakes until tomorrow but I’ve tried everything else, including that cinnamon roll, which was very good (and definitely too sweet). The baby is enjoying the sugar rush. 😛 It was nice to do a little bakery crawl and check out places I’ve never had a reason to go to before. We’re lucky to have such a variety of places near us and it’s a shame we haven’t sampled more (to be fair, the pandemic kinda kept us inside for a while).