Tag Archives: Castro Valley

Swiss Delices bakery – Castro Valley – Review

A few weeks ago I got a $20 voucher for $10 for Swiss Delices fine bakery & pastry through GotDailyDeals.com.  I hadn’t tried the bakery before, but it got fairly good reviews on Yelp.  After having tried a couple of their offerings, my conclusion is that it is fairly good, but overpriced.

Once I got to the bakery I realized that the voucher was only good for “morning pastries” (e.g. danishes and scones), bread and full cakes.  Neither the beautiful looking individual dessert cakes (~$4) or the cookies (75-cents) were included.  That was a pity because that’s what I was most interested in getting.  We ended up getting a dozen cookies to take with us to an event, and a small chocolate mousse cake to enjoy yourselves.  Cakes start at $28, so even with a voucher you end up paying $18 + tax for what is a relatively small cake.

I enjoyed both the cookies and the cake but I wasn’t awed by either.  The cookies (peanut butter and chocolate chip) were a bit dry, though they had a good flavor.  The same can be said about the cake, though the mousse did provide needed moisture.  It was very chocolaty, my oldest daughter enjoyed it but my youngest didn’t like it.  As good as it was, I much prefer the triple chocolate mousse cake from Safeway.

Swiss Delices uses organic flours, real sugar and free range eggs, which of course ads to the cost.  In all, I’ll go again because I have another voucher, and if I lived in Castro Valley I’d buy one of the individual desserts to try them out, but I wouldn’t otherwise go out of my way to get something there.

Update

I returned to Swiss Delices in December just before my voucher expired (though it turns out that vouchers don’t expire in California).  I was planning to get a cake to serve with Christmas Eve dinner, but the ones they had were all around $38 and I knew they wouldn’t be worth it.  Instead, I got a bunch of morning pastries.  My favorite were the cream cheese (or was it custard?) danishes, they were very flavorful.  The cinnamon rolls were good, but a bit dry, while their bread pudding was too heavy for my taste.

If you are interested in giving them a try, you can get a $10 voucher for $5 on Valpak.  This voucher seems to cover all types of pastries.

Swiss Delices
20669 Santa Maria Ave.
Castro Valley, CA
510-881-8669

http://www.swissdelices.com/

Marga’s Restaurant Reviews

JD’s Restaurant & Pies – Castro Valley – Review Update

(This is an update from a 2003 review)

San Leandro still doesn’t have any good, affordable places to go for breakfast/brunch, so on the rare occasions when we treat ourselves to morning food we usually go to JD’s in Castro Valley.  Their food is good, though not great, but I know what I’m getting.

What I got during my last visit – what I always get – is the ricotta French Toast, covered with fresh strawberries and cream. This is an impressive dish and quite good, though I can’t help to feel it’s missing something. Sweetness perhaps? Macerated strawberries would be nicer, I think.  The crispy bacon it came with was very good.  This dish is “market price”, and I don’t know how much it was, probably in the neighborhood of $10.

Mike had the Cajun omelet with andouille sausage ($8.50).  He liked it, but wished the sausage had been chopped and mixed into the omelet.  The accompanying potatoes were pretty good.

In all, a solid though not spectacular meal. We’ll return, but wish there were better options nearby.

JD’s Restaurant
2837 Castro Valley Blvd.
Castro Valley , CA
510-537-3862

 

 

Original Review

Bay Area Restaurant Reviews