Shokuh Patisserie

After opening Shokuh Patisserie, the single best French-style dessert bakery in Orange County, its owners set up a second location in Dubai, then left the U.S. to run it. Rather than closing the popular Newport Beach shop, they sold it to a Mission Viejo-based competitor, Little France Bakery, which redecorated the space and modified the menu.

In addition to its superb chocolate and fruit paste sourcing, Shokuh’s use of premium Italian hazelnut, pistachio, and almond pastes gave each of its pastries best-of-class nut flavors to match their looks, guaranteeing that everything tasted as intense as its looks were elevated. This gallery shows off the incredible array of miniature cakes and other pastries that were previously offered at Shokuh before the change of ownership, including:

• purple velvet black forest rings and other fuzzy-textured chocolate cakes
• pistachio raspberry, raspberry opera, coffee banana, and pumpkin cakes
• raspberry almond croissant, the best almond croissant we’ve ever tasted, and the margherita croissant, a surprisingly compelling circular pizza tart with basil, tomato, and cheese
• raspberry financiers and danishes
• super thick chocolate chip cookies
• canelés
• blueberry lemon tarts and lemon meringue tarts