Sweets by Shayda Cafe — Restaurant in Durham

Normally when I come back to an establishment the 2nd time, it was because the 1st time experience was really good. Although this time was not quite what I expected. I'm a college student who is initially from Chicago, but has been living in Charlotte for the past 12 years. I love a good bakery and being in Charlotte for so long, there's so many to choose from, whereas now living in Durham, I'm trying to find the good ones. I don't have a car on campus, so if I want to get around somewhere I simply just Lyft or Uber. The cake macarons, rather the strawberry or the raspberry are very very good, so good that I wanted to order me some to pick up the next day. When I placed the order over the phone, I paid over the phone. When I asked when was the best time to pick up my order, I was told 11 AM the next day. I felt ordering ahead would be perfect because I could just hop in a Uber, grab my stuff, and come right back on campus. Here we are the next day and I decided to come a little bit later than 11am, just in case somebody was running behind with something. I didn't want to drag it out too long, because I just assumed my stuff would just be sitting there waiting. Keeping in mind the whole purpose of me paying for the order the night before, was so she knew this was a legitimate order and not somebody wasting her time, calling a bogus order in. When I got there, 3 people where currently in the store working including the owner. I said, "Hello, I'm here to pick up my order for......". I told them my name and she responded with "I'm working on it now". I then responded with "How long is that going to take, because my Uber is outside". She walks down from where she was and I repeated to her that my Uber was outside and she informed me that it would be about 5 minutes. She then proceed to ask where the car was parked but never explained why that had anything to do with anything. I also want to note, she walked away as if she was bothered by the fact that I communicated to her that my Uber was outside and the fact that I asked how long it would take. Given the fact that she told me that it would be ready at a certain time, I didn't feel like I was rushing her. I figured I could just come in and grab my stuff and go and it wasn't the case and it messed with my Uber bill. Unfazed, she went back to completing my order that she communicated would be ready at 11 AM. I'm all for supporting quality, over quantity. I guess I could say next time I'll call before I head over. Maybe that would make a difference, maybe it won't. Deserts where very...

I lived in France for few years, so I know how French Macarons and pastries taste like. Macarons here tastes better than many of the big names! Not too sugary like the ones from Laduree. Rich in flavor, but not overpowering like Pierre Herme. Perfect texture of soft and delicate shell and rich flavor from the filling really surprised me. I never expected to find such high quality macarons from a small/ mid size town like Durham. Opera was also very good. In many cases, the biscuit layer can be dry and giving not so great textures, but that was not the case. It was moist with coffee flavored syrup. Ganache layer in Opera was really good too.

Only thing that can be improved would be the packaging for the take out order. If individual cakes can be anchored to the box, I would have felt less anxious about destroying beautifully crafted cakes on the way back home.

I would definitely stop by this place whenever I visit Durham...

Everything I got from Shayda Cafe was superb in both quality and taste! The French macarons were so good! They were everything you expect from a perfectly made macaron: smooth and thin outer crust, soft and pillowy almond cookies and deliciously flavored buttercream filling. The "champagne pop" macaron, which had a fantastic buttercream filling with tiny "popped" bits of chocolate in it, was a real standout.

The large butter croissants were also perfect, very flaky and buttery. The pastries were also wonderful. The mango one looked like a real mango and had delicious mango cream and pieces of fresh mango fruit inside. The individually sized Princess Cake was even better: delicate sponge layers, whipped cream + pastry cream, fresh raspberry jam and not too sweet marzipan on top. Absolutely the best princess cake I've ever had!

No, this is not an inexpensive bakery, but it is absolutely worth...