La Farfalla Bakery — Restaurant in Fremont

I had some sort of expectation for La Farfalla Bakery due to its positive reviews/ratings, and this bakery definitely surpassed it!

INTERIOR/STYLE: Super cute, super clean, and super organized.. It's a small space unfortunately, so the selection is limited. Despite that, I had no problems finding a few things to try. Each type of pastry is clearly labeled and individual plates are already covered for you to use. In the same fashion as a bakery such as ShengKee and 85C, you grab a plate, a tong, and then browse around. Then you bring your plate to the cash register and they will bag your purchase for you.

SELECTION: Today's selection was really good. There's a mix & match cookies section that's ~$4 per 1/4 lb of cookies. Then there are some pastries that are sweet, some savory. Since I already got a box of cookies to satisfy my sweet tooth, I went for the savory pastries. There's also a separate section of mini macarons priced @ $1.85 each. Then there's a refrigerated section for mini cakes and special occasion cakes. Look up, and you'll see a simple menu for your boba fix.

MY PICKS: Takoyaki pastry: Don't be fooled! This is NOT made of octopus. It's actually a pastry filled with pork sung (dried pork) and garnished with takoyaki-styled toppings. Very tasty, and would definitely buy again.

Butter Cream pastry: A pastry filled with butter cream, was fluffy and sweet, with a hint of saltiness.

Ham & Veggies: Not really "veggies," more like ham and corn.. Though I supposed corn is a type of vegetable. This is a good-sized pastry topped with chopped ham and generously covered with corn and some sort of mayonnaise dressing. Slightly savory, not super salty. Yum!

Assorted cookies ranging from the cookies with jam centers, Russian tea, chocolate walnut, etc: I loved the cookies here, they are not too sweet and most are bite sized. Good for sweet cravings without the impending sugar crash. They are priced per 1/4 lb and you can mix + match.

Chocolate croissant: Small compared to croissants I'm used to. While this was pretty good, it was my least favorite out of everything. Compared to Starbucks chocolate croissant, which is toasted when you order, this just can't quite compare. Also gone within a couple bites, this wasn't very satisfying.

Macarons: These are smaller than average macarons, but also slightly cheaper. There is a check-in offer for a free macaron that I used. The one I tried was Jasmine Green tea, and it was yummy. Not too sweet, but didn't really taste much of tea flavor. Delicious to indulge in, regardless!

Sea Salt green tea: Hm... Where was the sea salt... The tea was kind of watered down, but overall it wasn't bad. I wasn't asked about sweetness level, but it was at a tolerable level of sweetness so I didn't have to. There was no extra layer of sea salt, and it looks like it was mixed in for you... Probably try a different drink next time.

Final thoughts: Quality pastries/dessert, no crowd, comparable to bigger bakeries, if not better. Hopefully this place stays open (pretty empty in terms of patrons...) because I will definitely will be back.. I live really close, so it'll be very convenient to grab a...

I'm so confused about the good reviews. Is this place better in the morning or something? Went there today at about one in the afternoon. List of grievances:

Cases were 70% empty. I know bakeries try to run out at the end of the day but seriously, why even be open in the middle of the day if you're not going to have the majority of your product on display?

Milk tea was pretty good. What wasn't good was that I asked for it unsweetened with a certain type of boba and ended up with two pumps of syrup and the wrong boba.

Decided to splurge on some macarons. The pistachio, rose and caramel tasted like nothing, the lemon, blueberry and mango all tasted like various strengths of fruit loops and the coffee tasted like burnt coffee at the bottom of the pot at the end of the day.

If this were the only place around, I'd have nothing to compare it to. But I grew up with quickly and sheng kee and am just sad. Also, I understand that people seem to like their cakes. If you're not there for a cake, don't bother. Not worth the coupons you got...

I'm not sure how people give this 5 stars? Maybe they haven't had really good pastries yet. We tried 4-5 different pastries as well as a crossiant and the macaroons. While the pastries weren't bad they were nothing special. The crossiant tasted very bland and I felt Costco made better ones. The macaroons were just ok and the rest of the pastries weren't worth finishing. The only decent thing we had was the choclate mousse cake. I would go back to sweet orchid for macaroons and Tartine for crossiants and pastries. I feel generous giving...