Villabate Alba — Restaurant in New York

Been coming here for almost 30 years because its an incredible bakery. Pastries and cakes are excellent. Everything is fresh from my experience.

It can get difficult to shop here during Christmas and Easter and even on an average Sunday. The shop is pretty small and there is nowhere to sit down to eat which would be a great addition. Parking can also be difficult at times.

As others have stated, nothing is priced and there is no description of what each pastry is so that aspect of the shopping experience can be frustrating. They should consider some plscing small labels over the pastries like they have over in their ice cream section.

Some people here have complained about freshness… I have never had an issue with this at Villabate… then again, when we do go here to order cake, we customize it so…

Lastly, their ice cream is also very good. Nothing is overly sweet.

My biggest “gripe” (and I know this sounds petty) is that the new cones they use are too thin and tall. The ice cream has nowhere to go so it drips down the sides and gets quite messy. Also, because the cone is so thin, no ice cream gets to the bottom so you’re left eating a dry waffle cone… please go back to the other cones you had!

One final note: I have to admit, there is a sense of arrogance from the staff at times. Not sure if its because the place gets so busy at times and maybe stress levels go up?

I honestly think, if Villabate were a bit larger in size and had seating, it could be a really amazing hotspot for dessert, dates, or just a mid afternoon break. And a but more enjoyable...

First time came here to buy a cake which was moist and very chocolate-y. 10/10

Came back to buy another cake and some pastries. Since we are new to Italian desserts we asked the older saleswoman for recommendations and what were the ingredients. The presentations of the desserts were appealing but the taste was lacking. Also had a hard time understanding her because her accent was thick, which is why I wish the ingredients and price was listed. Led us to the bad experience.

We chose a cake that supposedly had some hazelnut flavor (small niccola -$38). It wasn't very good. We also bought some pastries from the glass containers on the right side that came out to be $4 per piece (peachx2, lemon, chocolate, strawberry jam). Only the lemon tasted good. Than we bought marzipan priced at $25/pound. This was almond paste and was as hard as rocks and very strong almond taste. It was so expensive because the paste was very dense, we bought a few pieces and it came out to be over a pound. Seriously regretted because the taste was all the same inside, it just looked different.

You can save on tax if you pay cash. The main con I found was that most of the items did not have a price tag so it was basically whatever price they told us. I wish I took more pictures but I was really turned off/disappointed by the taste and embarrassed since we bought it for family...

Dishonest personnel be careful! On my visit to this pasticceria i bought 2 cannoli, 1 large sfogliatella, 2 Napoleons and another small pastry. In total 6 pastries the young lady picked each pastry in front of us there was 2 of us that saw her collecting our order. She told us to wait at cashier while she was wrapping the box. We payed a total of $ 23. No receipt was given to us! When home we opened the box there was 1 cannolo missing! Myself and my wife saw the worker of the pastry store pick 2 cannoli and we know that for sure as it happened right in front of us and we asked for 2 specific ones!! Another very negative thing about the store is that there are no prices nor names of the pastries which i find extremely weird that one has to ask and no receipt of payment given but we were told by voice. Last but not least as some other reviewers have pointed out personnel is very court and seems unhappy to be there..i thought it was a Sicilian pasticceria instead they are all hispanics…and they comment in Spanish about the customers. I am half Spanish from Spain so i understood them.. I hope the owner will take this situation at heart and look into finding honest personnel.

Mi dispiace, ma no non tornero’, sono molto delusa e mi sono sentita presa in giro...