Maria's pastry, Boston, MA, USA

Yet another beautiful weekend in Boston, sunny, not a single cloud in the sky and yes, still -10 degrees C here. I found this lovely Italian pastry shop at Haymarket whilst I was, well, searching for the market. It has a good range of pastries and biscuits, but I couldn't see any cakes there and they also sell pre-packaged baked goods in there too. They do the baking in a separate room at the back of the shop and the place has generally received good reviews. So, I thought, let's give it a try. It's nice to visit local bakeries that aren't part of a chain, which can mass produce products and slip up on the occasional quality control. Unlike the previous visits to other places, I only picked up a range of pastries instead of going for things from across the disciplines in baking.

The first thing I tried was the Baba rum, or how we British call it, the rum baba. Don't know why we switch the order of words around to be honest. The actual baba was good, the texture feels that it has good volume, good aeration and a very slightly harder skin on the outside. It was filled with pastry cream. Variations from some cultures will add some fruit too, but not in this one, which is not an issue. Though both the baba and the cream were good, the overall impressiveness was ruined somewhat by the rum syrup. It was not as sweet as I had hoped and it has a quite distinct sour after taste, which didn't appeal to me very much. If it was made slightly sweeter and less sour, it would be a much better baba I think. Presentation wise, it was fine, but the pastry cream didn't stick to the baba very well and when you eat it, the two components separate. 

Next was the mille-feuille. Honest opinion, the pastry and structure were both very good. It held together very well. Sometimes the whole thing just disintegrates and difficult to eat because it's extremely messy. The flaky pastry built up a multitude of layers and was crisp, but not solid like some mille-feuilles, making it much easier to eat. The pastry cream inside was sweet and delicate, but too much custard and not enough vanilla, also, the cream was slightly too thick for my liking. I was looking for the flavourful caramelisation of the sugar on the pastry, but I couldn't find any, so the pastry on its own would be quite bland without the custard cream. However, the whole thing was sweet enough, shame about the caramelisation of the pastry though. 

Also, I had the custard slice. I thought the custard slice is just what americans call the french mille-feuille, but the one I had looked and tasted slightly different to the mille-feuille I bought. The pastry was the same, the custard was slightly sweeter I found, but that could be just me. And there is a very thin layer of sponge in the middle, which was interesting. This is something I'm definitely going to try when I get the opportunity. Overall, just like the mille-feuille, good structure, good pastry, good custard, let down by the caramelisation of the pastry. 

Chocolate filled cannoli, I don't have this very often, so can't say I'm very good at judging it. But, I thought it was good, it's not overly sickly or sweet, the sweetened ricotta also held well inside, which is, just like they said, filled upon purchase. The shell was crisp, has a very nice flavour and at the same time complemented the ricotta well. I quite enjoyed this. I always find the ricotta in cannoli a bit lumpy though, maybe I'm just too used to creamy cheese. 

The appearance of the sfogliatelle was impeccable, and the texture was good too. The cream was fluffy and sweet. It is quite crunchy and not really something you can eat with a knife and fork without making a mess (talking from experience here). But overall, it is rather tasty.

Finally, I got an apple strudel from the shop as well. The pastry itself wasn't very flaky as I would expect from a strudel. The pastry may not have been rolled out thin enough, it actually felt more like an apple turnover in parts. So, as an apple turnover, it is very good. It wasn't overly sweet, but as a strudel, it was let down by the pastry unfortunately.

Overall impression: 6/10
Baba rum: 5/10
Mille feuille and custard slice: 7.5/10
apple strudel: 5/10
sfogliatelle: 7/10
cannoli: 8/10