CLOSED FOR WINTER, WILL REOPEN IN SPRING 2010 (SNIFF, SOB)
Once you get past the straightforward names (ie: Coffee and a Cookie, Beer.Cheese.Bacon), Sugar Cube owner and pastry chef extraordinaire Kir Jensen’s menu reads like something you’d find in a high-end restaurant, not surprising considering her dossier includes stints at Genoa, clarklewis, and the Ritz Carlton. The Coffee and a Cookie, for instance, is an inch or so of sinfully creamy coffee panna cotta in a squat Ball mason jar, topped by a soft dollop of whipped cream and whisper-delicate shavings of chocolate, and accompanied by a crisp gingersnap covered in a light crust of sugar that glitters like fresh snow after a big freeze ($6). The Beer.Cheese.Bacon–a small, round, and impossibly moist and rich Guinness and ginger stout cake topped by a scoop Fifty Licks Tahitian vanilla bean ice cream, praline bacon crunch, a light drizzle of bitter buckwheat honey, and snowy little shavings of white cheddar, rings in at a scant $7, and is served in a real glass jar on a delicate pink-flower lined china plate. One of Kir’s magic sugarpowers is her ability to make unbelievably moist and flavorful cake, cake so good you cry a little bit when you eat it, so don’t miss her cupcake of the week, or you can special order cupcakes with 72 hours notice and a minimum order of two dozen. In addition to the more elaborate desserts, Kir’s menu features an “Ultimate Brownie” topped with bittersweet chocolate ganache, fleur de sel, and a grassy green olive oil ($3.50), the cupcake of the week ($3-$3.50), and hot drinkable deliciousness like the Hot Chocolate Malted ($5) with Ovaltine chocolate malt, whole milk, Venezuelan Maracaibo Creole milk chocolate, whipped cream and smoked Hawaiian salt, and quintessential autumn favorite Draper Girl’s apple cider, which Kir infuses with vanilla bean, fresh ginger, cardamom, cinnamon sticks and nutmeg and serves with a Tonalli’s old-fashioned glazed doughnut ($5).
