Paris Bakery Café

Anyone who knows me knows I am not a morning person. I'm the kind of person who abuses the snooze button on my alarm clock. Why lie? There are times when I take great joy, retreating back under the covers, in ignoring it. I need a morning jolt of caffeine to get the brain cells firing. Morning conversations prior to a few sips of coffee are far from vibrant.

Yet, I may have found the inspiration to change my ways: warm, golden-brown pastries fresh out of the oven from Paris Bakery on Muldoon Road.

On a dark winter morning it's a bright, cheery corner of the world, offering up yummy treasures to lure you in. Bread pudding, apple and strawberry tarts, raisin brioche -- these and other flaky gems beckon from the glass case. The morning I visited, the counter clerk greeted me with a hello I instantly knew would lead to trouble: "We have croissants still warm from the oven."

Not only were there warm croissants, but there were three kinds of warm croissants: ham and cheese, swiss style chocolate, and plain - a culinary trifecta of morning companions to the latte I had planned to acquire on my way to the office.

Food vice number two in my world, and a close second only to that morning jolt of caffeine? Chocolate. Snuggle it up in folds of buttery, flaky dough, barely crisp on the outside, with delicate inner layers... add a touch of vanilla cream, and I'm hooked. Serve it warm and fresh out of the oven, and I'm at risk of developing an indulgent habit, one that may require me to push my employer for a health club membership. The chocolate croissants are that good.

To further entice folks like me, the concoctions seem endless. Forget the fancy official pastry names. All you need to know is that there are crème puffs and brioche, cookies and cakes, and plenty of flavor combinations for finicky eaters in search of the perfect filling. Chocolate mousses, vanilla and raspberry crèmes, blueberries, pears, lemons -- chances are if you're after it, Paris Bakery has done something wonderful to it.

The bakery also serves lunch and dinner, brunch on weekends, and all items are made from scratch using organic ingredients; "fresh vanilla beans, real eggs, real butter, organic sugar, honey, praline, real fondant, real milk and fresh cream," according the bakery's website.

Because we believe in solid research here at Alaska Dispatch (and because the croissants were so tasty), I went back for lunch the same day. I ordered Linguini Carbonara -- fresh pasta in a creamy white wine sauce with prosciutto and Parmesan cheese for $14.95, my lunch date chose the Quiche Lorraine, $8.85. Both meals came with a choice of soup or salad, and both were excellent. The pasta tasted fresh, the sauce was delicately seasoned, and -- a big bonus in my book -- it wasn't too salty, as can happen when prosciutto or other salty additions enter the mix. My friend and I agreed that while the linguini was good, the quiche was even better. The Swiss cheese and bacon complemented each other in perfect proportion, the quiche had good texture, and the crust -- flaky and moist without being dense -- was just right.

Did I mention the nice ambiance, complete with fireplace, in the dining room?

Prices range from $6 - $17 for lunch, $6 - $22 for dinner, and Paris Bakery Café also serves beer and wine.