During a recent spring break trip to Baltimore, I was spoiled by my aunt and uncle on an excursion to Little Italy. After dinner my aunt pointed to a plain brick building with fancy white script that said “Vaccaro’s”. “They have the best desserts,” she said, and my aunt insisted that we go in. I didn’t walk up to the building with high expectations, the outside of the building looked very plain. Man, was my first impression wrong! I opened the heavy glass door and entered Italian dessert heaven. There were large cases of desserts, huge mirrors, sparkly chandeliers, and even an upstairs. From fancy red wall to wall, the sound of classical Italian music could be heard. I had no choice but to squeal with joy as our waitress sat us and handed each of us a five page dessert menu!
The prices were a little expensive, but my Aunt told me to not look at the prices, and that she would be treating me. I think she deserves the best Aunt ever award, and I made sure to savour my $8 cappuccino. *Disclaimer: I know Italians only drink cappuccino in the morning, but I like to break the rules sometimes, and yes, it was decaf! I was only able to get a normal cappuccino, but when I come back at 21 I will definitely be ordering the “Cappuccino Papa” which has Kahlúa in it. I might not be able to remember that experience to blog about it, sorry! My uncle ordered the mocha which looked heavenly. The mug was topped with homemade whipped cream around the edges, and an excessive chocolate drizzling! To his embarrassment I had to snap a photo.
As I mentioned earlier, the menu, which is all dessert, was five pages long. I was overwhelmed, but joyfully so. We decided to get the sampler, which had 2 mini cannoli, 2 creme puffs, 1 pignoli cookie, 1 sliced almond cookie, and 1 wedding cookie. The waitress delivered the sampler, and my jaw dropped. The desserts were gorgeous, the cannolis were bursting with creme, and everything was garnished with powdered sugar and chocolate chips! The back of the employees shirts said, “You cannoli get it here!” and I think they were right! We destroyed that sampler, and surprisingly my favorite thing was the pignoli cookie, which was a soft cookie with fresh, chewy pine nuts on top. The nutty cookies, and savory pastry puffs complemented the sugary sweet custards and fillings in the desserts. Everything tasted freshly made and melted in my mouth. It was well worth the sugar hangover I experienced later that night.
Before we left and my brave uncle paid the check, my aunt and I looked at the giant dessert cases packed to the brim with cookies and cakes. They also had beautiful gelato and a large selection of liquors and wines lined up in front of the espresso machines. My only regret of the night was not ordering the “Dominick the Donkey” dessert, named after my favorite Christmas song. The dessert was composed of Vaccaro’s warm chocolate cake with a scoop of Donkey Tracks Gelato, whipped cream, and a cherry on top. Maybe next time!
Thank you Aunt Mimi and Uncle Bob for this sweet treat.
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