Dish: Galette des Rois
Photo by Jenn Ocken
Among its handmade, preservative-free king cakes, Strands Café features galette des rois, the traditional cake of kings eaten in France around the Epiphany. Made of house-made puff pastry and filled with the sugar-almond paste marzipan, Strands’ French king cakes are assembled by hand with all natural ingredients, says co-owner and pastry chef Lilita Blanchard. The galette des rois comes in three sizes and four flavors to complement the marzipan: apricot, chocolate, raspberry and a new addition, guava (a nod to Blanchard’s mother’s Venezuelan roots). If mainstream king cakes still beckon, Strands trades up from the typical cream cheese to cheesecake filling and drapes its pastry rings in edible pearls.
