As someone who loves a cupcake with the perfect ratio of cupcake to frosting with superhuman devotion, a single question has been occupying prime real estate in my brain for four years now: when will Magnolia Bakery come to Mumbai? When the iconic New York bakery first set sail for Indian shores in 2019, it dropped anchor in Bangalore, Karnataka (brought to the country by Spago Foods) and then opened *checks notes* two more stores in the tech capital before moving on to Hyderabad, Telangana and *checks notes again incredulously* returning to Bangalore to set up a fourth store there. I almost sound petulant when I ask Erick Larios, Vice President for Magnolia Bakery Franchise, what took them this long to find their way to Mumbai. Larios is in the middle of giving the flagship store a final flourish before it opens to the public on November 1 but he takes a quick break to come up with a satisfying answer. “Good things come to those who wait,” he intones, simultaneously trite and earnest. It’s as good an answer as any.
The initiation of Magnolia Bakery into the pop culture hall of fame has been recounted far too many times: it was simply a small local bakery in the quaint West Village until Carrie and Miranda sat in front of it discussing the former’s latest situationship while devouring a frosted pink cupcake in an episode of Sex and the City. Frankly, that’s all it took for the bakery to rise from obscurity to cult status—it then appeared on The Devil Wears Prada (Andy informs Emily that she “needs to get to Magnolia before it closes because it’s Nate’s birthday”) and again on To All the Boys: Always and Forever (it’s one of the stops Lara Jean and Peter make on their trip to New York). But the bakery has refused to rest on its laurels and, through the years, made painstaking efforts to earn the praise that customers heaped on it.
When I visited Magnolia in New York a few years ago, the queue outside the store almost dissuaded me from getting my hands on the chocolate hazelnut banana pudding I’d been dreaming about for embarrassingly long. Fortunately, there’s no such issue at the capacious 2300sqft store in Bandra West. An 80-seater with a ground and mezzanine floor, there’s plenty of room to amble around as you marvel at the gorgeous dessert display or walk off a sugar rush. With its signature white beadboard counters, tin metal ceilings and touches of Aberdeen green on the walls, the bakery feels like a place where you can while away the hours with friends or a book (for is there a better companion than a good book?) Architect Khaiber Siddiqui of Studio Xalt has used glass and vertical slats to control how much sunlight enters the space: not so much that it bothers diners but enough to illuminate the desserts in the display case almost theatrically.
The desserts themselves need little introduction although I would urge you to come back for seconds (and thirds and fourths and fifths) instead of trying to sample everything during your first visit. Larios laid out four desserts in front of my partner and me to sample as a “taste test”, encouraging us to order additional portions if there was room in our stomachs. I wanted to tell him he was making a mistake and that I would easily wipe out all the shelves but I busied myself with the confections in front of me. Here’s a mini-review: my partner ascribed the words “made by an angel” to the Classic Tres Leches; the red velvet cupcake is worth every word of hype it receives; the vanilla bean cheesecake is a trustworthy classic you can rely on for all weathers; and although the banana pudding sits in a heavy cup in your hand it buoys your spirits. As predicted by Larios, I was unable to take more than a few bites out of each dessert, the reason for which he says is the quality of the ingredients they use. “We don’t cut corners when it comes to sourcing ingredients. The majority of our ingredients are sourced from India itself but if we don’t find a specific ingredient to make, say, a specific compote in the country, we will go ahead and bear that extra cost to source it from elsewhere. Quality is everything to us which is why when you eat our desserts, it doesn’t feel like a sickly-sweet feeling in your stomach but a more enjoyable kind of fullness.”
In its previous India chapters, the bakery has introduced exclusive summer menus featuring mango desserts (in homage to our national fruit) as well as a range of eggless ice creams for India’s sizeable vegetarian population. Thoughtfulness is at the centre of everything they do and in opening its flagship store in Mumbai in time for the festive/holiday season, Magnolia Bakery has given the city the biggest gift of all.
Also read:
Exclusive: NYC’s iconic Magnolia Bakery is all set to launch its first India outpost in Bengaluru
Meet Zonu Reddy, the woman who brought Magnolia Bakery to India
