Max's Bakery

Max's Bakery and Kitchen.  Max's Opera Cafe.   Max's Eatz and Fresh Bakery.  Max's World.  Whatever iteration you know it as, Max's is a Bay Area business that has really show it knows how to pivot and adapt to the time.  It is kinda impressive actually.

I don't know the full history of the Max's empire, but, they've had several restaurants over the years, and at some point started selling some of their signature desserts wholesale.  Many of the restaurants have closed, although Max's Opera Cafe near Civic Center in SF is still going strong, with a huge menu with seems to have every crowd pleaser imaginable.

"Max's Bakery team has years of large production experience.  Our bakery is well  equipped  to handle all kinds of baked goods. Max's also has it's own line of bakery products that are well known throughout the Bay Area. "

I've never been to any of the restaurants, but I've tried a slew of their desserts and baked goods, as my office got some items from them for a while.  While I'm not sure I'd consider them "well known", you may have also encountered their baked goods, or grab n go items, at the airport, as they stock many of the concessions at SFO, and the San Jose and Oakland airports.

"Our desserts are excessive because nothing succeeds like excess."

At the actual restaurant, Max's does serve rather large, many layer cakes, etc, but the items I had were all for catering setup, sheet cakes instead, so I wouldn't consider any of "excessive".

Most everything I tried was fine.  Better than average for wholesale baked goods perhaps, but not remarkable.  There were no real duds though, so that is saying something. 

 Ultimate Chocolate Cake.

"Layers of chocolate cake, bittersweet chocolate and fudge covered in chocolate ganache."

I believe this the most famous of Max's desserts, and I was eager to try it, even though chocolate based desserts are not my favorite by any means.

It was ... well, chocolate cake.  Fairly boring chocolate cake base, thicker layer of ganache, light fluffy frosting, drizzle on top.  Sure, it was chocolate cake, but, nothing particularly notable about it in any way.

Update: I've since had it again, as many of my co-workers routinely rave about it.  I still find the cake layer boring, but the chocolate frosting is decent, and a very generous layer.  I also realized it has a thick dark chocolate layer on the base that gives a bit of crunch, also a highlight.

New York Cheesecake.

"Creamy, smooth and rich real cream cheese filling in a thick graham cracker crust."

I call this ... the most mediocre cheesecake ever.

The cheesecake was ... fine.  There really isn't much more to say about it than that.  The texture was decent, firm, creamy.  The flavor was decent, you could taste the cream cheese.  The crust was buttery compressed graham crackers, not too thick, not to hard.

Everything about it was absolutely fine, and unremarkable in any way.  Not a cheesecake you'd ever crave, but also not one you'd ever complain about.  It was fine, really, but very boring.

Carrot Cake.

"Fluffy, spiced cake filled with raisins, pineapple, pecans and coconut layered and topped with creamy cream cheese icing."

I love carrot cake, but this I didn't care for.

The cream cheese icing on top tasted like lemon, it didn't really have cream cheese flavor to it, and it was not a very good texture.  I really disliked the coconut on top, as it was soggy and quite off putting.

The cake was somehow both dry and moist at the same time.  Moist from the plentiful plump raisins and chunks of pineapple, but the cake itself was quite dry.  I did like the crunch from the nuts.

The best element was actually the base, which you can't see here, THAT was white chocolate.  Crunchy, sweet, white chocolate on the bottom.  Why?  I can no idea.  But at least that part was good.

Chocolate Danish Roll.

This was a decent pastry.  In my world, more appropriate as a breakfast item or mid-afternoon coffee break snack than a full on dessert, but, I liked it more than any of the Max's cakes.

The dough was not croissant dough as I expected at first, but rather, more of a sweet bread.  It wasn't too dry, but wasn't particularly interesting.

In-between the rolls was dark chocolate, fairly flavorful, quasi-melted chips. 

Chocolate Danish Roll: Bottom.

The bottom is coated in dark chocolate, a thick layer.  I liked the coating, kinda the best part of the item for me.

Overall, this was ok, but not anything I'd get again, and most likely better warm.

Chocolate Danish Roll: October 2019.

Well, I had another.  They do always look so good.

This time I tried a bite at room temperature ("Meh, its fine, but not anything special"), and immediately set to warming it up, fetching some vanilla ice cream, and pulling out a can of whipped cream.  

It was marginally better warm, but still, even the a la mode and whip couldn't transform this into more than it was.  Meh.

Raspberry Rugelach.

The rugelach was fairly classic.

Rolled with a filling that contained both apricot and raspberry, and some chopped nuts.  The pastry was decently flaky, crispy, and I liked the larger pearl sugar on the outside, and the cinnamon spicing.

Overall, quite fine, although the raspberry + apricot + cinnamon element wasn't particularly compelling for me.