SWEET MAGNOLIAS BAKE SHOP
Hoppen Hierarchy:★★★★
Bakery with Sweet & Savory Confections
Perfect For: Baked Goods; Breakfast; Casual Dining
Standout Dishes: Everything Parmesan Roll; Malted Milk Chocolate Oreo Cookie; Spinach & Feta Scone
Pancakes vs. waffles.
Jelly vs. peanut butter.
Butter vs. honey.
There will always be differing opinions in the battle of sweet vs. savory. Some prefer the syrupy rush of sugar while others embrace the salty, spicy flavors of savory food. Whichever you prefer, you’re likely to vouch for it as strongly as you do your favorite political candidate.
Unless you’re Sweet Magnolias Bake Shop, the bakery that dares to ask, “Why not both?”
Don’t be fooled by Sweet Magnolias’ name: whether it’s your sweet tooth or your savory cravings that need to be satisfied, Sweet Magnolias has you covered. This bakery not only concocts some of Omaha’s finest sugary confections, it also specializes in savory baking. In fact, owner Katina Talley, who left a successful career as a food scientist at ConAgra to take over the shop in 2016, prefers the savory confections.
“I understand that not everyone comes into a bakery and wants the sweetest thing available,” Katina said on the Restaurant Hoppen podcast. “I think there’s something interesting about savory baking. The flavors can be a bit more delicate. You’re not competing with a pound of sugar. You have a little more room to play with herbs and compound butters and things you just don’t get to with sweet pastries.”
You can taste that passion in all of Sweet Magnolias savory offerings, and none more so than the Everything Parmesan Bun. This baked good consists of twirled folds of dense, buttery dough layered with sharp, nutty parmesan cheese. Salty, crunchy everything bagel seasoning is delicately distributed throughout, adding notes of garlic and onion to create a complex pastry that, in my opinion, is the best in the city.
Those brilliant savory elements are also present in the Spinach & Feta Scone, which combines buttery, flaky dough with light, herb-like spinach with tangy, rich feta cheese. And the Bacon & Cheddar Scone is an ode to wonderfully fatty, salty breakfasts everywhere. And when sweet corn is in season, the Jalapeno Cheddar Corn Scone is a must-try. Gooey, sharp cheese practically erupts out of it and the corn adds pops of sweetness, while jalapenos arrive to provide just a touch of heat.
But the scones also allow you to dip into the sweet—and more well-known—side of Sweet Magnolias menu. With fruit-filled innards and caramelized sugar finishes, these pastries add a good deal of sweetness without becoming overwhelming or cloying.
If it’s your sweet tooth that needs satisfying, Sweet Magnolias more than has you covered there, too. With cupcakes, cookies, bars, brownies, cinnamon rolls, and more, the pastry case beckons with all kinds of sweet treats.
Sweet Magnolias also offers custom cakes so beautiful that you almost feel guilty devouring them. The piping is exquisite and the layers are neat and even.
The cake itself is moist and fluffy with a luxurious mouthfeel, while the buttercream is smooth and rich. The Double Chocolate is a chocolate oasis, with layers of rich, cocoa-y chocolate washing over your tastebuds.
The cookies at Sweet Magnolias are so delicious this bakery could thrive if it sound only these. While these cookies all carry the same pleasantly chewy consistency, they feature very different flavors. The shop’s signature offering is the Malted Milk Chocolate Oreo Cookie, which Katina calls “the greatest achievement I have in life.” A combination of a chocolate chip cookie and cookies and cream ice cream, this creamy, rich cookie adds a crunch from crushed Oreos.
And the Brown Sugar Cinnamon Cookie is nearly as delightful. With a soft, chewy consistency and plenty of cinnamon, it’s kind of like a snickerdoodle on steroids, as caramel-y brown butter and brown sugar amp up the sweetness.
Sweet Magnolias’ other cookies can’t quite reach the heights this masterpiece does, but they’re still delicious. The base is delightfully chewy and has the appropriate amount of sweetness, and Sweet Magnolias doesn’t skimp on the included ingredients. Its Chocolate Chip cookie is studded with large chips, and the Birthday Cake is swimming with sweet sprinkles.
Sweet Magnolias takes things to the next level by turning its cookies into sandwiches with a rich, luscious buttercream in the middle. For example, take the Honey Butter Sweet Corn Cookie Sandwich, which slides a delectable sweet and salty buttercream between two soft-baked sweet corn cookies. Sweet and savory are seldom done better than this.
That item is an example of another thing that makes Sweet Magnolias special: there’s always something new in the case. Whether it’s an in-season ingredient or just a particular inspiration, the bakers are constantly coming up with new and delicious specials.
Any sweet you get at Sweet Magnolias is sure to delight, from the puffy, light cake donuts to the decadent, fudgey brownies and everything in between. You can find cinnamon rolls, macarons, coffee cake, cake slices, and just about any sugary confection you can dream of at Sweet Magnolias.
The Cinnamon Roll in particular deserves a shoutout. The exterior is baked to a proper crispness, while the middle maintains that gooey, sticky texture and wonderful caramel/cinnamon combination of flavor. With or without the cream cheese frosting, it’s a hit.
If you want something unique as it is delicious, get a Cardamom Knot. This light, flaky pastry doesn’t overpower with sugar, as the cardamom adds fragrant, herbal notes of mint and citrus. It has just the right amount of sticky sweetness to complete a special sweet/savory pastry.
And maybe that makes it the perfect pastry to sum up Sweet Magnolias. This bakery could be completely successful if it focused solely on cookies, brownies, cakes, and donuts. It could also thrive selling only scones, rolls, biscuits, and quiches. It’s Sweet Magnolias’ ability to blend the two culinary worlds that makes it truly special.
Whatever treat you’re craving, Sweet Magnolias can not only deliver, but blow your tastebuds’ expectations out of the water. Plug this bakery into your GPS, look for the famous purple door, and prepare to have your world rocked.