Watergate Pastry

Used to get a box of their ends all the time when I lived in DC. All delicious, just trimmed off other stuff. Perfect for a party gift.

It’s a bit difficult to find and not the most inviting of bakeries. There’s a wide array of pastries from croissants, muffins, to eclairs. The pastries are all fresh and taste great! The cakes look beautifully decorated, however, rely on other reviews as I did not order any.
The reason for the three stars. I went down for a quick breakfast. The service is very slow, especially if other people are in the shop, as only one individual is behind the counter. There are no real coffee options – just American drip. There are random items scattered throughout the bakery such as Godiva chocolates to sale items on a fold out table. It’s not eye appealing.
Overall, for breakfast pastries it was fine. You may need to hike a few blocks to GW to get a good cup of coffee.

Ordered the Grand Marnier chocolate (on the right in the photo) and the Vanilla Almond (on left). The Grand Marnier was overkill on chocolate — so rich you could only stand to eat a teeny sliver (and then no takers on leftovers), but the Vanilla Almond was a winner. Light cake, fresh flavor — we enjoyed it for several days.
The cakes are packaged in high quality boxes secured with ribbon. Lovely presentation and beautifully decorated. Recommended!

Use caution when visiting. Avoid sliced cakes. My piece was moldy. Green. Mold.
We visited on a sat afternoon. I checked Unilocal and saw 4 stars only later to see the the good reviews were for the watergate barber not the bakery.
Selection was limited. Store was empty. We ordered three cake slices. Mine was moldy. Yes. Green mold. It was presliced and not fresh. We alerted bakery as luckily we were eating in. She replaced with another piece from the same cake which was less moldy the the first. Cashier noted the cake was delivered today. Hmmm.
If the other items are treated with the same care I would not recommend. Service was average but not overly friendly as others have noted.
Watergate used to be the best. Not sure if they even make their own baked goods. Only visit in cases of extreme chocolate emergency.

I would give the desserts here four stars, but my overall experience would have to be three. This bakery is hidden down a path of stairs, in a little corner. When you step in, you can tell that the bakery has been there for a while. There isn’t a lot to choose from, but that’s okay because everything they have is delicious! They have cakes, cookies, and chocolates here! I got a whole white chocolate mousse which tasted delicious. The mousse was was so rich and creamy. It had flakes of white chocolate all over the cake, so you got even more of a white chocolate flavor.
When I went there, it was so hard to decide from the white chocolate mousse and the milk chocolate mousse, so I ended up getting a slice of milk chocolate mousse and I was pretty happy I did.
I actually liked the white chocolate mousse, so I was happy I got the bigger version of that, but both were delicious!
The lady working at the bakery wasn’t friendly and she wasn’t very welcoming. That’s why I would say my experience here was a three star rating.

Beyond mediocre. I ordered a slice of the white mouse cake which everyone on Unilocal was raving about. The slice was tiny which would’ve been okay if it was a good slice. The cake itself was really dry and the mouse was really more of a cream. The other baked good looked sub-​par.

I’ve always wanted to try Watergate Pastry. I’ve heard great things about them. So, I decided to choose them for a friends birthday.
I called last minute and they were able to help. I went with the boozy Grand Marnier chocolate. How can you not like a boozy dessert AND chocolate. Well the cake was just ok. At the party, I found quite a few unfinished slices. :(I was good, maybe just didn’t live up to all the hype. Maybe I should have gone with one of the all time favorites chocolate or white chocolate mousse cake. :-|
As for the service… the gentleman on the phone was very nice and very helpful. When I went to pick up the cake, the woman was not very friendly. Not unfriendly, but just not welcoming.
I might go back to try something else, but would try by the slice before making a commitment to something like a birthday cake.
One little sweet surprise… I grabbed a slice of the mango mousse cake, it was quite nice with a cup of tea today.

This bakery might not look very appealing from the outside, and the cakes and pastries behind the glass might not look as great as they can, but let me assure you, they taste better than any pastry shop in town.
So far, the favorites are the mango mousse cake — not too sweet, with plenty of mango and berry flavor.
The fruit tarts are phenomenal: fresh fruit resting on a pillow of custard filling that is pilling a delicious pie crust that is topped with thin chocolate layer.
The chocolate covered almond marzipan pastry was surprisingly great too.

I have been going back for the heavenly white chocolate mousse cake since 1995. Nothing can top it.

I had a birthday recently and wanted a movie reel cake. Anton, the baker at the Watergate Pastry worked with me to get me what I wanted. I got a 10″ yellow cake, with chocolate icing, fondant top and bottom to make the movie reel casing, and buttercream icing on the sides for the stars.
The chocolate oscar statue is from Schokolad, and had to be laid down as it wouldn’t stand.
Tasted wonderful … Everyone was asking me where I got the cake. I am very pleased with the Watergate Pastry and recommend them highly. Their service was prompt, professional and courteous.

They have the best chocolate mousse cake!

As Watergate Pastry offers delivery, and given the likelihood that I would somehow manage to ruin a cake driving it back to Georgetown, I have never actually been to the bakery. That said, this review is strictly for their amazing mousse cakes.
I attended a party where the white chocolate mousse cake was served and as others have said — its incredible. People who swear not to have a sweet tooth (myself included) went back for second and potentially third (shh!) slices. I ordered the strawberry mousse cake for my boyfriend’s birthday and it was a hit with all attendees. The cake was delivered exactly when they said it would be and in perfect condition. All of the staff I interacted with were very polite.
Overall, a great experience. I will definitely be using Watergate Pastry for future cake orders.

Well this review is for the recent customer service — not the cake which is always excellent.
When purchasing a birthday cake, I came home and it was dented. I let the bakery know via email that this happened, and added photos. The phone call I recieved was SO DAMN RUDE.
I was really surprised because I thought they would say, sorry — instead they insisted the cake wasn’t like that to begin with and they would never sell such a cake. You did. I don’t lie and don’t accuse me of it either.
I’ve been going to this place for 15+ years and its a damn pity because all they had to do was say, «sorry». Instead they said here’s a 25% off coupon which really doesn’t make it better. Thank goodness it was for a birthday… imagine if it was a wedding cake… now that would have been a disaster!

We made a special trip out here after we were done with the embassy tour. This is such a cute little bakery. We ordered a piece of chocolate fudge cake. The cake was kind of dry but i really liked the frosting. Overall, that cake was ok. I liked the interior and selections this place had. The prices are kinda on the high side — thats why it got a three stars.

As others have noted, prices are ridiculously high here. The service is ok — the woman behind the counter each time I’ve been there isn’t mean or anything, but she’s definitely not welcoming either. There are a few chairs in there, but it doesn’t seem like the kind of place I’d want to spend any more time than necessary.
The selection in the cases is ok, but has nothing on the full menu, which can be found online.
I special-​ordered a coconut cream pie last week with a LivingSocial voucher. I’d give it the same rating as the pastry shop in general — ³⁄₅ stars. It tastes ok, but is unlike any coconut cream pie I’ve ever seen before. It has layers of cake in the filling for some reason, and there’s some sort of odd topping around the edges. I don’t know if my coconut cream pie experience is just too limited or what, but I’ve never seen or heard of the cake thing or whatever is on top. It doesn’t taste bad, but it also doesn’t add anything. I ended up feeling a little screwed because the cake is obviously not nearly as delicious as regular pie filling.

Watergate Pastry makes amazing mousse cakes (especially white chocolate and mango mousse). Prices are on the higher end though.
Four stars because their in-​store selections are limited and you have to order most of the things on the menu (I guess it pays off, because my cake was always super fresh!)

Watergate Pastry was THE patisserie in the 80s, probably 70s too, but I wasn’t around for that. When someone would show up w/​a box of mini pastries and petit fours from here, you could hardly contain yourself.
Now I knew it was long past the heyday, but as I walked back to work from the Kennedy Center I couldn’t help, but take a little excursion through the «Shops at the Watergate» and visit the old haunt.
A lone babushka sat there sipping some coffee and eating a pastry next to a table of discounted chocolate. The Toblerone on the counter was a familiar sight and I remembered when Toblerone was a treat that was not readily available at various retail establishments like today.
I looked and the cases were half full, the upscale feeling of yesteryear all but gone. The napoleons looked old, as did the eclairs. The slices of cake held no appeal, but I looked an saw some cookies and figured they couldn’t mess that up, I suppose.
Linzers. I asked the girl when they were made. She said she «didn’t know.» Warning shot.
I got 3 small Linzers, 3 small palmiers, and 3 shortbread cookies. I bit into the Linzer as I walked out. It tasted terrible — no better than a jelly filled cookie out of a tin. Next came the palmier. Meh. Lastly the shortbread. Meh, as well. That’s when I concluded that I didn’t even think they were made with butter. It’s hard to be tasteless and made with butter. These were tasteless, particularly the palmiers.
And maybe I just have to accept that there is a time that will be no more.

3 slices of mango mousse cake: $ 12
2 Christmas Christstollen: $ 56
The jokes over the next several days that you must have actually bought the body and blood of Christ for how good and how expensive it was: priceless.
If you’re in dire need of a Stollen (a German christmas bread that is a cross between fruit cake and challa), go for it, because their stuff is GOOD, but geez-​o-​pete they want a lot of money for it. Their other offerings are not particularly unique, so I would skip it unless you happen to be rich and live conveniently above in the Watergate.

Watergate Pastry makes some fantastic Stollen. The problem is, it costs a fantastic amount of money. $ 25 for a large Stollen to be precise. (They didn’t have any small Stollen left.) A piece of their Mango cake runs $ 3. I loved the flavors on both of these… BUT:
Their staff has a difficult time communicating. I asked for a Stollen with Marzipan inside on Christmas Eve and it was like the bakery had never heard of marzipan. Maybe the kitchen had, but that wasn’t coming through with the front of house staff. I was kind of bummed.
I left this review and had to revise upwards. 4 days later, we’ve finished the Stollen and it was just so darn good. Flaky with fresh raisins (golden and dark) and the crust is slightly crunchy with the sugary goodness coating.
Watergate Pastry definitely caters to the incomes of those who have retired in the Watergate Apartments, but I’ll be saving until I can go get next year’s Christmas Stollen.

Day 3 of the Flu, Hopefully Not Swine Flu:
I finally muster up the energy to leave my room, which is better than I was able to do on days 1 and 2 of the flu. I realize this bout of energy will not last long, certainly not long enough to walk four blocks to buy groceries at Trader Joe’s and walk back with them. No, desperate times call for desperate measures. I hobble across the street to the Watergate Pastry. It’s a hobble rather than a walk, because the Nyquil makes me dizzy and kind of puts me off balance.
I got a latte and a large apple strudel for $ 5. No complaints here. I quickly hobble back to my building and collapse in a chair. The strudel is delicious, more delicious than I remember it being, and far more delicious than anything you can get at the Cup’a Cup’a on the ground level of the Watergate. The latte is also far superior to the offerings at their competitor, not to mention cheaper.
I should also mention that all their pastries are pretty good: croissants, danishes, etc. The cookies are also excellent, but ridiculously overpriced. And by overpriced, I mean $ 4 for an average sized cookie. Stick with the pastries and espresso.
God bless the Watergate pastry for being across the street from where I live!