Review: Lily Vanilli Bakery, London, UK

I first heard of Lily Vanilli when my Mum bought me 'A Zombie Ate My Cupcake" many, many years ago.

I have since been intrigued by this baker and keen to sample her food. Upon researching her bakery, I was slightly disappointed to discover that she was not serving bleeding heart cupcakes year-round but perhaps I was being slightly unreasonable... (what can I say... I am a total horror fiend...)

Despite this discovery, the constant feed of pictures of sweet treats on Lily Vanilli's instagram page convinced me that the bakery was worth visiting and so, upon making a trip into London, it was the first place that I put on my list to visit.

The cafe opens only on Sundays and is located off Colombia Road in Shoreditch. For a tourist, it is out of the way and really not ideal. This was the major clinch for me. Unless you happen to live in Shoreditch or Bethnal Green, It's certainly not a convenient place to pop for coffee and cake.

Nevertheless, I went... I sampled... and I left - very satisfied.

Although, I do m think after traveling for so long to get there my expectations were a little too high.

However, the friand was yummy. It was really, really, good. Sticky, savory and sweet, gluten free and vegan. It was definitely good. Good enough that it made me start googling similar recipes as soon as I got home. The coffee was good as well.

Pear, parsnip, ginger and chilli cake

It was a little pricey... three and a half pounds for a cake is just about reasonable... bump it up to four pound twenty just to sit on the bakery bench for fifteen minutes and it was enough to raise my eyebrows. I ordered a friand and a coffee and it came to almost seven pounds.

By all means, if you live within a reasonable travel distance, I would go and try it out. If I am in the area again, I will most certainly return. However, if, like me, the yearning for sweet friands, brownies and cupcakes involved taking a tube ride and a tedious bus journey, maybe just purchase Lily's Sweet Tooth book instead.

✭✭✭✭1/2