Lyla D

Review of UBAE

My taste buds have changed from decades of eating ...

My taste buds have changed from decades of eating sweet desserts to now favor savory food items. However, I was lured to this shop by a BOGO free offer for a 4 oz ube cheesecake through the Five Stars marketing platform.

Upon entry, the counter girl greeted us with a smile as I mentioned the BOGO offer which was loaded onto my account. She pointed me to the Five Stars keypad where I entered my phone number then went about browsing their display case of purpleness.

For those who may be unfamiliar with "ube", it's actually a regally purple-colored sweet potato. Pronounced "ooh-bey". In fact, its pronunciation is boldly emblazoned in a purple neon sign on one of this bakery's walls. (See photo). It's a mildly sweet and not too starchy sweet potato that is used most commonly by the Filipino community in desserts. The desserts can be made from fresh cooked grated ube or from powder, dependent upon its application.

Luckily, we had just eaten lunch so I didn't go "hog wild" ordering the mouthwatering ube products. I did get the BOGO free offer for a 4-ounce ube cheese cake and 6 ube crinkle cookies that I'll pair with a cup of hot black coffee or a Cortado.

The crinkle cookies are light with its somewhat cake-like brownie textured center. But, its ube flavor isn't particularly intense. As for the ube cheese cake, its cream cheese filling is rich and creamy but I couldn't taste ube flavor even though it was vividly purple. The graham cracker crust was crumbly and not too sweet to distract from the cream cheese flavor. I was a bit worried if our teeth or tongue would be stained purple from these treats because we just got our teeth cleaned by our dentist. Well, no staining occurred.

We liked their ube products but it's not something that we crave of would indulge in frequently.