Birthday at The Bakery

This past Saturday I celebrated my 28th birthday. As you get older, birthdays get less exciting...but I always try to make the best of them! Jon and I already had plans to go out to Altoona, PA for an all day hardcore music festival, so I knew I had to stop at one of my favorite places before we headed over there.

The Bakery in Altoona opened up in December of last year. I did a little road trip and tried it out for the first time back in March and immediately fell in love. I knew I had to bring Jon out. He loved it too and we've gone quite a few times now. It's a bakery/coffee shop/restaurant that changes up their menu items weekly. They also specialize in gluten-free and vegan options, which is great since there aren't many places around here who offer that. Everything I've had there is absolutely delicious. I decided to order a birthday cake from there to eat before we went to the fest and then we took the rest of the cake with us to share with friends. I got a vegan vanilla buttercream cake because I've had some of their vegan options before and they were so tasty. Also, some of our friends who were attending the fest are vegan...so I wanted them to be able to enjoy some if they wanted. We were also eating brunch there and I decided to get an avocado bagel with tomato, which was a nice change up for me since I've only had sweets there.

The owner Lauren is always so cheery and friendly every time I've been there. She was very great with my cake order and even found vegan sprinkles to put on it and included a little star candle - so cute! The interior of the bakery is very cozy and modern with fun shapes on the walls and it's accented with beautiful plants. I try to get out here at least once a month...or when I see something on the menu I really want to try. I've had both hot and iced coffee from there and they were very good. I'm holding out hope they'll offer decaf coffee/latte options at some point, but I'm obsessed with the iced matcha latte (I get oat or almond milk and honey in mine) and usually get that when I go now anyway. Most of the food items I've tried are shown below (coffee cake loaf, vegan strawberry shortcake, apple cinnamon waffle, coconut cream pie), but I've also had a bite of a glazed donut with sprinkles that isn't shown. My favorite so far is a toss up between the vegan strawberry shortcake and the waffle...it's so hard to choose because it was the best waffle I've ever had, but strawberry shortcake is one of my favorite desserts and I hadn't had it in so long! We haven't gone out there for lunch yet, so that will be our next trip for sure.

The Bakery doesn't have a website, but they have Facebook and Instagram and it seems to work just fine for them. They have quite the fan base already and have only had their doors open officially for six months...it's impressive. Give them a follow and go try it out it if you're in the area and get a chance - I promise you won't be disappointed!