City, o’ City Debuts Bakery in Capitol Hill

MAKE, BELIEVE OFFERS TREATS FOR ALT-DIETS

City, O’City is an indispensable cornerstone of Denver’s vegan scene and now offers something even more exciting to people living with alternative diets.

Make, Believe bakery (previously known as Watercourse Bakery) has opened next-door to City, O’City, and is serving vegan and gluten-free baked goods to the people of Capitol Hill and beyond.

Anyone on an alternative diet—whether by choice or necessity—knows how difficult it can be to make decent pastries without dairy or gluten. Most alt-diet baked goods turn out either dry and crumbling or too dense, paste-like, and generally upsetting. To the joy of Denver’s unconventional foodies, Make, Believe Bakery has completely overcome those tribulations.

The bakery hosts a beautiful display of treats and pastries that would send the Pillsbury Doughboy running and crying in shame. Anything found in a normal bakery is housed at Make, Believe: cookies, cake slices, muffins, mini-cupcakes, and so on. Not so normal is the size of the treats: they’re all huge, and—relative to their size—pretty cheap.

The gluten-free sugar cookie ($3.50) is about the size of a toddler’s head and covered with vanilla frosting, chocolate drizzle, and slivers of almonds. No one can deny a classic sugar cookie, and this revamped version is even harder to resist.

Always a favorite, the muffin case featured the blueberry streusel muffin ($3), chock full of juicy berries and topped with a delicious crumble. Unfortunately, because of the sheer number of berries in the muffin, it wasn’t cooked through all the way, so it was a bit doughy, but still edible enough to down the whole thing in one sitting and feel no regret. After all, it is only an average-sized muffin; it’s hard to feel too bad about enjoying a mid-morning snack when it tastes that good.

The kicker of them all was the Ho Ho Cupcake ($6). It’s about the size of Dwayne Johnson’s fist, adorned with chocolate ganache and a dollop of vanilla frosting with chocolate chips on top. The cupcake itself is chocolate cake, but—most importantly—it’s so stuffed full of cream that it’s almost impossible to tell what flavor the cupcake is anyway. It’s also impossible to eat more than a quarter of it in one go; more than that and it might eat through the enamel of its consumer’s teeth.

The bakery’s pastries aren’t the only things to rave about. Make, Believe offers an array of coffees, teas, and hot chocolates to pair with their desserts. The iced white mocha and sugar cookie are an especially delicious combination.

Frequenters of City, O’City who enjoy the contemporary atmosphere in addition to the food needn’t worry about missing out on it—Make, Believe is just as modern and cushy as its parent restaurant, and even more delicious. Those who plan on visiting the bakery should be sure to bring a friend with a sweet-tooth along; even for a dedicated sugar-lover, it’s hard to finish these sweet treats alone.