I figured it was too late to post about my first bûche de Noël experience before I left NYC to spend the holidays with my family in Ohio, but since Blondie & Brownie revealed that Financier is still selling them, it looks like I’m good to go.

Being from the Midwest and being very much culturally sheltered, I had no idea what a bûche de Noël was until my office decided on a whim to order a couple of cakes from the downtown Financier Patisserie the week before Christmas. When I called at 3 p.m., the order-taker told me that they were down to a couple of roll cakes, one in white chocolate and one in Grand Marnier. I told her I’d take them, but she kept stressing that these were not normal cakes and kept asking if I was sure I wanted them. I was like, “Lady, cake is cake.”

But no! A traditional bûche de Noël is a French sponge cake rolled up with frosting to resemble a log, complete with buttercream bark, meringue mushrooms, and protruding branches (made of chocolate, in this case). The Grand Marnier version was entirely untraditional, but the mound of berry-flavored mousse was no less delicious.

I usually think Financier’s cakes are too light and fluffy to really count as a decadent dessert (because I’m a glutton), but the yule log was a total exception and one that I’ll look forward to next year. It seems like the woman at Financier shouldn’t have been warning me about the cake but should’ve been asking why I wasn’t buying all three.

Is this something normal, non-Midwestern people often eat for Christmas?

If you, like me, are saddened by your ability to only purchase egg nog one month out of the year, this is your lucky day. After seeing less apathy more cake’s photo of it on Chains of Love, I decided I probably couldn’t survive the week without tasting Burger King’s new Cupcake Sundae Shake.

I first tried the BK website, which doesn’t list it on the nutritional information with the other desserts. I then called the BK around the corner from my office, which didn’t pick up their phone. Finally, I spoke to a representative at BK headquarters, who helpfully informed me that it’s a national item that should be available at every location.

On Friday afternoon, some brave co-workers and I ventured out to the BK–which I had never been in up to this point but will now be visiting afternoonly–and to my surprise, actually found a whole sign for it showcased on the menu. New York City, unlike cities in my home state of Ohio, doesn’t seem to be a test market for anything, so whenever I hear about something awesome available in other states, I assume I’ll be able to find it in NYC in 6 months to never.

The only sizes were small and medium, which was a huge disappointment, because although I would’ve never ordered the large or extra-large, it’s important to me that gluttony is at my fingertips if I desire it. I requested the medium, but the cashier informed me only a small was available. And then promptly charged me for the medium, anyway.

It turns out that Burger King’s small is everyone else’s large–which I would’ve known was I a dedicated fast food eater like I should be–so it was perfect. The shake was yellow to accentuate the fact that it’s supposed to taste like yellow cake and had what I thought was an undersized dollop of whipped cream and a pathetic smattering of sprinkles on top.

It turns out that the whipped cream is so dense that it actually sinks into the shake. Even I, a person who claims no amount of sweetness is too intense, thought I could’ve been overwhelmed had there been more. It was like icing and was definitely the best part of the dessert.

The shake tasted really familiar to me, but I couldn’t decide why until I told my co-worker Steve that it was “eggy somehow”, and he asked, “Like egg nog?”

OH, CRAP. Life could not get any better.

I know there are a lot of Max Brenner haters out there. I agree that their menu full of quotes from some bald dude likening eating chocolate to lovemaking is pretty laughable (and sorta gross before dinner), and I agree that waiting in line for an hour with all of the tourists sucks when you feel like you should be entitled to special treatment as someone who pays $2,000 in rent to actually live in the city. But I still crave it.

My friend Beth and I ate at the one in Union Square a few weeks ago and were full enough from our large dinner portions that we were unsure we were able to pack in dessert, but dessert is the whole point of Max Brenner, so we decided to share the Gooey Marshmallow Fudge Brownie Fluffernutter Ice Cream Sandwich. Ridiculous name, right? But I guess it’s polite to let your customers know exactly what they’re in for.

The photo doesn’t do it justice, but the description sure does:

Deep chocolate peanut butter ice cream, marshmallow fluff in between the famous Max Brenner “Oh My God” very chocolately soft baked cookie, with extra milk chocolate drizzle. Served with warm peanut butter dip.

That’s right. Peanut butter dip. Not baby poo.

I didn’t think I’d ever be able to get anything but the fondue (served with milk, dark, and white chocolates heated over candles!), but those fudgey cookies can’t be beat. The crunchy crumbles added great texture, and the peanut butter sauce was so good that I cleaned the bowl while Beth was in the restroom. Mwahaha.

At dinner on Thursday night, my dear boyfriend got incredibly sick. Now, I was fairly suspicious that it was just his attempt at keeping me from making any plans with friends for the weekend out of guilt and empathy so we could hole up in his apartment together, but I expressed a workable amount of pity, anyway.

He came home from work on Friday night with a soup container and a bag that he said was full of crackers, so I accepted that his sickness meant I was going to have to forage for my own dinner and went about my business. We made smalltalk about our days, and then he said, “Aren’t you the least bit curious about the food?” I hadn’t been before, but I jumped up and went over to his desk to find that the soup container had the Magnolia Bakery logo imprinted on its top.

It was banana pudding! And the bag of crackers was actually something called a Whoopi Cookie! See, Kamran and I have been around the block when it comes to Magnolia cupcakes, so we’ve been branching out to other treats each time we go there. We’ve been caking it up lately, but the Whoopi Cookie was something I hadn’t seen yet.

It’s two brown sugar cookies with what the menu says is a “dollop” of maple cream cheese icing between ($1.75). A Magnolia Bakery dollop is evidently the size of a small child, because this stuff was hanging off the sides of the cookie to begin with, and more oozed out with every bite. The cookies were soft and chewy, but the icing was the real selling point, and I wasn’t embarrassed to lick it off the paper wrapper when we finished.