The cakes looked so good, I had to take a photo.

A year or two ago, Mike and I went back to New York to do some visiting. While we were there, we downtown in Manhattan for a walk around SoHo.

The SoHo area of New York, as many people, know is the area SOuth of HOuston (pronounced house-tin). It started getting popular with the artsy crowd at least 20 years ago and most of the buildings and lofts have been renovated. There are lots of great shops and restaurants. There’s even an Apple Store down there.

It was a kind of crummy day weather-wise but the light drizzle didn’t bother us. People from Arizona generally like rain — because we get so little of it — and we’re no different. Mike’s cousin Rick was with us and he’s from Seattle so he’s used to rain. We walked around the relatively empty streets, past street vendors who’d given up trying to keep their wares dry and were packing up for the day.

Then we saw this bakery. I wish I could remember its name or where it was. North of Canal, I’m sure. We went in, ordered some delicious pastries and coffee, and sat down to snack out of the rain.

This case of cakes and pies and pastries called to me. In Arizona real bakeries are a rarity. Supermarkets here are big and new and almost all of them have a bakery department. Some are actually quite good. Our recently renovated Safeway here in Wickenburg has a nice display case of cakes and cookies these days. But I’ve never seen any bakery in Arizona with a display like this. And I’ve never been to a bakery in Arizona worth writing about.

That’s why I took the photo. To remind me of New York bakeries.

This coming weekend, Mike and I are going back to New York to do some visiting. We’ll only be there two days. But I’m hoping, with my fingers crossed, that we get enough time to drive into Manhattan, perhaps down to Little Italy. There are some Italian pastry shops down there that are to die for. I’d like to put together a little box of goodies to take home on the plane and, if they survive our airline-induced hunger, snack on for a few days next week.

That’s the plan, anyway.