Carrie can have her calamansi cupcake and eat it, too

Pastry Chef Candy Lu of M Bakery (right) with Erick Larios, Magnolia Bakery director of franchise operations, at the blessing of M Bakery BGC.

As you might know by now, Magnolia Bakery has opened a branch here in Manila.

Magnolia Bakery is that iconic New York cupcake shop immortalized in pop culture, thanks to a scene from Sex and the City where Carrie and Miranda have cupcakes and the former reveals to the latter she has a new crush. The two eat outside the shop because it’s really more of a takeout place.

The branch that opened at BGC, called M Bakery, follows the same setup. The shop here did not use the name Magnolia so as not to confuse with the Magnolia Ice Cream House and other Magnolia brands/outlets.

One of the regulars of Magnolia Bakery New York is Filipino entrepreneur Stewart Ong. “Every time I would go to New York I would make sure to drop by Magnolia Bakery,” he shared at the bakery’s blessing last week. He loved it so much that on impulse, he randomly sent them an e-mail inquiring if he could get a franchise and open a branch in Manila.

It took three years of back-and-forth e-mails until finally, they said yes! At the time, he had no company to bring in the franchise nor any background in putting up a restaurant but he committed to bringing the brand to the Philippines.

Ong then teamed up with a pastry chef from Mindanao, Candy Lu, who has an eponymous pastry shop in Cagayan de Oro called Candy’s. Lu shares the same love for Magnolia Bakery.

At the onset, the Magnolia Bakery New York guys saw that Ong and Lu respected the brand, understood and embraced it, and so entrusted them with it.

They bagged the franchise, thus the first Magnolia Bakery in Southeast Asia. I witnessed for myself the pandemonium and the long lines on opening day.

I stood inside the shop with Erick Larios, director of franchise operations at Magnolia Bakery, who personally stood as doorman and timer that afternoon, managing the crowd. “Two minutes!” he shouted to the bakers—the opening team from New York and the Manila crew.

“I need to give them time to catch up,” he explained as he shut the door to the rest of the crowd patiently waiting in line for that much acclaimed banana pudding.

Past the counter, four ladies—two of whom flew in from New York just to open M Bakery—were making cupcakes from scratch, working like machines with such precision in literally putting icing on the (cup)cakes.

I noticed a yellow cupcake on the shelves. “What flavor is that?” I asked Larios. It turned out to be calamansi.

Magnolia Bakery cupcakes

Calamansi is a flavor that the New York bakery does not even sell. It was introduced by the team in the Philippines thanks to chef Lu.

“In New York, one of our bestsellers is the key lime pie,” Larios shared. “But key lime is domestic to the US. It has a specific level of tartness in citrus that we could not find here.”

“Candy told us, ‘I have this beautiful fruit called calamansi. I think it will be similar,’” he recalled. They gave it a shot and—voila!—M Bakery Philippines is the first to offer calamansi cheesecake (in the shape of a cupcake).

According to Larios, it is very similar to key lime pie but still distinguishable and familiar to the people of the Philippines. “It’s a nod to Manila,” he said.

They also offer a calamansi ice box bar. On opening day, they also introduced ube flavors.

“Maybe later you can offer durian cupcakes,” Dr. Henry Lu, Candy’s brother-in-law, suggested. I jokingly added, “How about balut cupcakes?” He laughed very loudly and replied, “Oh, I know what you are talking about!”

Larios said that as much as possible, they use local ingredients. But since they have very high, distinct standards for the quality they desire to achieve with their products, there are items they need to import such as butter.

“One of the things we pride ourselves in is that we won’t sacrifice quality. We use only the finest ingredients. So we need to import some ingredients. It’s a little more difficult for the franchisee but you can taste the difference,” Larios noted.

“Butter is extremely important for us in order to get that smooth, buttercream taste,” he explained. Same with the cream cheese.

Another unique thing about M Bakery is that everything, as in EVERYTHING, is made from scratch at the shop.

“We do not have a kitchen commissary,” Larios emphasized. “Everything you see here was baked right back there in the kitchen.”

He also stressed they do not use mixes or “anything that is in a bag.”

This is why it is very important the kitchen team truly master the techniques used at Magnolia Bakery New York. Chef Lu herself stayed in New York for several months just to learn firsthand the techniques for churning out Magnolia Bakery-standard recipes.

This mastery of Magnolia Bakery techniques is probably the reason why M Bakery’s brownies are to die for. While everyone was raving about the banana pudding and the cupcakes, I fell in love with their brownies.

It’s so cool to finally have THE Magnolia Bakery in the Philippines.

M Bakery. Lower Ground Level, One Bonifacio High Street, 5th Avenue corner 28th Street, Bonifacio Global City. Limited seating. Open daily from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. First Class tip: For cake orders, you can ask them to customize to your desired flavor and color. Call 847-9829.