I have been going back for the heavenly white chocolate mousse cake since 1995. Nothing can top it.

I recently had some pastries that looked amazing, but tasted horrible. After one bite, I had to spit out the pastry because it was incredibly stale. The dough and chocolate tasted like it had been out on the counter for at least a month. Also, they were selling boxes of chocolate that were 6 months past the sell by date. Granted the chocolate still probably tasted okay, but it's just inappropriate to do that. Not only was I incredibly disappointed by the horrible quality, but the customer service was also terrible. I will definitely not be heading back here. read more

I really want to love this place. It is right by my office and could be amazing. I have nothing against the quality of the product. I am actually impressed with that. I am just not impressed with the service. Each time I have been there, it has been underwhelming at best. The last time on July 6, I walked in the door, which makes a very loud noise, so you whomever is working can't act like they don't know someone is there. I stood at the counter for at least 3 minutes and even said hello. It took two other people coming in before the lady could even be bothered to come from the next room and she was right by the door. I kindly asked to get an assortment of 12 of muffins, Danish and one other thing. She acted put out. And gave me attitude about it. I have no idea why. And when we got to the last section she asked me how many muffins. I replied, how many other things do we have in the box. She then gave attitude again and slowly counted to 9. She said 9. How many muffins do you want? I said three. It was like pulling teeth to get her to do any customer service. I think in the future when I want to treat my staff or others, I will go somewhere else. It is a shame since it is nice to have a bakery so close. read more

Love this place! Have been having cake here for years. Recommend getting personalized cakes here for birthdays. The owner puts her own touch on it and the taste is always fantastic. I've also gone to try their eclairs which are second best to their fruit tarts which are my favorite and divine. They offer small little pastries and my family loves digging in to the sample boxes i bring home. But definitely the fruit tarts are the best. I recommend their mango mousse cake for something lighter and delicious. The store is nice and quaint. Representative to the old homey feeling that matches it's ambiance. read more

Pastry heaven! Looking for some savory cookies to go with your coffee? Ordering a special cake for a grand event? As a former Washingtonian, Watergate pastry is one of the many reasons why I'm homesick for DC after over a decade! Their best creations are the large, eye-catching fruit torte and white chocolate mousse cake, though to ensure fresh quality, you're advised to special order their beautiful cakes. Don't forget the exquisite eclairs with the best quality, delectable custard. Tempted yet? I'd fly back to my hometown from this side of the country just to savor their luscious delicacies again . . . come on, what's stopping you? read more

For some reason, Watergate Pasty on google reviews has four stars which is...absolutely ridiculous. I have tried the orange butter cream cake, the rum ball, and the fruit pastry (shared them with two other friends) and they were not nearly as good as I was led to believe. The orange butter cream cake is ordinary, something that I could make in a jiffy in my own kitchen. The rum ball had an outer shell of chocolate and mint and on the inside was a mixture of rum and miscellaneous spices. The filling was grainy and left a bad after taste of alcohol in my mouth. Overall, everything put together was a pretty disgusting high-caloric combination. The fruit tart was the best dessert of the three but it was made with canned peaches (!!) and the crust was thick. The biggest problem that I had with this pastry shop, however, was the service. The desserts are not labeled so my friends and I were asking questions about what the cakes contained, etc., however, there was a little old lady with a heavy accent who seemed disgruntled at our inquiries. She clearly did not want to be working there and either knew little to nothing about the cakes or just didn't like us because while we were asking questions, she'd roll her eyes, mumble and eventually walked away from us. Personally, she made me very uncomfortable because she was so obviously unwelcoming and unfriendly which is the number one environment you want to avoid in any type of public establishment. Service is an important aspect of the food service business and in some circumstances, it can make or break a decision to return. For me, this place definitely will not get a second chance. read more

The cakes and pastries are delicious however the customer service is horrible! I ordered a cake for my colleague and the lady moved at the rate of a snail. I thought that the purpose of ordering the day before was to have it ready so I can just stop and pick up the cake apparently it took 20 minutes for just to pack it up. As I was leaving and trying to get a fork ( 1 measly fork ) she saw me looking through the basket for a clean one , they had a bunch of them covered with coffee stains and I guess she assumed that I was taking a handful but she had kept repeating only one very loudly I felt so embarrassed. read more

Customer Service gone down hill!!!!! I ordered a birthday cake recently for my mom. White Chocolate Moouse cake which I called on Wednesday 8/31 at 6:50pm but got recording only. Therefore, I had to leave a detailed message since online they were open until 7pm. Alton called me back on 9/1 at 7:45am when I was already at work to reconfirmed my ordered that I left on their message. They kept their promise on having my cake ordered for my mom's request by 2pm when I got there. However, the customer experience went down hill there. The dude with glasses who served me was handicapped with hearing. I had to repeat myself several times my requests. I specifically informed Alton I need them to work with me on traveling my cake on metro so it's not damaged by some asshole bumping into me and my pricey cake ruin before celebrating my mom's birthday evening dinner with family. Apparently, he failed to inform his staff working that day. The dude above was very nasty and taking back to me..... "I don't see how having a trash bag over the cake is going help you carry on metro"? it's not his decision since I requested them provide me some way of easier transporting my cake on metro. I complained to Asian obese lady with glasses who sits behind the counter in the back room and I think she's the manager too. She offered to provide me the trash bag telling her staff to do my request. But she was rude too. I said your 15 minute free parking is very limited to customers driving and rushing to claim their cakes not able make it in that time frame. No sorry from her. I noticed they always have a "help wanted signed display in the shop" when I go there frequently. The cake was delicious and fresh when you bite into it but very pricey since not all bakeries can do white chocolate Moouse cake since I called around to all supermarkets and local bakeries. Anyway, cake great but customer service skills are lacking there with staff and manager. I will write them off as a place to get future cakes. read more

The pastries are pretty good, be warned this place is pricey so if you don't want to pay 20 dollars in total for a few pastries this should not be the place to go! read more

As others have noted, prices are ridiculously high here. The service is ok - the woman behind the counter each time I've been there isn't mean or anything, but she's definitely not welcoming either. There are a few chairs in there, but it doesn't seem like the kind of place I'd want to spend any more time than necessary. The selection in the cases is ok, but has nothing on the full menu, which can be found online. I special-ordered a coconut cream pie last week with a LivingSocial voucher. I'd give it the same rating as the pastry shop in general - 3/5 stars. It tastes ok, but is unlike any coconut cream pie I've ever seen before. It has layers of cake in the filling for some reason, and there's some sort of odd topping around the edges. I don't know if my coconut cream pie experience is just too limited or what, but I've never seen or heard of the cake thing or whatever is on top. It doesn't taste bad, but it also doesn't add anything. I ended up feeling a little screwed because the cake is obviously not nearly as delicious as regular pie filling. read more

The staff who work there don't seem to know the prices and the credit card machine does not work. They make it difficult to do business there and don't seem to care. read more

I used a Groupon to buy a mango mousse cake. This cake is the bomb!!! It really tastes like mango. It was my husband's birthday cake tonight and there was nothing left of it. The lady at the bakery said I should have said in advance I had the Groupon and I told her I indeed had. She didn't make a big deal out of it. Parking on a Sunday morning around 10:30am was fine with plenty of spots along Virginia Avenue (probably not true at other times of day). I'm a satisfied customer and the Watergate bakery, which I believe also supplies the Tivoli bakeries in Arlington, are the absolute best. read more

Feeling adventurous, I bought the Groupon special for the mousse cake, I placed my order on Friday to be picked up Sunday, which I thought was convenient. When I got to the shop my cake was ready to go. When I tell the person at the counter, who was not the nicest...that I didn't bring my printed Groupon she seemed a little annoyed to have to write out the info. but did it anyway. She went as far as asking to check the Groupon app on my phone to make sure I marked the coupon as used....which I found annoying. I ordered the marble mousse cake and it was DIVINE, so worth the drive! The chocolate and vanilla mousses were perfect and the cake is wonderful. I can not say enough good things about the marble mousse cake. I'm glad I got the Groupon because the bakery is fairly expensive and I will probably return to try their other mousse cake flavors. oh, and parking sucks so its not the most convenient place to get to if you are driving. read more

Used to get a box of their ends all the time when I lived in DC. All delicious, just trimmed off other stuff. Perfect for a party gift.

There is a good cake that is on the table for Thanksgiving and Christmas. It has become a family tradition. It has a thick white creme on top of the cake. And inside is vanilla cake. We have one cake for each holiday. It is very sweet,rich and delicious. It is expensive and is worth it. And nothing is left of the cake. Each holiday meal. We buy two for the holidays. And hide the other cake so it would not be eaten before Christmas. read more

My wife and I were strolling and came across a wonderful little hide-away, I fell in love a few times that day, the cakes were wonderfully decorated and the two cakes we took home for a house party were amazing, the strawberry's were fresh and uber yummy and the chocolate mouse cake was mercilessly devoured at an unscheduled rendezvous in front of the fridge at 2am with my wife winning the battle :) I read some of the other reviews and the 1 star people are simply crackheads that thought they were eating meatloaf. Love the place and will enjoy it for life! read more

I ordered my wedding cake from Watergate Pastry a few months ago, and it was fantastic. I chose the design of my cake from their photo book of examples, and they were able to make exactly what I was looking for -- and it was absolutely delicious, too! I haven't tried the pastries in their shop, so I can't comment on that aspect of the business. But if you're looking to order a cake, I highly recommend them! read more

We used a groupon/living social deal which was good because the pastries were pretty expensive. We went on a Sunday afternoon and were surprised at the limited selection (the online menu is huge). There were only a few slices of cakes, croissants, cookies and some whole cakes. I think in the middle of the week there would be more of a selection. Every thing we got (we needed $30 worth!) was pretty good but nothing that i would make a special trip for. The lady behind the counter was not helpful but not rude. read more

Watergate Pastry provided an amazing custom cake for our wedding in 2011. The cake looked like artwork and tasted terrific! We received many compliments for our wedding cake. We are very happy to have picked Watergate Pastry for our wedding cake. Fred and Kristi Shapiro read more

We bought strawberry $25 cake for the birthday there and were very disappointed (and it was too late to buy a new one already). Apart from being poorly done, strawberries were rotten and tasted like few days overdue already. The seller woman who is there does a very bad job (I saw how she drops some cake coverings around and then puts them back with her hand) and speaks poor English. In short, do not go there. read more

DISASTER! I recently attended a birthday dinner party where a cake from Watergate Pastry was served. What a disaster! The cake tasted good but it ended there. The tiered cake had been delivered and deposited on the table in two boxes. Assembly had to be done by the hostess after arriving with the guest of honor for a surprise entrance. Maybe okay since guests were available to help with this last minute task but I'm sure the cost of the cake warranted that it be in "working order" for the event. But the worst thing was the misspelling of the honoree's name, Violet. To test the difficulty of spelling this name, I tested it on my 10-year old granddaughter who correctly spelled it on her first try. I would not recommend this shop to anyone, special occasion or otherwise. read more

Pre-ordered and pre-paid a 10" Sachertorte (chocolate) birthday cake, as I have for many years. Ready right on time. Moist cake, delicious marmalade, decorated with ten "Sacher buttons" and our birthday greeting, just as ordered. Friend picked it up, in and out in a minute. Pricey but worth it for a special occasion. read more

I was totally disappointed in the cake I ordered for my friend's 95th birthday. The decorations were really below average -- the cakes at Costco are much prettier, I had asked for yellow and white and they made it gold which was really orange. They delivered it to the restaurant and just left it there -- it was in two boxes and they didn't even bother to put the cake together, they left that for the servers at the restaurant. The servers didn't realize it was a layered cake until I went back to check on it before dinner. The worst part was that when they brought the cake out with the candles lit -- they had misspelled my friend's name -- it was the Hispanic version of her name. When I called them the next day, they said I should have called them at 7:30 p.m. to come over and fix it -- ridiculous. I told them I didn't even know it until they put it in front of her -- I guess I was too trusting since this is supposed to be such a reputable bakery. This was a very bad experience in every way and I would never order a cake from them again. They did refund $15 for the wrong name -- big deal considering this cake cost $95! read more

Watergate Pastry - This is a $95 cake?? And the name is wrong. - Bakeries Near Me - Washington, DC, District of Columbia

Beyond mediocre. I ordered a slice of the white mouse cake which everyone on yelp was raving about. The slice was tiny which would've been okay if it was a good slice. The cake itself was really dry and the mouse was really more of a cream. The other baked good looked sub-par. read more

AVOID this place. After a detailed conversation with the manager, Anton, I ordered a cake for my husband's birthday a week in advance and paid an additional fee ($15) for delivery. They delivered the wrong cake. When I called the pastry shop to fix the problem, I was greeted by an extremely unprofessional employee that told me I would have to pay for the ADDITIONAL cake. Two hours later and after 6 calls (including a couple to Anton, who complained it was his day off) I cancelled my order. At one point, I was told that Anton stated I ordered the wrong cake because I had claimed the correct cake was "too expensive." First, we never discussed the price of the cake since the main objective was to order the perfect cake for my husband. Also, I found this to be quite insulting considering the fact that there was only a $15 difference in price, I was already overpaying by ordering from Watergate to begin with ($60 for an 8" cake plus $15 delivery), AND the only time prices were mentioned was when I was paying for the cake. There was nothing convenient about this transaction and I obtained zero value for ordering in advance. Would have been better off picking something up at Firehook or Whole Foods for half the price, and more importantly, in a fraction of the time. read more

I tried this place once. I skipped the chocolates and such (which looked great) and instead got an assortment of pastries. The rum ball was pretty good. The cake I tried was good, but not great---and it contained a layer of marzipan (which I don't like) between the icing and the cake. The cookies were disappointing. I tried the little ones with almonds on top, the double chocolate, and the maple walnut...none of them were worth the calories or money, in my book. My favorite item was something I hadn't seem before...a circular creation, which is a cookie base with some chocolate cream covered in almonds then dipped in chocolate. Nothing spectacular, but the most interesting item that I tried. Some of the items I didn't try might be better---I skipped the eclairs, the streudels, the chocolates, the sacher, the cute figurines (made of marzipan). I don't think I'll make the trip here again...just not my cup of tea. read more