The Halloween season is upon us, and Starbucks in South Korea is full of the Halloween spirit! They have prepared a new set of drinks to enjoy, as well as some cakes and other treats, plus a whole range of merchandise.
Before I get to the cakes, the change in Halloween culture has happened rapidly. Growing up, this was a holiday that I had only read about in schoolbooks, something that children in Western countries did. Now though, it seems that there is a lot of Halloween merchandise and promotions available at many stores and shops and there are even some Halloween parties at schools. No trick-or-treating yet, which may be challenging given the apartment culture that exists in most cities here.
When I went to the Starbucks shop, I enjoyed trying the drinks and looking at the merchandise, which you can read about here, but given how much there was I decided to take the two cakes that I bought home and enjoy them a bit later to give my stomach a rest.
After getting home, it was very hard to resist opening the box, that was sitting, just waiting, for me on the counter.
I finally gave in and opened the box.
The two pieces of cake that I had purchased was one slice of Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake, and one Halloween Mint Chocolate Cake.
Looking at these two cakes, I have to say that I was very impressed.
The Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake had a warm orange hue, with little crumbles on top that tasted a bit like pumpkin spice, and I believe were meant to resemble the dirt on either a graveyard or a pumpkin patch.
This made sense, because there was also a plastic tombstone sticking out of the top, with a jack-o-lantern on it as well.
Looking at the side of the Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake, you could see the real pieces of pumpkin in looking out. That’s right, this cake has ACTUAL pumpkin in it!!
The Halloween Mint Chocolate Cake was just a visually interesting. The cake had a lovely green mint hue to the icing, with delicate chocolate shavings generously covering the icing. There was also a plastic set of witch’s legs sticking out of the cake, which made me think of the Wizard of Oz! Kudos to Starbucks Korea for coming up with some funny and interesting cake designs.
Of course, design is only one part of a cake, and the taste is something else that we should celebrate and think about.
Sitting down at my little table, I decided to try the Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake first. This had a very creamy and soft texture to it. As mentioned above, the crumble had a delicate pumpkin spice flavor to it. There was a nice thick layer of Pumpkin Mascarpone Cheese Cream just under the crumble, and the base was a pumpkin cheesecake with the pumpkin pieces in it.
The cheese cream was very tasty, and the cheesecake base had a wonderful pumpkin pie flavor.
The pieces of pumpkin were…interesting. They were very well cooked, not too tough, and when eaten with all the other ingredients add a unique dimension to the Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake. I did try one piece by itself, and I think it works much better when mixed with the cheese cream and cheesecake, and eating plain pumpkin is an acquired taste.
Overall, I really enjoyed the Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake.
Next, I tried the Halloween Mint Chocolate Cake. The cake is made with three layers of chocolate cake and two layers of mint icing, plus more mint icing covering the whole cake.
This cake reminded me so much of mint chocolates that I ate as a child. The mint flavor was so cooling and refreshing. The chocolate cake was quite moist, although it didn’t have the strongest chocolate flavor. The little chocolate shavings were also tasty, but for this cake the mint icing is the predominant thing you will be tasting.
I also really liked this cake, but if you are not a fan of mint chocolate (a very divisive flavor here in South Korea) then you might want to give this cake a pass.
I really enjoyed the Halloween cakes that Starbucks Korea is selling now. The Halloween Pumpkin Cheesecake is like a soft slice of pumpkin pie, with the added twist of real pumpkin, and the Halloween Mint Chocolate Cake is minty and refreshing.
I will definitely be sad when these are gone, so try them before they disappear!