5 fantastic coffeehouse treats you can find in Fairhope

Fairhope is a picturesque, artsy coastal town beloved by Southern Living, so it’ll come as no surprise that it provides visitors with plenty of places to beat the heat with a nice iced latte. But what if you want a truly memorable treat to go with that coffee?

That narrows the list considerably. Here are some recommendations. We focused on establishments that make their own treats, excluding many fine coffee shops that stock pastries and other treats made off-site. That said, The Latte Da coffee shop in the Page & Palette bookshop merits an honorable mention for its expertly curated selection: gluten-free goods from Guncles in Mobile, carrot cake and pound cake from Punta Clara Kitchen in Point Clear and more.

But for house-made coffeehouse snacks and desserts, you can’t go wrong with these:

Many of Fairhope's coffeehouses offer visitors more than a ready dose of caffeine. — There are lots of ways to mess up a good BLT. The Fig & Goat Cheese BLT at Provision in Fairhope isn't one of them: It adds an interesting balance of flavors without losing the basic balance of a good BLT.Lawrence Specker | LSpecker@AL.com

Fig & Goat Cheese BLT, Provision

Provision, at 100 N. Section St., has a multifaceted business model. It’s a Wine shop with a small, elite grocery section. (If you need black truffle or foie gras-flavored potato chips, this is the place.) It’s a wine bar. It’s a coffee shop. It’s a café. The breakfast menu (served until 2 p.m.) has some intriguing options – for example, its localized variations on avocado toast include one topped with West Indies salad. Somehow, though my eyes went straight to the Fig & Goat Cheese BLT ($12). To my mind, it was a gamble. You can put anything you want on a burger, but the basic concept of a BLT is so solid and straightforward that attempts to get fancy with it often backfire. This works, however: Crispy bacon counterbalanced by extremely creamy cheese, shot through with figgy sweetness. It’s every bit as rich as you’d think, yet somehow not as heavy as you’d fear.

Bill E’s Bacon Breakfast Sandwich, Kind Café

Kind Café, at 108 N. Section St., is known for bagels and for putting an emphasis on “a spirit of being helpful, generous and considerate.” The best seller among its breakfast sandwiches is the Bill E’s Bacon sandwich ($12.97). If you’re from out of town, you might not know what that means. Elsewhere in Fairhope, restaurateur Bill E. Stitt cures bacon so good that connoisseurs have picked it as the best in Alabama and one of the four best in the nation. You get a lot of it on this bagel-based sandwich, along with Sriracha mayo, egg and sharp cheddar cheese. The bacon might not be as crispy as some would like, but please understand – it’s a crime against humanity to fry Bill E’s bacon to a cinder. The folks at Kind are treating you right.

Pastries at Warehouse Bakery & Donuts

Warehouse, at 759 Nichols Ave., is a big place and it’s often packed. It’s not hard to figure out why. It’s a café with a hearty all-day breakfast menu of loaded biscuits, bowls and plate meals ($9-$15), and the lunch menu piles on additional burgers, sandwiches, salads and more. But baking is the real passion of owner Jennifer Haffner, and even if you didn’t read that on the venue’s website, you’ll know it as soon as you walk in the doors and inhale. The selection of cakes, cookies, muffins, pies and other treats in the display cases can be overwhelming. On this particular visit my eye was caught by the Cranberry & Blueberry Bread Pudding Muffin. It lived up to its artful looks, with just enough muffin lightness to make me feel like I wasn’t just having a particularly decadent dessert as a morning snack. But it I was pretty close to doing just that.

Fairhope Float at Mr. Gene’s Beans

Mr. Gene’s Beans presents more as Ye Olde Fashioned Ice Cream Shoppe than as a coffeehouse but does serve a reasonable selection of lattes and other coffee beverages. What puts it on this list, however, is the Fairhope Float ($5.69 for 16 ounces, $6.39 for 20). It’s billed as a combination of “iced mochaccino, French vanilla frozen yogurt and whipped cream” plus your choice of several toppings. When you take it in hand, it looks like a big Styrofoam cup of ice cream. But the coffee is swirled in there in such a way that you’ll be mixing coffee and frozen yogurt together until the last bite. It’s good.

Cornbread waffle at The Barn at Hope Farm

Hope Farm, a restaurant and event site in urban Fairhope, is a full-fledged farm-to-table venue and its Barn annex offers a full breakfast and lunch menu as well. Yet, despite the vast and gleaming open kitchen, it works as a coffee shop too. Partner business Nova Espresso comes with impeccable coffee credentials, and the lighter side of the menu includes a cornbread waffle ($8) that is crazy good. Topped with candied pecans, drizzled with just a bit of orange blossom honey and served with salted sorghum butter, it defies all expectations: First off, it definitely does not taste like a waffle made with cornbread batter. Set your mind at ease on that point. As for what it does taste like, that’s harder to capture. Imagine a whole-grain waffle that is so light and has such a fine savory-sweet balance that it makes whole grain seem like the preferred option, not just the responsible one.