Don't Be Fooled By This Gorgeous Walmart Pastry, It's The Worst By Far

Walmart stocks several yummy bakery items, from apple turnovers and sticky buns to glazed donuts. All these sweet treats definitely tick the affordability box, but there's one particular Walmart pastry that didn't tickle our taste buds even though it was inexpensive and had a gorgeously inviting appearance: the strawberry cheese bowtie danishes.

Taking last place in our taste test and ranking of eight pastries from Walmart's bakery, this offering looked attractive at first glance and almost had us fooled with its appealing presentation. For instance, the pastry itself was golden-colored and inviting, while the jam peeking out on both sides had a tantalizing quality. The fine drizzle of icing, running across the surface of each bow tie, looked pretty too, making the pastries appear delicate and considered. Having said all that, the texture and flavor of these pastries were humdrum and the very worst of the bakery options we tried.

Firstly, the pastry had a gummy character rather than a crispy and buttery quality. On taking the first bite, it congealed into a dense mass and didn't have that light, feathery texture we expected. Secondly, the filling had an unappetizing artificial flavor that tasted like the center of a Pop-Tart rather than a fruity and aromatic strawberry jam. Finally, the Neufchâtel cheese inside gave the pastry an unpleasant squidgy consistency.

The ingredients list on a box of Walmart strawberry cheese bowties shows that the pastry is made with margarine rather than butter, which might explain why it didn't have the tender, flaky texture we had hoped for. The squidgy character of the filling was likely down to the moisture content of the Neufchâtel cheese. In contrast to other cream cheeses, which can have a maximum 55 percent moisture content by law, Neufchâtel can have a moisture content of up to 65 percent. This variety of cheese is generally tangier than regular cream cheese, but there was no sign of this sharpness in the pastry filling, which would have been a welcome contrast against the sweetness of the jam that contained both sugar and corn syrup.

We'd advise that you skip the strawberry cheese bowties and grab the iced lemon cake instead. The winning item in our ranking, this cake was light, spongy, and packed with lemon flavor. It wasn't as moist as we'd have liked, but the balance of sweet icing to cake was on point, and it was zesty and bright. But whatever you do, heed our advice and don't go for the pecan pie. With a thin and gloopy filling, we declared this offering as the worst pie from Walmart's bakery because the ratio of crust to filling was off. You'd be better off making your own classic pecan pie at home.