Chez Hareg

They are revamping their offerings to have brekkie and lunch. So, for now, no fabulous amazing delicious pastries and baked goods as they move around between functions and spaces. Still, this place has great potential with so much room! Keeping the prices fair also helps– this neighborhood needs more options, so glad they are staying!

I wanted to call to attention that this place may be temporarily/​permanently (?) closed. I have not seen it open (during posted business hours) in the past four months.

I stopped eating dairy a year ago due to health reasons. This little bakery has become a savior for my sweet tooth. It’s been difficult finding really delicious baked goods made without butter, etc., but chef Hareg prepares most of her goods without dairy or eggs. The cookies aren’t usually labeled as vegan on the shelf, but all staff members know which products are vegan. They make gluten-​free goods too, though I can’t attest to how they taste as I’ve never tried them.
There’s a wide variety of cookies to choose from, although some days the selection is much better than other days. It might be worth it to call ahead to see what’s available. My personal favorite is the cranberry coin, but each time I go I end up leaving with a box of 15+ cookies because they are all so tasty and impossible to leave on the shelf. The idea is always to share with my housemates, but I usually end up sneaking the box up to my room and eating them all within a day or two. Plus, these cookies are cheap! All cookies are under $ 1, many of them 2/​$ 1. In DC, these prices are just about impossible to beat. The banana bread is also excellent, and well-​priced for the size and quality. I haven’t tried the other treats yet, but they all look super tasty.
You can find these cookies in the Whole Foods on P St NW (and maybe at other locations too), but they usually don’t taste as fresh as the ones bought in the shop. Shopping at Whole Foods also removes the possibility of getting to know the chef and workers. Because I’ve stopped by multiple times, they recognize me, welcome me, and ask how I’ve been. I had a wonderful, long chat with the main chef, Hareg, and her genuine care and curiosity about me, as a customer, has solidified my support for the store. It’s so easy to spend money at a shop where the food is delicious and the workers are wonderful people.

Great little spot on an otherwise derelict street! The cookies and pastries are great and they also have a full espresso bar. This place is great for grabbing a quick breakfast or dessert on the weekends.

This is exactly what this neighborhood needed — nice, clean, quiet café that serves coffee and homemade desserts. It has an unfortunately location, nestled between the sketchy Pizza Mart where the owner was murdered a few months ago, across from the old art deco liquor store, and another liquor store and a small grocery on the other side; chez hareg definitely lends some respectibility to a rather rundown but slowly improving neighborhood.
The coffee is cheap and pretty good — not great, though — I wouldn’t travel out of my way for it. The desserts are really the highlight here — homemade pies, cakes, brownies, cookies, etc. I don’t care whatsoever about vegan food — I would eat a dessert made from raw steak if it existed — but vegans and vegetarians will be pleased to find a lot of vegan options here.
A lot of their cookies are really biscotti in disguise — I’m looking at you, rock hard chocolate chip «cookie» — but the cakes are moist and rich. I’ve yet to sample the pies.
A very good local bakery, really improves the neighborhood.

I live in the neighborhood and I have never been more pleased than when Chez Hareg opened up. That staff are lovely and they bake the most AMAZING vegan cupcakes. My son turned two and has multiple food allergies and his birthday party was coming up. We placed an order and the results were beautiful! Not only were they aesthetically pleasing, they tasted moist and rich. Everyone remarked on how good they were. We frequently buy cookies and other treats there for my kids. We love the coffee which is small, flavorful and strong.
We are big fans, but they are worth a trip any day or for special occasions.

Slow to take off when it first opened three years ago, Chez Hareg has since become a stalwart of Little Ethiopia and has even expanded with a second shop now open on4th St, NE in Edgewood (with a bigger kitchen, this is where most of baking is now done).
Anyway, back to the product. The pastries themselves are in the European tradition (Hareg used to be a Ritz Carlton pastry chef) with many vegan options. Her creations are all natural using agave syrup instead of sugar. While not vegan, I can attest that her Napoleon is all creamy and flaky goodness. This is a café in addition to a pastry shop, so you can eat in or get something to take home for dessert.

I’m so glad to see new businesses popping up around Edgewood/​Eckington. This new location of Chez Hareg is open and ready for business. They’ve got vegan treats (YUM), delicious cupcakes, and more! Looks like they will be set up for coffee and tea soon. A great place to grab a quick unhealthy breakfast or dessert. I got the Red Velvet cupcake. It was a relatively moist cupcake with cream cheese frosting, quite tasty. I’m really looking forward to the vegan biscotti. Overall a neat little shop, and a great addition to the neighborhood.

This place is truly a gem. They have a ton of vegan desserts, most of them agave-​sweetened. Now sold at some Whole Foods locations as well. The place is cute, tiny, with seating downstairs. They have an amazing display. Their baklava was to die for! Very affordable.
Definitely would recommend this to anyone, vegan, vegetarian, or omni.

Amazing. You would never guess that this non-​descript space has such incredible baked goods, let alone vegan ones. I’d read about Chez Hareg in the Washington Post and had to try it for myself.
I had one spritzer cookie, one butter-​style cookie and one other thing with a name I can’t remember. None of the vegan options are labeled, but pretty much the entire top shelf of the glass case is vegan. Each little cookie or pastry costs about $ 0.50, or you could get 3 for $ 1 with some varieties. The cookies that I had were all wonderful — crumbly and rich. They evoked memories of my childhood, eating butter biscuits with milk tea in the afternoon with my parents. I had not encountered such flavors in the vegan world and was amazed to find them at Chez Hareg.
I also had a «Napoleon» ($ 3.50) which was some kind of multi-​layered pastry filled with lemon and powdered sugar. It was kind of like a lasagna in its design and appearance. The thing was a marvel. Each crust layer was impeccably thin and crispy, but also flaky; the lemon-​custard filling was smooth, cold and just subtly sweet without being overpowering.
I have encountered vegan desserts of this sophistication and excellence only on two occasions in all my travels — once at Millennium in San Francisco, and once at Horizons in Philadelphia. However, the desserts there cost anywhere from $ 10 – 15, whereas Chez Hareg offers the same quality and taste for only $ 3.50 or, in some cases, for less than $ 1. Unbelievable.
The owner, Hareg herself, is a master baker that formerly worked at the Ritz Carlton. I applaud her for opening up her own coffee shop/​bakery and exposing the world to the delicacy, balance and excellence of her products, all for absurdly low prices. It’s going to be hard to justify paying $ 2 for a vegan pastry at the coffee shop down the road, knowing you could get a superior gourmet product for the same price, if only you lived in DC. Chez Hareg sets the bar almost impossibly high for pretty much anyone.

I love this place.
The palmiers are delicious. They’re perfectly flaky without causing the flakes to get caught in the roof of your mouth. The sugar on the outside is well proportioned as to not overpower the cookie.
Every cookie (or cookie-​type thing) I’ve had here has been amazing (especially the pistachio biscotti and the round sugar-​cookie-​like things whose name I forget).
Also, they’re coffee is good.
I’ve never had their smoothies or cake-​type things (the tiramisu and napoleon always beckon, but I resist), but I’m certain to one of these days.
* After my review above, I realized the upstairs of this place is actually a café/​restaurant serving a full menu (that’s very veggie-​friendly). And, as much of a faux pas some may consider it to be, I’m writing this from there.
I got the fish misto and it’s pretty delicious. The fish is fried and cook well and the portion is huge. It also came with a salad and roll. Considering this whole thing costs $ 10, the salad was good and the roll, though not spot on, tastes like it was baked here (which indeed it was). I also got a smoothie. I wanted the Shaw Peach, but they were out of a lot of the juices, so they made me a combination of what they had. It’s huge and tasty.
Everyone here is so friendly … and they have internet. You can plan on seeing a lot of me here.

After reading the review in the post, I decided that I should stop in since this place is only one block from my house. The café seems tiny at first until you see the sign above the stairs indicating the café area was upstairs. It was very difficult to figure out what they served. The chalkboard listed ten different smoothies and I decided on the Chez Hareg Fix. It was quite tasty but it took a little longer than I expected to get it. I also had two sugar cookies. All the desserts from tiramisu to the cheesecake looked great. I saw a espresso machine but there was no sign saying they served coffee or how much it cost.
I went upstairs to take seat where I found a very large seating area. At least 10 tables. The only problem was that there were no lights on. I wanted to study but that was not possible. The place was very empty at 1pm on a Sunday and there was something strange about that.