YOLO Dessert Bar - Closed

If you have a nearly insatiable sweet tooth, there is a place in Mobile that could cater to your needs - YOLO Dessert Bar.  There is two locations; one in Birmingham and the other is in Mobile inside the Bruno's shopping center at the corner of McGregor and Old Shell Roads.  It's a cupcake shop, candy store and yogurt bar all rolled into one.

As soon as you step in, the big cupcake display case automatically draws your attention. Inside is a number of decadently flavored treats.  There's your red velvet, birthday cake, double dark chocolate, milky way and much more.  There's also something they call gooey butter cake and hunks of fudge.

Double Dark Chocolate

These cupcakes ($2.99) are small but boy do they pack a punch. I had three flavors; the double dark chocolate, the salted caramel, and the goat cheese chocolate.  The common theme for these seems to be "surprise inside." The double dark chocolate cake had a ganache filling, the salted caramel had a caramel filling and the goat cheese chocolate (you guessed it) had an actually chunk of goat cheese.  The flavor combinations are really unique and great.  Thank goodness, I didn't eat them in one sitting because boy are they sweet.  I wouldn't be able to eat an entire one by myself. If you get the gooey butter cake, it's a good idea to have a cup of your favorite dark roast coffee handy.  The cake taste a lot like a hunk of sugar dipped in condensed milk. It's that sweet.  My teeth actually ached after one bite.

YOLO has a small selection of frozen yogurt, gelato and sorbet but I think the quality is much better than other similar places in Mobile.  For $0.45 an ounce, you can get your choice of ten flavors and an assortment of toppings.  Like many shops, you can get little samples and I took full advantage of it. According to YOLO, the frozen treats are made in small batches with fresh ingredients and it certainly shows.  I particularly liked the salted caramel and the chocolate hazelnut.  The flavors rotate daily so it would be fun to come and try them all.

The amount of available toppings is incredible.  You can get everything from fresh fruit to nuts to cakes and candy.  I saw blueberries, peach, strawberries, kiwi, cheesecake bites, peanut butter cups, oreo cookies crumbs, pecans, chocolate covered waffle cone squares, gummy worms, pretzels, sprinkles, almond slices, walnuts, caramel and fudge.  Just about everything you could ever want with your yogurt.  There's apparently 60 toppings to choose from so the combination is literally endless.


If you like to eat any of the toppings by the handful instead of the spoonful, you can do that too. YOLO sells the toppings in bulk for $4.95 a half pound. There's such a variety to choose from and some are worth buying in bulk but others not so much.  I think you could get them elsewhere for a much better price.  I don't mind loading up my gelato or yogurt with it though.

My brother's and mine concoctions.  It was delicious.

One of the most interesting thing I saw at YOLO is the Pucker Powder machine.  There's basically 12 or 14 flavors and you can load up a 6 inch, 12 inch and what looks like a 34 inch tube with the powder.  It's Pixi Sticks in bulk form.  How fun is that?  I only peeked at it because well for the most part kids swarmed the thing.  I saw a sour green apple, sweet strawberry, sour white apple, sweet bubblegum, wild cherry, watermelon and so many more.  I think the concept is build an artistic candy stick with layers and layers of flavor.  One thing I saw though is that many kids would fill up their tube, stick their tongue in it to taste the candy then put that same tube in the machine to fill it up.  There's suppose to be a gap between the tube and dispenser but sometimes the kids stick right to the top.  I may try to go here early one morning before the kids get there to try the pucker powder out.

YOLO also has it's own mix of granola, chocolate bars, those big lollipops, and chocolate covered raisins.  The blackboard also advertised truffles but I didn't see any.  The only thing it is missing is plated desserts.  According the clerk, they weren't selling well so they decided to do away with it for now.  I understand that from a business standpoint.  It looks as though the majority of the clientele are parents with kids who are more interested in the yogurt and candy. To check out YOLO's website, click here.