Why are dessserts so often awful?
Yes I know I am qualified as a pastry chef so may be a little biased, but so many places think about their savoury food and desserts are an after thought. Badly made or cheaply bought in. A proper dessert finishes a meal off perfectly, even a well made bought in one. Restaurants charge a high price for what is often second rate.
I am not expecting casual dining places to have a pastry chef or small local restaurants either just give it some thought.
I am not expecting casual dining places to have a pastry chef or small local restaurants either just give it some thought.

Comments
So yes, chez Firenze is the mainstay of the panna cotta industry.
(Having said that I am going to exert myself the length of Apple Snow for the windfalls).
I often eat at smaller places, usually where in addition to lunch and dinner they run as tea/coffee shops in the morning and afternoon and therefore have a good selection of quality cakes and the like, and also usually good light meals (soup etc).
I think also that the industry prioritises fancy mains over desserts. If you watch most flavours of Masterchef the tasks are very much skewed towards meat until the later stages when they start doing full menus. I know a lot of them require a fair amount of setting time, but it says a lot when the art of patisserie is relegated to the unpublicised sibling of Bake Off.
However, I am not sure I agree with the OP. Most places I have been to have had desserts the same quality as their (vegetarian) mains. Which is variable.
If it were me, I would run a restaurant that only did starters (savoury nibbles) and desserts. Skip all the nutritious stuff in between.
[As to the actual OP, deserts are generally awful because they have no water, no life, and you can die there.]
We hates puddingses, yess we does, Preciousss...
I'm inclined to agree with @Hugal that puddings can be disappointing, and if I have a choice, I'll always have a cheeseboard instead.
When we lived in Canada, we found that the puddings tended to be tooth-rottingly sweet and usually so massive that one between us was more than enough.
* As my pudding repertoire only extends to Cranachan, chocolate mousse and bread-and-butter pudding, the emphasis would be on "simple".
"It was hiding under that grape".
Eclairs are a particular Russian roulette in that regard.
The cream is to contrast or mitigate the sweetness !
Desserts require a skill set that is different from main course or starter cookery. Most chefs are better at latter two. You can get some decent ready made stuff from a wholesaler.
It is also the fact that you often see a big savoury choice but two or three desserts.
Pendragon I agree Bake Off the Professionals got hidden away. It is great and the judges are some of the toughest on TV.
Here we must disagree. For my money, it’s almost impossible to make a nice, decadent dessert that does involve chocolate.
Yes, I know I’m weird, but I’ve never been a chocolate fan at all, and really have never understood why people go ga-ga over it. There are a few exceptions—I love my mother’s chocolate pie and I enjoy a good brownie. (Though I enjoy a blond brownie even more.) But I pretty much avoid chocolate cake, chocolate sauces and other chocolate desserts completely. Even chocolate chip cookies are the cookie of last resort and are easy for me to pass on. And desserts with chocolate on chocolate on chocolate are definitely not my thing.
I guess I haven’t encountered the problem in the OP often enough to think there’s a widespread problem. Yes, occasionally the dessert disappoints, usually it seems because it’s too sweet/not balanced or because of something like a poorly-made pie crust. But the times I have a complaint—particularly the times when the main course has been very good and the dessert not—are the exception, not the rule.
But for those who don't like CHOCOLATE, I can only
S is one of my favourite letters on the keyboard.
Meanwhile, cheese at the end of the meal is very rarely encountered here.
.....
...and proper frites , but that's another matter.
I would, however, have creme patisserie over cream in a cake or tart; I love custard.
I’m very much a cheese fan but I seldom order a cheese plate as the selection is usually poor and I have better cheese at home. I’m always disappointed with them.
My Old Mum used to make a special Sunday Pudding, called *ahem* Spotted Dick, which is traditionally accompanied by Custard. We, however, preferred it to be soaked in Treacle (aka Golden Syrup), which was warmed up beforehand so as to be nice and runny.
I doubt if you could find such a Pudding in a restaurant today - it would probably be illegal - but it would go well on the menu at Piglet's Pudding Emporium (which, I am sure, will be found in Heaven, if not here below in the Vale of Tears just yet).
My husband makes Spotted Dick, with Birds custard, of course.
AIUI, the rule is to serve this with Custard, too, but, as I (*shock* *horror*) don't like Custard, warm and runny extra Jam can be added instead...
Is it just me, or is this thread turning distinctly less Hellish?
A dick is an old English (or very old) word for a log one may find on the floor in a forest or similar. Spotted Dick pudding looks like a log with spots in it.
I am sure I don’t have to explain the slang use for a male member
I virtually never eat any dessert ... By the time I have finished a delicious nutritious meal, I don't need anything else or more ... I DO enjoy an occasional yummy pastry as a treat in its own right ...
Can't abide custard either.
Here in the US, I tend to find restaurant desserts too large, too sweet, and rather lacking in flavour. Mrs. C and I still talk about the anniversary meal we had at a (generally rather good) local restaurant. The main course was fish, cooked to perfection (can't actually remember what fish it was - just that it was good), and the promised dessert was a decadent slice of chocolate cake to share. What came was a massive wodge the size of my head (literally!), which was overly sweet, but also rather frothy and lacking in any kind of strong taste. We took most of it home with us, and after a couple more forkfuls the next day, threw it away.
Looks good, except for the "dogs are welcome."
I agree. It’s a pain for service dog owners having unruly pooches in restaurants. My pups are good as gold in restaurants and cafes, but many others are an absolute untrained pain. I avoid ‘dogs welcome’ restaurants with my dog! 🐕
Puddings - I agree with @tclune. Something nice, light and lemony is my favourite.
I do admit I like sample sized puddings served with coffee. Though at present I quite fancy an espresso martini instead.
I'm not a fan of pouring cream, but I do like it well whipped and flavoured. Lemon and lime zest added at the time of whipping and given an hour or two to stand in the fridge before serving is an excellent accompaniement to a chocolate brownie or torte. Vanilla essence or coffee make excellent flavourings too.
Too much sugar. Routinely in baking we find that sugar at the levels of recipes is far too high.
The wrong kind of sugar can make a difference too.
Not now, of course. Most diners around here are take-out only, and I won't set foot in a restaurant until I've been vaccinated.
Worst experience is where you have to order blind from the dessert menu and even the most appealing-sounding treats arrive at your table as a big disappointment.
So long as the dessert cart is at the correct temperature. I am always wary of those.
Going to be controversial here. We accept low quality Deserts in a way we wouldn’t accept low quality main courses. Proper desserts are worth £6:50 or whatever. We expect lower quality and we get it. If a creme brûlée has a proper top that cracks it showed care has been taken somewhere. Some places put just sugar on top and try to melt it. You will burn it. The proper topping for a cream brûlée is melted clear sugar, let set and ground to a powder. That way it melts and resets quickly.
I may be at odds with some here
I think part of the issue is that I am a very good cook myself. As the only daughter still at home I started cooking for my four older brothers aged 13 years. At seventeen the manager of the small care home I worked in taught me catering cookery so I could cover for her when she was away. I am a very experienced and good cook married to an adventurous and good cook and when we visit a restaurant it’s like we are doing a magazine food review. I know staffing, training and atmosphere costs money but being able to make something yourself colours the attitude. I’m the same buying crafts, I think ‘I can make that myself’.
I am glad you go to good restaurants. Casual dining restaurants have taken over here in the UK. Their desserts are largely pre made of mixed quality. They charge the same as a decent restaurant would for a dessert. I go to casual dining restaurants but less and less get a dessert. Casual dining has brought eating out into the realm of more people. Which is good, mostly. One of them would not sell me a starter off a set menu when I was eating A la Cart because it could not go through the till individually.
Anyway if we pay the same for a pre made (but good) dessert in a casual dining restaurant as we pay in a nice restaurant where it is made on the premises we are happy to pay more for less
Or serve rice pudding cold when they haven’t warned you.
Also, for clarity, I don’t want a fruit couli on either my cake or my rice pudding, I want jam !
As for cheesecake, there's the very dense variety, the baked one you don't like, and the Japanese one which contains eggwhites to make it fluffy as a dream. The Japanese one is the best. I actually just put one of these in the oven. The worst cheesecake ever was made of tofu.
I've heard of couli, no idea what it actually is. Do I need to know?