dessert Archives - Curiously Carmen

La Glace Ice Cream

September 16, 2021 Leave a Comment

After dinner at Yuwa, we decided to go over to La Glace for some ice cream. It was perfect timing because Maki had mentioned this place to me a few days prior, and she really enjoyed it.

La Glace is located in the same small plaza as Yuwa. The space is very girly and cute, something out of a French bakery.

They were closed for dine in when we went, but there were a couple of patio tables and benches around. It got pretty busy and lined up around 7pm, with many families coming here after dinner perhaps.

They have some really nice ice cream to-go jars. They would make for really nice jars to keep afterwards!

Coconut pandan (vegan): I’m not vegan, but I can’t have dairy. Many places have started to offer more vegan/dairy-free flavours in the past couple of years which I am definitely not complaining about. Maki had tried the coconut pandan flavour before, and really liked it. I take it as a good sign when regular ice cream lovers enjoy vegan flavours. The coconut pandan was delicious. It was made with coconut milk, so the ice cream was creamy. I would definitely get it again.

Cookies and cream (vegan): I don’t normally see a vegan cookies and cream, so I decided to order a second scoop. It’s been 2 months since the visit so I don’t remember exactly, but I THINK I found it to be only alright. I think it was not rich enough. I definitely remember liking the coconut pandan one more.

I don’t remember what everyone else ordered, but here are the photos! I tried checking the website but their flavours vary each month.

The husband and Aero both ordered the same flavour. Unfortunately, Aero found a strand of hair in her ice cream. They replaced it with a new cup.

Despite this failure of a blog post of forgetting 1) how I liked the cookies and cream scoop, and 2) what everyone else ordered, the takeaway is that we enjoyed La Glace hahaha.

I wouldn’t make the drive purposely to come here because there are many other ice cream places closer that I enjoy (Elephant Garden Creamery and Earnest Ice Cream to name a couple), but if I was in the area I would come by again.

Minus Cake Boutique

May 19, 2021 Leave a Comment

Minus Cake Boutique is a dessert cafe that opened a bit over a year ago. They are located by Kingsway and Boundary Road, next to Sharetea. I actually haven’t noticed Minus Cake Boutique before, but have heard about it on social media. I always thought it was in Burnaby.

Screenshot from Google Maps, next to Sharetea

It was the fiance’s birthday (this post is super late because I haven’t been motivated to write food posts lately), and Sangria and Lager surprised us with an UberEats delivery from Minus!

Minus specializes in cake and bubble tea. The cake comes in a plastic sphere that sits on top of the bubble tea drink. I haven’t seen other cafe stores offer something like this yet.

Combo Pandan Pineapple Coconut Cake: This was delicious! The drink was a fizzy kiwi lemonade, with fresh kiwi pulp inside. I really enjoyed the drink and it was good quality. The pandan pineapple coconut cake was equally as delicious as well.

The cake was part mousse, and part regular cake (sorry I don’t know the term….lol not a baker). The flavour of the cake was Asian style, light and slightly sweet. The pineapple and coconut went really well together and I would get this again.

Brown Sugar Hojicha Mochi Cake: The second dessert Sangria and Lager ordered for us was a chocolate style one! The drink had high quality, smooth chocolate in it. I would describe it as a high quality chocolate milk.

The hojicha mochi cake was delicious as well! There were some pieces of chewy mochi inside. The hojicha flavour was strong and delicious too.

All in all, we really enjoyed the surprise from Minus Cake Boutique and am glad that Sangria and Lager introduced us to it. I would recommend it as the perfect birthday treat, you get a bubble tea and personal sized cake on top! The quality of the cup and plastic sphere were sturdy, so no worries about the sphere falling off.

Remi Patisserie

December 27, 2020 1 Comment

Vancouver has been abuzz lately with the opening of Remi Patisserie’s storefront! Over the past year, Remi Patisserie has gained popularity by selling their pastry products in other cafes or on social media. They are a small shop located by Cambie and Broadway, and pre-ordering days in advance on their Instagram is highly recommended.

Maki and Nigiri told us good things about Remi Patisserie back in the summer, and really enjoyed it. They were nice enough to drop off some cake for us recently! It was the perfect treat and pick-me-up since the fiance and I were both feeling sick that week.

Maki and Nigiri picked out 3 slices of cake for us. While looking on their Instagram, I believe these are called tea rolls. They are more Asian inspired and reminded me of an elevated version of the Chinese swiss rolls from Asian bakeries that I grew up eating.

Thai tea roll: First up, we tried the Thai tea roll. At the time, we didn’t know what flavour it was… but knew that it was DELICIOUS and that we loved it. The roll itself felt dense and thick, but it was actually very soft and fluffy when bitten into.

In addition, the filling of the Thai tea whipped cream was delicious. There was a strong milk tea taste while the cream filling was light and delightful.

Matcha sesame tea roll: Secondly, we tried the matcha sesame tea roll. The matcha used at Remi Patisserie is organic and from the city of Uji in Japan. Again, this roll was delicious. Just like the Thai milk tea roll, the quality and flavour of the matcha was excellent. The matcha was nutty, strong and earthy.

The sesame added more nuttiness to the roll and highlighted the strong matcha flavour even more. The combination of the two was great.

Earl grey and salted caramel roll: Lastly, we tried the earl grey and salted caramel roll. Out of all three, this one was my personal favourite. The earl grey and salted caramel cream inside was so incredibly light and fluffy.

The tea flavour in this roll wasn’t as strong as the Thai milk tea or matcha, but I could still taste it. In addition, the salted caramel gave the roll an extra amount of sweetness.

Overall, we really enjoyed the pastries we tried from Remi Patisserie, and can see why they are so popular! The quality of the pastries is evident and it was so delicious. The texture of the tea rolls were perfect too.

As mentioned earlier, they reminded me of a fancy version of traditional Asian pastries. I would love to try more of their other desserts as well.

Mink Chocolate Cafe

August 8, 2020 1 Comment

I remember seeing Mink Cafe a lot during the hot chocolate festival. I believe they had some kind of special grasshopper drink that people were posting online! How interesting. I tried crickets once and it was interesting… they were dried so they were very crispy. Anyways, I’m going off topic.

While venturing out to South Surrey, Latte looked up a place where we could hang out after having lunch at Pho Sunrise and suggested Mink.

I haven’t been before but heard good things, and their chocolate seemed like great quality so why not give it a try?

This Mink location is located inside Morgan Crossing. It was pretty spacious inside, with half of their tables gone for social distancing. They had hand sanitizer by the door and I felt clean and comfortable in there.

I wish they would have asked for our contact information for tracing though.

Hot chocolate, 70% cacao dairy free: I was happy to see that they had a dairy free version with their dark hot chocolate. I chose oat milk as my dairy substitute.

The hot chocolate was delicious! It was creamy, rich, and decadent. The dark chocolate was very smooth and easy to drink. The sweetness level was perfect, not too sweet but not too bitter either.

They also gave me a free chocolate on the side (weird that Latte didn’t get one with hers though….) I gave it to the fiance when I got home and he enjoyed it.

White chocolate waffle: The waffle was not good. Although they had heated it up, the waffle was still hard and tasteless. I wouldn’t order it again.

All in all, Mink has really high quality chocolate as evident in their drinks. You can also buy a bunch of chocolate as gifts. In addition, they also have fondue which sounded delicious, but I was already feeling full from lunch.

I’m glad we came here and I would go back to Mink for a solid cup of high quality hot chocolate.

Lee’s Donuts

July 25, 2020 1 Comment

The fiance and I decided to go to Granville Island for some takeout by the dock (we decided on Kaisereck Deli, you can read my review here) earlier this month, and enjoy some donuts afterwards! I have heard great things about Lee’s Donuts for awhile, so it was about time we try it out.

Lee’s Donuts is located inside Granville Island Market. They are known for their quality donuts, made from scratch each day. While in line, you can actually see them making the donuts.

As expected, there was a lineup. However, it went by very fast – I would say we waited less than 5 minutes!

Honey glazed: I went with their classic honey glazed. This was delicious and I could see why this place is so popular. The donut was soft and fluffy.

Mango madness: I haven’t tried a mango donut before, so decided to give it a try. The donut was also delicious and very fresh. The mango filling inside was still a bit warm!

Dutch crumb: The dutch crumb came with a cake crumb topping and cinnamon sugar. The cake crumb added a slightly crunchy texture to the soft donut. The cinnamon sugar was a tasty addition as well!

Bavarian: The bavarian came with a dark chocolate custard filling. Like the rest of the donuts, this one was amazing too.

All in all, we enjoyed our visit to Lee’s Donuts and glad that we finally tried it after hearing so many great things about it.

We ate them outside the market, and had to keep an eye on a pigeon who was eyeing us the whole time… it was not his or her lucky day though because they did not get a donut from us! 😉