A small space with seven or so tables, packed on Sunday night. There is free parking available at 500 Doris Ave! Found this out too late :(

Shared the Sesame Crepe - 2 scoops black sesame icecream (made in-house), whipped cream, cereal, sponge cake. Ice cream is great - love the strong sesame flavor and dense/hard texture, unlike some watered down versions. Crepe is good too. However I just strongly dislike the vanilla sponge cake!!  Was not aware it would be vanilla flavored.... too strong and artificial tasting.

The Strawberry Banana Sundae was cute - but just one small scoop of strawberry icecream while the rest is just whipped cream.

This weekend, we had a mini getaway to Montreal with one main mission - eat! We enjoyed the sunny weather on Saturday as we ventured to Mont Royal and Old Montreal to seek out the city's specialties - from bagels to poutine.



1. St. Viateur Bagel & Cafe Mont Royal - Montreal's famous bagels made in-house. I had the Poulet Sesame Bagel - love the toasted bagel with hint of sweetness. Chicken was bland; the Moo-Moo (roast beef) and MTL smoked meat with mustard were better. The beef & barley soup of the day was great. A cute little cafe and love how you can see the production of the bagels.

2. Point G Macarons - Pretty, affordable macarons and many unique flavors to choose from. The texture is so delicate and soft without falling apart in your mouth, with just a slight crunch in the shell. My favorite was the Tire D'Erable (maple) - didn't think I'd like this one but it had a strong maple flavor without being overly sweet.

3. Les Delices D'Erables - All maple errything at Maple Delights - maple body cream, maple dressing, etc. Happy to have found tire d'erable sur neige - rolled my own maple taffy on snow along with some maple cappucinos.





4. Ferreira - Amazing Portugese seafood in a romantic setting. Mom's go-to place. The best seafood rice - rice was a bit hard for my liking but the sauce was amazing. Scallops and shrimp were perfectly cooked and meaty. We also enjoyed the Bouillabaisse and grilled seafood in a garlic-parsley sauce (fresh octopus, fish, lobster) Dessert was warm fig cake and sweet potato icecream - delicious. Not much sweet potato flavor but instead gingerbread-cinnamon notes.

5. Cacao 70 - Mom's favorite dark chocolate fondue with fruit, fluffy waffles, and rich dense brownies. Long wait!! but worth to try since Toronto doesn't have a good fondue.

Day 2:

6. Humble Lion - A nice cappucino and breakfast granola bar at an independent coffee shop.

7. La Banquise - A 24h poutine heaven. Suprisingly not too heavy, I enjoyed La B.O.M (bacon, onion, merguez sausage - love the sausage!) and B liked his hamburger steak. We then ordered a second poutine - La Miam (ground beef, Swiss cheese, onion, tomato, sausage). The only bad thing is they charge mandatory 15% tips. Also, there was a long line up outside but it was for take-out so better to ask!

All in all, a wonderful satisfying getaway to MTL! Everything was delicious and enjoyed with great company :)

8333 Kennedy Rd (at T&T Plaza), Markham

Discovered this Taiwanese cafe about a month ago and it's my current favorite for popcorn chicken lunch/dinner combo and a nice place for conversation. Space is large and spacious; a lot of staff compared to the low traffic. Very extensive drink menu, as well as lunch/dinner, snacks, and dessert (shaved ice, toast..)

Ordered from the $9.99 lunch/dinner menu which comes with a large drink and dessert (some jello/pudding). The complimentary garlic black pepper edamame is quite tasty as well.

Popcorn Chicken + Noodle; Grapefruit Green Tea
- large portions!! Couldn't finish at all
- popcorn chicken was crispy, light batter, and juicy
- noodle is plain white, soft, thin noodle, to balance out the saltiness of the deep fried meat, with some green veg. and egg

A compilation of what I ate in London. (In addition to Hawksmoor, Borough Market & Aquashard)

1. Vietnamese spring rolls & pho at Mien Tay in Pho Mile, Shoreditch area


2. Hot Salt Beef - Brick Lane Market
   


3. £10 steak at Flatiron.  Lovely juicy, tender shoulder cut with nice beef flavor and a cute little cleaver.


4. My fav coffee chain - Pret! Great salmon sandwich. Love the Americanos. (Also missing the Flat White from Costa Coffee.. )


5. Happy moment - found Stella Apple & Pear Cider at a local convience store


6. Sourdough pizza with anchovies, tomato, garlic, oregano, capers, olives, mozzerella - omg jam packed with salty anchovies goodness! at Franco Manca


7. Fish & Chips - flaky, meaty goodness. The mushy peas were great as well!


8. Fresh  juices from M&S to make up for lack of fruit & veg
   


9. The best ham & cheese crepe ever! at Creperie Angelie, Bicester Village
   


10. Amorino gelato
    


11. Udon at Koya, in Soho


12. Cottage pie ~ must squeeze in a second pub meal on our last night

London is another foodie heaven! Such a variety of diverse and multicultural foods for every budget. I ate fries (chips) every day and they were all delicious!! (So chunky and soft!) Too bad we didn't have time for a sit down Indian meal so settled with take-out butter chicken. We also had afternoon tea, but it didn't taste that great, mainly a nice photo opp.

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 300 F.
2. Pour cream in saucepan. Bring cream to boiling point, then reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. 3. Whisk egg yolks and sugar until pale and fluffy. 
4. Pour cream into egg mixture and mix well until thickened. 
5. Pour mixture in ramekins. 
6. Fill large roasting tray wth hot water and place ramekins in, making sure water is halfway up the outsides (bain-marie). (I used a shallow pan which covered just a bit but still worked fine)
7. Bake for 40-45 minutes. 
8. To caramelize: sprinkle teaspoon of sugar on the surface and caramelize with blow torch.

Souffles Cafe is a Chinese-run dessert place with a large selection of desserts and teas. All the souffle flavors were so appealing! Takes 30 mins to make souffle and you can call ahead to reserve (just found out after we arrived)

Walking around the oldest/largest(?) Chinatown was like stepping back in time to 1960s... Everything was just so old.

We had dinner at R&G Lounge and then dessert at Souffles Cafe.

I was so excited to visit the Magnum pop-up store. Not bc I like the icecream (prefer Haagen Dazs) but bc I'm a sucker for gimmicks. I love marketing and I love customizable things so I just had to check out this whole experience.. esp the whole 'pleasure'/high end concept and success of word-of-mouth and social media. For $6 the ice cream wasn't cold/hard enough, but it was worth it 'cause it was fun! I chose vanilla ice cream x dark chocolate coating with toffee bits, macadamia nuts, crushed macarons (I wanted green but they only had yellow at the time) and rose petals with white chocolate drizzle. Didn't bother asking for golden touch... The other one is chocolate ice cream x white chocolate coating, dried strawberries, dried coconut, dark chocolate drizzle - white choco is super sweet but a nice contrast for photo purposes! Pop-up store now extended to the end of August!



1. Choose Ice Cream
2. Choose chocolate coating
3. Choice of 21 toppings.
4. Choice of chocolate drizzle

After Magnum.. made one last stop to Butter Avenue. Finally got to try their famous macarons. Matcha & Passionfruit were too sweet for my taste but I liked Sea Salt Caramel and Earl Grey the best; Rose/Lavender okay too. 

 五代同糖 @ MK. The menu has soo much variety! I wanted to try all the desserts but could only have this green tea snowflake 雪花冰。(There's actually a nicer name for it too) Thought it would be very watery/slushy but it was quite creamy and cold with green tea flavor, red bean, white jelly, white tapioca and basil seed.

I like this milk flavor with the oreo crumbs!

Paul Lafayet @ Hysan Place - Couldn't pass up the chance to get rubber duck macaron - passion fruit flavor, usually don't like passionfruit but it was my fav out of the three (green tea and rose) 15hkd each, pretty decent price.

a

Had a hard time deciding between this and the chocolat hazelnuts. Ended up getting this white chocolate nougat. love the box.

Just returned from Paris yesterday. Next few posts will be dedicated to some of the food highlights of my trip.

Creperie @ Rue Cler. Jambon et fromage. 4 euros.

Green Tea Yogurt-Ice Cream w frozen mangoes, strawberries, blueberries (Medium) cost me almost $6! That's double the price of Yogen Fruz, and it wasn't that outstanding in taste. But the presentation is nice, and the cafe is nice so I guess the extra cost is for the environment.