Cheesecake Etc.

January 25, 2013May 2, 2013Leave a comment

After dinner, J and I went to get dessert at Cheesecake Etc. It was probably half full since it was a weekday night, so they told us to just choose a seat wherever we wanted.

Original Cheesecake with Strawberries

J got the Original Cheesecake with Straweberries, which I’ve also had in the past. They have actual strawberries on them, and the whip cream is fresh! However, I still like the cheesecake at Cheesecake Factory in the states the most!

Tonight’s Special – Tiramisu

The waitress told me that tonight’s special was the Tiramisu, so I immediately said yes to that. Their cheesecake is basically the same, except you can choose different toppings, so of course I wanted to try something new! I really enjoyed this. It wasn’t too strong in alcohol and the cake itself was soft and crumbly. Perfect when it was mixed in with the whipped cream!

That night, they also had a pianist and jazz singer performing. I’m not usually a jazz person, but jazz and cheesecake in a dimly lit seating area just seems to work so well!

Nicli Antica Pizzeria (revisit)

January 19, 2013May 2, 2013Leave a comment

For K’s birthday, we headed to Nicli Antica Pizzeria since she wanted some thin crust pizza! I’ve gone here once, and the pizza crusts are made from scratch. The place was quite packed when we got there, and it makes sense since it’s a nice place to drink a glass of wine, have some pizza and chat with friends.

Special* – parma prosciutto and arugula

We chose three pizzas to share, and I chose their Today’s Special, which I forgot the name of since it was so long. But it had param prosciutto which is my favourite. The arugula also added some great flavour to it. I guess the funniest part of dinner was our inabilities to cut our pizza. These pizzas are made from scratch, hence their crust is much more tough than normal pizza. Some people like it and some people don’t, but the crust is intended to be like that. Our waitress laughed at us while we took forever cutting our pizzas, and in the end she told us it would be okay to use our hands. How embarrassing, since we looked around and everyone was well-mannered and slowly slicing their pizza. I was hungry, so eating with my hands were the way to go!

Pesto – herb pesto, fior di latte, marinated black olives, capers, roasted red onion, fresh tomato

J chose the Pesto, which was definteily much more interesting than normal pesto pizzas I’ve had. The flavour was much more strong, and the capers and roasted red onions gave it a distinct flavours. The only part was that I don’t like olives, so I had to pick those out.

Margherita – pomodoro, grana padano, fior di latte, basil

Lastly, K got the traditional Margherita, which is a great classic. Their tomato sauce is made from fresh tomatoes too, so it has a distinct flavour.

Tiramisu – classic with Marscapone cream and frangelico syrup

For dessert, we decided to all share a Tiramisu. It was homemade and really good! Just the right about of alcohol in it, and the cake was soft.

Apple Fruit Cake?

I wish I remembered the name of this cake, since it was really good. We got this as a little surprise since we wanted to get a dessert that could support a candle. I guess none of their desserts really did that so they put the candle next to the cake instead…Anyways, this was really good! There were soft apples with a sauce inside the cake, and it also came with a vanilla bean ice cream on the side. Yum!

The downside to Nicli is that they don’t take reservations, so you’ll need to expect some waiting time if you come on their busy nights.

Christmas Baking!

January 14, 2013May 2, 2013Leave a comment

Christmas Day is always good and bad at the same time for me. It’s great because it’s a time to reunite with family and friends, but at the same time, thinking of what to do can sometimes be a headache. It always seems to revolve around food though with all those family dinners. But what about the afternoon? This year, I celebrated Christmas and also S’s birthday by baking some Christmas goods! First up, we got the Pilsbury Christmas Cookies. So yea…we’re not exactly the best bakers, and we wanted to be festive, so what’s better than premade cookies where we just need to pop them into the oven right? I actually expected to cut the cookie dough, but apparently, they’ve gotten so advanced that they already come pre-cut too… Guess you literally just need to put them in the oven.

These cookies were sold out everywhere too! My mom snatched the last box so I guess they’re a big hit during the holidays. And here’s the finished product! Don’t they look awesome?! Tasty too, and so easy to make! Oh, and no washing dishes required! Well other than the baking sheet.

And then we also made Gingerbread men! We were also lazy and bought the kit from Superstore. However, it wasn’t as quick as the Pilsbury cookies. It came with the pre-mixed flour, icing flour, piping bag, cookie cutter, as well as some sweets that we didn’t end up using. I think we over mixed these guys since they came out pretty holey… And the shapes were extremely awkward looking. The cookie cutter shaped the arms and legs extremely skinny so it was really hard to lift the dough off the counter, resulting in awkward looking men. We used smarties instead of the included sweets and the icing was surprisingly really easy to use and also didn’t taste too sweet. The gingerbread was strong in flavour, but I found them quite hard after letting them cool. Either we over mixed it or the mix wasn’t great.

Lastly, we baked a pie! We followed Grandma Ople’s Recipe and we were quite proud of our finished product! The lattice top just makes the pie look so much better. The filling definitely was too strong in cinnamon and spices for me though. Funny thing was we already cut down half of the cinnamon that was required. The crust was flaky, and that’s thanks to the Pilsbury unroll-and-fill pie crusts! Yes, we were being lazy again, but we didn’t have time to let our dough refrigerate!

And more desserts! Well we didn’t make this, but my parents bought some Cheesecake from Costco, and it was not bad. 4 flavours including lemon, raspberry, chocolate and dulce leche. My favourite was the lemon since the hint of sourness balanced off the sweetness of the rest of the cake. At an affordable price too!

And that was my Christmas afternoon. Definitely a belated post! 8)

Earl’s Restaurant & Bar (Richmond)

January 9, 2013May 2, 2013Leave a comment

Warm Gingerbread Cake – brown sugar roasted apples, salted caramel sauce, vanilla bean gelato

I realized I’m half a month late on my posts again… Blame the busy holidays and school starting! But anyways, back in December, the staff at work got together for a mini late night dinner, which was supposedly our Christmas party. We ended up at Earl’s since we get off so late that everywhere else is usually closed on a weekday. I had just grabbed dinner with some friends, so I ended up going for drinks and dessert. Service was not bad, since the restaurant was pretty empty at that time.

I got the Warm Gingerbread Cake, which is on their seasonal menu, and it was such a large piece of cake! It was moist and a little sticky, but surprisingly not too sweet after a few bites. The roasted apples on the side complimented the cake well since whenever I felt like it got too sweet, I would take a bite of apple and the sourness would balance it out. It also came with a vanilla bean gelato, but because the cake was so warm, the gelato was already half melted when it was served. Overall, not bad. But it’s definitely a huge piece to finish on your own. So a great dessert to share with a friend.

Sweet Revenge

November 22, 2012May 2, 2013Leave a comment

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I’ve wanted to use my gift card for Sweet Revenge for a while, but I never really go to that area of Vancouver. Finally, I decided to head over there to get some desserts for my friend and I. I read reviews that the place is always packed with people since it’s only open at night, and indeed it was. People were lining up at the doors. I ended up getting take out and ate at my friend’s instead.

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The interior of the place is really cute though. It’s quite dim inside, but the red walls give it an interesting ambiance. They put framed pictures around, and the décor is quite vintage. I only waited around 5 minutes and my take out was ready.

Chocolate Mousse Cake – semi-sweet chocolate mousse, with cream cheese & a crunchy curst & White Chocolate Cheesecake – flourless cheesecake with home-made sauce

I got the Chocolate Mousse Cake, which was surprisingly not too sweet. It was smooth and had a really nice crunch at the bottom of the cake. There were also pieces of chocolate flakes on the top, which made a nice touch to it. The second dessert I got was the White Chocolate Cheesecake. It was recommended to me by the cashier. I really enjoyed this. It came with a raspberry sauce in a container. It wasn’t too sweet, and I love white chocolate and cheesecake, so it was the perfect pairing. Too bad I couldn’t see what it would look like presented on a plate with the sauce drizzled over it. My take-out box pictures clearly did not look as nice as the ones I saw in the store. Other desserts I really wanted to try were the tiramisu, and crème brulee, which were both recommended to me by the cashier as well. However, these had a $2 deposit that needed to be paid for the cups for take-out. I don’t live near that area so I wasn’t prepared to go back to return the cups, but I didn’t feel like paying that extra $2 either. I guess I’ll just have to try those desserts next time when I actually sit in. The place looks pretty cool with a variety of drinks as well. Check it out!

Menchie’s Frozen Yogurt

October 9, 2012May 2, 2013Leave a comment

People have been talking about Menchie’s for quite a while, but I still hadn’t visited this froyo shop yet. I’ve had Qoola before, but I’m still not a huge fan of frozen yogurt. There are a lot of other desserts that I rather have instead. But after our meeting, M and I spotted Menchie’s and I thought it would be the perfect chance to try it!

This is the yogurt bar. After you choose either a cup or waffle cone in a cup, you head over to the yogurt bar to choose your frozen yogurt flavours. I had no idea Menchie’s had so many flavours! It’s pretty cool how you can try all the different flavours in these little ketchup cups they give you. That way, you know beforehand if you’ll like the frozen yogurt. I tried at least half the flavours, and there was even Red Velvet Cake! Yum! It was like chocolate cake! I ended up getting the Mango flavour though, just because I wanted something that was more refreshing on this warm September night.

Then you head over to the topping section. There are loads of candy and pretty much any topping you can think of. Then there is a section with toppings that are gooey and such. There’s also syrups and sprinkles and more that you can add.

And then when you have finished decorating your frozen yogurt, you bring it to the till where you proceed to pay. The cashier will place your item(s) on the weight, and weigh it. You basically pay a base rate (which I can’t recall) and then for every pound, you also pay a rate. So everything is based on how heavy your items are. So don’t go crazy and pump as much froyo as you can, and add all that heavy candy on – well unless you’re ready to pay the ridiculous price for it. It’s actually pretty smart to make profit, since most people would just put whatever they like on it, and for those who love candy, those are probably one of the heaviest toppings you could put.

Mango Frozen Yogurt with Mango Popping Boba and Mochi

Some things I added were mochi – which were sooooo delicious! I love mochi 🙂 and I also added something called Mango Popping Boba. At first, I thought they were tapioca pearls that were mango flavoured, but no… these things actually pop in your mouth! Well more like burst. I don’t even know how to describe them, but they just pop when you apply pressure on them, and then you get a bit of a mango flavour to it. Kind of weird and I didn’t extremely like them. I enjoyed my frozen yogurt, but I’m still not a crazy fan of it. I’d much rather have some other desserts, but that’s just me. I like Menchie’s a lot more than Qoola though, just because of the wide variety of flavours and toppings.

They recently also opened a shop near UBC! So perhaps I will grab some when I crave frozen yogurt!

Granny’s Cheesecake & More

September 26, 2012May 2, 2013Leave a comment

Deep Fried Kool-Aid

Kool-Aid. Deep Fried? Wait, what? How can Kool-Aid be deep fried?! I think I asked that question so many times when I saw the signage. At Granny’s Cheesecake & More at PNE, they deep fry everything. From the typical bananas, to cheesecakes, and then all the way to the extreme: Deep Fried Kool-Aid. I tried to take a picture of the signage they had for “What on Earth is Deep Fried Kool-Aid”, but the lighting was pretty bad. So to summarize:

They make a super concentrated Kool-Aid mixture. Then they apparently add Granny’s secret ingredient, and then they deep fry it in small balls and then cover it with icing sugar!

Pretty cool idea, but how well did it taste is the question! They were definitely not as good as the Deep Fried Oreos, but you couldn’t say they were terrible. They lacked flavour, and I could just taste a hint of berry flavour, and then the rest was just like eating a piece of red dough. One is enough, and when you keep eating it, it becomes too much.

Pennsylvania Dutch Funnel Cakes (at PNE)

September 22, 2012May 2, 2013Leave a comment

Deep Fried Pop Tarts… tempting…

Deep Fried Wagon Wheels…?

Deep Fried Oreos!

Almost a month overdue post now..since PNE was at the end of August! But anyways, PNE had tons of good food during the Fair, so this is just the beginning of some of the food I tried! I heard from my colleague back when I was interning about Deep Fried Oreos, and I knew I had to try them when I went to PNE. There were a two stands with them, but this stand also had Deep Fried Pop Tarts and such…so I decided to give it a try. They were surprisingly really good! I usually find oreos too sweet, but for some reason, these weren’t as sweet as normal oreos. The batter also didn’t feel too oily. It was basically a soft dough on the outside, and the oreo inside wasn’t extremely gooey or melty, so it was really good! They were extremely filling too. I still wonder what Deep Fried Pop Tarts would taste like, but I guess I’ll have to try next year!

Every Day is a Food Day

Tag: Dessert