Specialty Shop Archives - Page 4 of 4

In Bakery

East Village Bakery: Mom & Pop Bakery With Artisan Treats

December 23, 2011

East Village Bakery is an artisan bakery specializing in artisan bread, pies and french pastries. I honestly thought it was just an asian bakery, but when M and stepped inside, we were just amazed by the amount of little ornate treats. Everything looked very fresh and the smell inside was just amazing.

They had a lot of delectable treats available! I’m sure you can come in to find lots of inspiration too if you love to bake.

They all looked picture perfect! From the scones to the gingersnap cookies. Pretty good prices too.

Palmiers AKA Butterfly Cookies are nice and crunchy with good layering. Not too buttery.

Doesn’t that look so delicious. It is one of my favorite cookies as a kid.

White chocolate blueberry scone ($2.35) was a really good scone. It was different that the usual scones since it was not very hard and was quite delicate. I wasn’t originally going to purchase this, but the owner suggested it. Good decision indeed.

Spinach Cheddar Scone ($2.35) is for the people who love savory baked goods. It wasn’t very flavourful, but it does taste better with some tea or coffee. The inside texture was quite light and fluffy similar to the other scone.

Sour Cherry Chocolate Truffle Tart (2 for $3.50) was surprisingly really good. Good balance between the sour cherry and the chocolate.

Callebaut Chocolate Banana Cake with Marzipan ($2.95) was good, the inside had a really cool texture and had some chewy bits inside. M liked it a lot.

Ginger Crackle Cookies ($1.95) was not that good since it was really tough and hard to eat. M likes his ginger cookies a bit softer and sweeter.

Overall, it’s a good place to grab a few treats and bring them back home.

Words of Wisdom:

Call in for special orders to ensure the item you want
Fresh and baked daily on site
Very very limited seating, mostly for take out
Some items can be a hit or miss
Good affordable prices

We Rate East Village Bakery:

Address:

2166 East Hastings St.
Vancouver, BC V5L

Website:
eastvillagebakery.com

Twitter: @eastvillagebake

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Vancouver

In Dessert

La Chocolaterie: The Best Chocolates In The Lower Mainland

December 21, 2011

La Chocolaterie is the best chocolate store in the Lower Mainland. I really mean that because I have never been so excited and addicted to chocolates until now. Ever since my first bite at the Bakers Market, I have not been able to stop myself. They are my version of Willy Wonka. The owners – Taka & Kayoko have really dedicated themselves on making quality chocolates!

Their store is inside Izumi-Ya Japanese Marketplace. Its a small space, but thats where all the magic happens.

They are best known for their Ganache Chocolates. Really smooth chocolatey texture with amazing balance of flavour. I’m pretty sure they have over 30 flavours. Really unique flavours like blueberry, mango, green tea, black sesame, sake, red bean and even wasabi.

They also have chocolate bars too! These may look normal, but they are truly amazing. Earl Grey and the matcha bars are really good!

These ganache chocolates part of their coconama collection are really the gem of it all!

Favorite Pack ($5) contains 6 of the most popular flavours. You can’t go wrong with this since these are tried and tested flavours.

The green tea is quite strong, so if you aren’t familiar with the taste of green tea, it will be quite bitter.

Adventurers Pack ($5) is not for all. Judging by the flavours, it won’t appeal to everyone. The flavour is very subtle and acts as a secondary flavour to accompany the chocolaty ganache taste. The wasabi is not spicy at all, but you do get the faint flavour of wasabi.

I know some people may be scared of it, but it’s not bad at all.

6 pack of Tarts ($8.80) is assorted and you can choose what flavours you want inside. I initially thought the the tarts were a bit weird, but the tart make the ganache not as sweet. It makes for great presents…but in this case….I ate them all.

I also got Gift Basket A for $30 and it had a good assortment of everything in their store, so my coworkers really enjoyed it.

My all time favorite flavours:

Blueberry, mango, earl grey, coffee, black sesame, strong matcha and lemon basil.

Words of Wisdom:

Great Unforgettable Gifts (especially for the office)…step aside Ferrero Rocher!
Get a gift basket if you want to try a little bit of everything but can’t decide
Can be found at the Vancouver Bakers Market

We Rate La Chocolaterie:
Address:
7971 Alderbridge Way (Inside Izumi-Ya Japanese Marketplace)
Richmond, BC
Website:
http://www.lachocolaterie-vancouver.com/
Twitter:
@TKChocolate

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Vancouver

In Gastown

Big Lou’s Butcher Shop: Sandwiches, Sandwiches, and Sandwiches

August 30, 2011

Big Lou’s Butcher Shop is best known for their selection of meats as well as their sandwich counter. Some say that their sandwiches are equally as good as Meat & Bread.

I am never in this part of town, so it took me a while to make a trip here. M wanted a sandwich as usual, so I thought this would be a perfect place.

The back of this small store is the sandwich counter. They have a decent sized selection of sandwiches, but you really have to come here before certain items run out. I really really wanted the Porchetta, but that was sold out…also the turducken was sold out too.

They have very ornate decoration in the store. I just adored their shelves because of all the old style items that are there. Mostly it was the Boylan bottles of pop, but it gave it a cool look.

M is a huge cherry cola fan but I have never liked the flavour of any cherry type of cola…..till now.

Boylan’s Black Cherry soda is so good! It has a nice refreshing taste of the cherry flavour and it’s the best I have ever had. even said it was the best he’s ever had as well.

We took the sandwiches home to eat since there were only 2 stools to sit on. Since they were closing in 30 mins, we really didn’t mind taking it out. I hear thats what most people do anyways. I love how they wrap up these sandwiches so nicely in butcher paper and wrap the string around it.

Banh Mi ($8) has pickled vegetables, shredded pork shoulder, pate, cilantro and spicy mayo. This was pretty good. The bread is super crunch on the outside and quite nice and fluffy on the inside.

It is packed with a good amount of the shredded pork shoulder! The sauce worked really well with the ingredients too! They really created a good variation of this vietnamese classic. Just look at all that tender meat, who could resist?

Big Lou’s Chicago Style ($7.50) has in-house made sausages, pickles, onions, mustard, tomato mayo, peppers and celery salt. This sandwich uses the same type of bread as the banh mi sandwich.

I wasn’t a fan of this sandwich. The sausage had a really good taste, but I didn’t like the combination of the pickled, peppers and onions. I didn’t feel like it accentuated the flavour of the sausage since it really is the star of this sandwich.

The Shooter has seared medium steak slices, mushrooms, caramalized onions and perhaps horseradish. This sandwich is definitely different than the other ones. All the ingredients are embedded into the middle of the sandwich like a cross-section. All the laters are quite visible and you can see the medium color of all the steak slices.

The bread is different and it’s more dense and full of grains than the other bread.

When you bite into the sandwich, you will notice that is cold. I think they prepare it ahead of time and slice a piece off when someone orders it. It did have a good combination of flavours, but since it was cold, it was hard to taste some of the flavours. If this was a hot sandwich, I am sure the caramelized onions would have stood out a bit more.

Overall, Big Lou’s Butcher Shop has some interesting sandwiches. I found that some sandwiches can be a hit or a miss. Since I didn’t try the porchetta, I still don’t know which is better. For the time being, I will still stick with Meat & Bread. I will return for another visit and see which sandwich shop reigns supreme.

Words of Wisdom:

Super sketch area of town
Under $10
Banh Mi is good choice!

We Rate Big Lou’s Butcher Shop:

Address:

269 Powell Street
Vancouver, BC

Website:
www.biglousbutchershop.com

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/BigLousButcherShop

Twitter:

@biglousbutcher

In Chinatown

T&T: Another Cheap Lunch

April 10, 2011

My coworker and I wanted to grab some food at T&T for cheap! So, during our lunchbreak, we headed over to grab a few things to go. We hoped onto the Granville Skytrain and got off at Stadium Skytrain.

My goal yet again was to keep everything under $10. Surprisingly I got a lot of food for under $10. I didn’t get the hot food again, but I wanted to try to be healthy as well.

I grabbed a pack of 2 rice rolls. One of them had marinated pig ear and the other had shrimp. Some people are disgusted by pig ear, but some people like me love it. Just be warned, even though the packaging says “pork”, you are not getting the usual pork meat. It is the pig ear.

The rice rolls were not very large like the ones you would find in restaurants. Perhaps half the size. It’s not necessarily a bad thing because you get to taste both kind of rice rolls without being stuffed.

Next, I got the Negituna (~$2). This is not Negitoro, it uses the usual tuna sashimi and not the meat from the belly.

Since these were the small sushi rolls, I really didn’t noticed much of a difference. There is the tuna and the green onions wrapped up in the rice and seaweed.

Usual, I had to balance this meal with fruit. T&T has a lot of cut fruit, but I noticed that most of them do not look very appetizing. You need to look through all of them to find the fresh ones that are made in the morning. The ones that have noticeable moisture like the one above is not very fresh.

Words of Wisdom:

Lots of Hot and cold food items
Under $10
Limited seating
Do grocery shopping as the same time as eating lunch
Free Parking at Tinsel Town

We Rate T&T:

Address:

179 Keefer Place
Vancouver, BC

Website:
www.tnt-supermarket.com/en/

In Chinatown

T&T Supermarket: Cheap Lunch

April 1, 2011

I am starting to go through a “cheap” phase to start saving more money, than just blowing it all on food. A girl has wants you know… like clothes and electronics. hahaha.

Since I work one Skytrain away from T&T Supermarket, I thought why not? It’s cheap and they always have a lot of food since they are a supermarket. I met up with Mandu as well since she wanted a quick lunch.

Walking in, there is SO much to choose from! Sushi, dim sum, hot food, cold food, drinks, etc. There was so much food and the smell was so nice! We were literally going back and forth between the cold and hot food sections trying to figure out what to eat. I kept eyeing all the fried items in the hot sections… but I told myself I had to be a bit healthy today…so I went to the cold section.

I got the Chirashi Don ($6.99). There was a lot of ingredients in this dish – wild salmon, normal salmon, tofu, ebi, lemon, cucumber, wasabi, and ginger.

What is cute about this dish is that the wild salmon is presented like a rose. The price of the don was definitely worth it. The other sushi joints would charge $10+ for a chirashi don.

I also got a container of freshly cut fruits ($2.93). There were kiwis, strawberries, cantaloupe, grapes and honey dew.

I have to admit, some of the fruits were not in the best quality or cut very well. There would be a little bit of kiwi skin left on it. Strawberries were a bit off color. Since they are a supermarket, I guess the use up their left over fruit to prep it for their meals.

Address:

179 Keefer Place
Vancouver, BC

Website:
www.tnt-supermarket.com/en/

In Cafe

The Dirty Apron

February 14, 2011

The Dirty Apron is many things….a cooking school, delicatessen, grocer, and a lunch/dinner hot spot. They are owned by the creators of Cafe Medina and Chambar. They are actually located on the same block as well.

Mandu and I passed by a few weeks ago and noticed this new place. It wasn’t until today that we decided to try it out.

Walking inside, you can see there are 2 aisles of packaged products. Most of these are packaged products, so you can find canned items, pre-made pasta sauces, and specialty ingredients.

They have a variety of meats if you want to grab some for home or create your own sandwich.

They have about 5 of their grilled sandwiches on display. You can look at them and decide which one you want. Then they will grill it up for you!

They also have daily hot food such as roasted chicken, soups, rice, lentils, pasta, and stews. While you are there, you should try out some of their cheese samples. You may discover a new cheese which you will LOVE.

They have one main menu for baguettes and grilled sandwiches. They range from $7 – $9.

Mandu first wanted a sandwich but then when she saw a huge plate of lasagna ($6.99), she had to have it. First of all, this is some steller lasagna. It has lots of meat and vegetables. Perfectly cooked and had an amazing flavour. Highly recommended if you come here!

While we were there, 3 other people in the dining area had this as well. On any rainy day, this lasagna will turn your whole day around!

I ordered the prosciutto Grilled sandwich ($8.99). Inside this sandwich are figs, prosciutto, watercress, cheese, balsamic and onions.

The bread was really nice, it has inside nuts and cranberries. the outside was nicely grilled so it had a bit of a crunch to it. The balsamic and onions made this a very savory sandwich. I wish this sandwich had a but more prosciutto because at times I felt I could taste more of the figs than prosciutto. Still, the sandwich was amazing.

Oh, they also have cooking classes! Seriously, such an amazing looking set up. Who wouldn’t want to cook here?!

Words of Wisdom:

Free parking at Tinsel Town (Supposed to be for patrons…but it’s ok)
Cheap lunch
Specialty ingredients
Lots of seating

We Rate The Dirty Apron:

Address:

540 Beatty Street
Vancouver, BC

Website: http://www.dirtyapron.com/

In product

Candy Aisle

February 12, 2011

Have you ever walked by Robson street and saw this candy shop? I’ve been going here for a few years and it really makes me feel like a kid again. They have so many different types of candies that you can’t find at any of the big box stores.

You know how there are so many candy bars you can find in the US, but you don’t get in Canada? They have some of that here.

They have so many types of gummies, sour candies…and even a lot of jelly bellys. They have all the colors of the rainbow!

They even have a wall full of Pez.

In the end I got Astros, which are chocolate covered wafer balls. They use to have it at places like Walmart. Now, they only sell them exclusively only in Africa.

M loves Milky Way since it was his favorite candy bar as a kid. It tastes similar to 3 Musketeers.

The last thing I got was the Milo Chocolate Bar. I usually have the drink but when I saw the chocolate version, I had to have it. It kinda reminded me of Aero.

I honestly think this is a really cool place to find gift. Who wouldn’t want a box of chocolates from their childhood. Or even some humorous chocolate bars. They have a lot of really weird things like chocolate covered crickets, scorpion lollipops, nintendo mints, and chocolate cigarettes.

Website: http://www.candyaisle.com/

Locations: