Extreme Coffee Freak

To complete our evening we headed out to visit Rosso Tuxedo. It is the closest Rosso to the where we live, didn’t want to venture to far with the roads how they are. The cafe was not that busy, a couple people here and there, when we ordered I got my Sweet Latte pretty quick but my daughter and wife had to wait a little for the YYC Hot Chocolate. The wait was definitely worth it.

Rosso’s beverage is the Orange Blossom Hot Cocoa, which is a unique blend of orange and floral notes, Deutsch processed cocoa, orange zest cookie and a dried orange slice.

The cookie was absolutely outstanding and loved that it was a cookie that I could dip instead of being crumbled over the drink. When my wife tried the first sip all she could say was wow. It had such an amazing floral flavour without being overpowering, it was very pleasing to drink. You definitely got the Orange Blossom flavouring in the beverage.

After chatting with the barista he said to come up with this beverage they held a store competition to come up with ideas and this wonderful drink came from the Inglewood location. We had asked if there was anyway to buy some of the cookies, but unfortunately only a certain amount was sent to each location.

This drink was very creative and delicious. Just don’t try and eat the orange, it is purely there for decoration.

Today we headed down to the Simmons Building to go to Phil & Sebastian Coffee Roasters. I don’t actually know how many times we have visited Phil & Sebastian’s but today it was very pleasant. The music was amazing and there seemed to be quite a few people down there enjoying a beverage and a good conversation. Today I decided to have a Dulce Latte and my daughter had the YYC Hot Chocolate.

Their beverage is the Tonka Soul Hot Chocolate which is a infusion of Tonka beans, with their Dulce de Leche and Madagascar dark chocolate from Canadian small-batch chocolate roasters – Soul Chocolate out of Toronto. Tonka beans add a unique vanilla-cinnamon-almond liquor aroma to the hot chocolate.

The first sip was very good, if I was judging on a hot chocolate. I didn’t get much Tonka flavouring in the beverage at all. The shavings on top of the drink gave the aroma of Tonka beans but didn’t get the flavours. It just seemed to be lacking some of the flavours that they said it would have. After drinking the beverage, the very last sip had all the Tonka flavour because the shaving had drifted to the bottom of the drink.

Overall this was not that great of a drink, sorry, it just seemed very plain.

Tonight we decided to head down to one of our newest local coffee shops, Société. They closed at 7:30pm and we got there at 7:05pm. There was a couple other people in there, the owner let us no that there was no rush to finish our drinks.

Ordering the Bumblebee Hot Chocolate which is their rich dark chocolate from Epiphanie with a lightly spiced tumeric blend, and top with honey flavoured whip with a drizzle of honey. We were pleased to see that they use real honey and not fake honey. Tasting just the whip it tasted so amazing, the whip had such an amazing flavour.

The first sip of the drink was absolutely amazing, I don’t have anything negative to say. The smooth blend of spices and the sweetness from the honey was absolutely great. The words that my wife and daughter continued to use while enjoying this beverage were, wow, amazing, and delicious. I have to say that they really liked this hot chocolate. My wife said she hopes that no other hot chocolate beats this, because it is her favourite. This is definitely one of the top hot chocolates thus far. You have to go and try this!

We also noticed that they are now selling wine, so head on down for you YYC Hot Chocolate and a glass of wine and maybe some cheese. At least that is what my daughter would do.

It’s me, Extreme Coffee Freak’s daughter, taking over the blog for this post. I work at Mount Royal University and it made sense for me to try Barrow Espresso’s Coconut Hot Chocolate. I work in the Bissett Building and there is a Barrow Cart on the main floor, but this year they didn’t have the hot chocolate, it was only in the new location over at the Riddell Library and Learning Centre. So I wandered on over.

The location is absolutely beautiful, so many windows with natural light and very spacious. The bar spans the whole length of one of the short walls and they have so much room. Definitely a step up from the little Barrow Cart in Bissett. After I ordered I had to wait a couple minutes since the barista forgot about my drink, even though when I was there I was second in line.

When I received the drink, the whip could have been a little prettier since it seemed like the barista didn’t know how to place the whip on top of the drink. The whip really tasted like coconut which was amazing. In the drink I got very subtle coconut flavour, which was sad. When I got back to my office, the whip had melted all into the drink which was nice, but the flavour didn’t move into the hot chocolate. I really wished there was more coconut flavouring in the drink.

We decided to visit Higher Ground at Capitol Hill on Sunday, and boy was it busy, full of students studying and hanging out. That cafe is not very big so seeing it this full was a great sight. Before we ordered, the barista asked if any of us were having the YYC Hot Chocolate because they only had enough syrup to make two. There was someone who ran to get more syrup form the Kensington location so we would not have had to wait long if we wanted more. While we were waiting for the hot chocolates to be made, we asked if it was a collaborative effort to make this drink, and the barista said no, it was made by a colleague at the Kensington location.

On our first sips it tasted really good, but once you got past the vanilla whip (didn’t taste like vanilla) it was super sweet. You got an overwhelming flavour of Lavender and it was almost too strong to enjoy. We didn’t taste any chocolate at all. So my daughter decided to see if they would slightly change their ratio of syrups to make it a little less sweet, so she asked for half the Lavender syrup and an extra of the chocolate. It seemed less sweet but still very sweet. We think that the ratio of Lavender syrup to Honey in their bottles may be a little off.

After drinking the hot chocolate, we thought it would have been cool to only put in a pump of lavender since it is so strong, and still do two pumps of chocolate, and drizzle a little honey on top with the purple sprinkles. We thought it would give it a little less sweetness and would be a more pleasing taste to the palette.

Sucre is another one of our favourite cafes since they have amazing pastries and other assorted items. Their hot chocolate is called the Orange Florentine Cocoa, a mixture of Monin Dark Chocolate Sauce with their homemade caramel and freshly squeezed orange juice. It is topped with fresh whipping cream with crumbled homemade florentine cookie along with a dab or orange zest.

While talking with the barista she said that the manager and her were the ones who put together the flavours, their inspiration was Terry’s Chocolate Oranges. Those are so good. It was a very pretty drink and every time you went to take a sip you really could smell the orange zest which was amazing. We did feel that the added orange juice seemed to water down the chocolate flavour a little. It was still a smooth hot chocolate, and we did wish that it was hotter since it seemed to be a little cooler than it should have been.

We also thought that it would be nice to have a florentine cookie to dip into the hot chocolate instead of crumbling it on top. Having to chew something while you are drinking the hot chocolate is not one of our favourite things, it is just a weird texture thing. Plus who likes to chew what they are drinking.

Euphoria is always our go to cafe and since it was the start of YYC Hot Chocolate Fest we decided that we should try this one first. Their hot chocolate is called the Cirque Du Chocolat, it is their famous hot chocolate infused with toffee, it has a sprinkle of marshmallows, a handful of buttered popcorn, a drizzle of dark chocolate and a dash of chocolate bits.

We thought it would be strange with the buttered popcorn, but it was so delicious, how it was combined with the dark chocolate drizzle was amazing. Something about sweet and salty really work together the best. All the flavours worked really well together. Even though there were chunks of popcorn in the drink it really didn’t bother us as much as what we had thought they would.

Overall this hot chocolate was way better than the one they made last year! As well it was a great way to start YYC Hot Chocolate Fest!

Follow us as we venture out over the next month to try as many hot chocolates as we can.

One of the highest hurdles in a business is the ability to adapt with current trends and industry developments. It’s kind of like a car traveling uphill, a business either moves forward or slides back; there is no stalling out, you must try and keep your business moving forward.

In coffee as well as any business, moving forward usually translates into staying on top of rising trends, and keeping your business looking fresh. This place looks tired and old.

Sadly, La Boulangerie is not skilled in this; many times a coffee establishment will find success with an initial plan and as long as it works (aka makes money), the business remains in a holding pattern until things head south and by then it’s usually too late. Here’s what’s crazy, I have driven past this place a number of times and seen the patio plugged with people and maybe it’s just because they have a great location on 4 Street SW, I am not sure. With the amount of traffic this place sees, it should be amazing, it was not.

 

The Interior

Once you walk inside, the café looks tired and old. Seating is extremely limited and is very tight. We grabbed a table close to the windows but since the till was mere feet away from us, people were always just about on top of us. There was a guy sitting at the table that was right in front of the till and he could hardly wait for us to leave so he could move a bit farther away so he would stop getting bumped into.

The Drinks

The drinks were ordered were as follows:

My wife ordered the Bernard Callebaut Hot Chocolate and my daughter and myself ordered Vanilla Lattes. The Vanilla Lattes were lacking flavor. La Boulangerie serves illy coffee. Honestly the latte tasted like it came out of one of those automatic machines you see at Tim Horton’s.

One positive is my wife’s hot chocolate was actually really good and had lots of flavor. It tasted like it was liquid milk chocolate. Great job on this drink.

The Food

Unfortunately today we didn’t order any food. A lot of what we seen looked really good and the quality looked like it was there but it was very pricey. We did want to try a macaron so my daughter bought the Orange Blossom and White Chocolate and the sad thing is we didn’t taste any orange until my daughter decided to dissect and find where the orange was. For paying the most for a macaron ($2.50) we have ever paid for, we expected stronger flavour.

The Service

The service we received was pretty good, the owner was the bubbliest one there that day. The rest of the staff only talked to you if you asked them a question.

 

Overall

Unfortunately, on this day I really feel La Boulangerie failed for me. Maybe it was a bad day for this place, but I don’t think so.

 

Parking and Location

They have a lot that you can sometimes find parking, if you cannot get a space there, it is street parking which can sometimes be very hard to find on a weekend.