Goodness Me! Natural Food Market

Bakery: Goodness Me! Natural Food Market
Address: 720 Bristol Rd, Mississauga ON (plus other locations in Hamilton/Guelph area)
Website: http://www.goodnessme.ca/ 
Style: North American 
Price: $$ 

Well, it looks like there's a new health food store in town. Located at the corner of Bristol and Mavis, not only is Goodness Me! of impressive size, they also advertise they have a bakery. And whenever someone's advertising a bakery, you know a certain someone's not far behind. ;)

The bakery itself isn't particularly large and although it's not exactly Whole Foods, probably their closest competition, this (Canadian) chain is most certainly better priced and, while the goodies are simple, they're also good. For those concerned about gluten, I also liked how these guys pretty much had a gluten-free equivalent of all their baked goods, from muffins to cookies to cupcakes. There are a few fancier pastries (mostly from the yummy Dufflet) but the selection isn't that impressive. Wanting to try something original, I laid off the Dufflet and went for the small counter of more modest baked goods; that is, mostly muffins in about half a dozen varieties as well as a couple of cookies, from the more "healthy" options with every seed in the book (^^;;) to some more exciting (lol, yes, I don't want my sweets healthy) varieties such as the ones I took.

First of all, I decided to try the strawberry streusel muffin ($1.99). I'm not the biggest fan of muffins, I have to say, but this one resembled more a coffee cake with tasty streusel on top and a delicately spiced dough. To be quite honest, I'm not sure what happened to the strawberry portion... I think I found one piece of strawberry in the whole muffin. At the very least, they didn't put in nasty gloop or fake red dots like some places. x_x Still, a tad more fruit would have been appreciated.

My favourite item, however, has quickly become their ginger molasses cookie ($1.89). Not only is it one giant cookie with a bit of granulated sugar on top, it's so fragrant and spiced with plenty of ginger. What's more, it has the perfect chewy texture that I love: not too soft and far from hard. I went back again to pick up something that was advertised and walked away with another cookie. I don't think I can get enough of these -- I love gingerbread/spice cookies!!! :P

Although it's nothing too impressive, the baked goods are nonetheless quite tasty and worth trying. Especially seeing as there weren't that many people there on either visit, I think this place deserves a little more love... after all, I need to ensure my supply of ginger cookies. ;D

Rating: **1/2