Coach House Shortbread Company

Bakery: Coach House Shortbread Company
Address: 235 Carlaw Ave, Toronto ON
Website: http://www.shortbread.ca
Style: Shortbread
Price: $$$

In the basement of a building of an old factory-turned-lofts, there's the Coach House Shortbread Company, which, as the name gives away, makes shortbread. And lots of it. ^^; Going into this thing or poking your head through the windows, you get the impression you're in the high end boutique of cookie stores and I just couldn't help but be reminded -- especially with the gold ribbon and pretty packaging -- of Ladurée in Paris. You feel like you're not buying cookies, you're uh, making a real purchase. ;DDDD The difference being that at Ladurée, you're not greeted with a smile and invited to the free samples by the owner/baker upon your entrance! I was impressed. I was special! (lol, please don't mind me~~~)

The pretty large space consists of a series of tables, stacked with differently coloured rolls (resembling Christmas crackers) filled with shortbread, both sweet and savoury, in a whole bunch of interesting and original flavours. Of course, I wasn't too interested in the savoury, but the sweet were pretty neat like rose, cranberry, candied almond, orange and cardamom, etc.

Taste aside, I found the pricing a little confusing (especially since there are two sizes) and didn't quite get the multiples; it almost seemed a little too corporate with entire baskets being priced, so much so that I felt a little... wrong buying just one thing, like it's not done or something? Many, many thanks for the clarification: the small "crackers" cost $9.95, whereas the larger rolls are priced at $12.95. The latter gets cheaper when bought in multiples (hence the list of deals -- not sure why it eluded me -.-)... therefore, one can conclude: it is best to buy the most you can. ;DD But at $10 as a minimum purchase, they weren't necessarily cheap. My little roll had 7 cookies in it, so roughly $1.40 per cookie, though there was a jar with lemon shortbread for $0.65.

Also, I was a little disappointed that there weren't any variety packs! For a first timer, I would have loved being able to try a few flavours/pick out some that appealed to me without needing to buy multiple packs.

Anyways, to the most important part: the taste. There not being cardamom (for that Scandinavian baking taste I love), I picked out sugar plum, because it sounded tasty. I like plums. ^^ Seriously, all I needed to do was read the ingredients to know these were going to be good cookies! First on the list: butter. :P And then it only got better: bits of plums, slivered almonds, raisins soaked in rum and spiced with cardamom, caraway and was cinnamon in there too? I don't even know how all of this can fit into one wee cookie! But wow, this was impressive. For one, these are just waiting to melt on your tongue. The texture is great and, in fact, letting them melt is the best way to enjoy them, since the dough kind of disappears and you're just left with this punch of flavour: spices and butter and candied fruit. Mmmm... these are definitely amazing shortbread!! Enough said. O___O ((I wouldn't have minded a little more either~~))

In the end, I like cookies, I like shortbread, but I can't really go crazy for them, so I guess I'll always prefer other baked goods, but still... Coach House knows *good* shortbread. :)

Rating: ***