Sveinsbakarí [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Sveinsbakarí
Address: Skipholt 50B, Reykjavík 
Website: http://www.sveinsbakari.is/
Style: Icelandic
Price: $$ 

Well, well, well, look who's back! A slight hiatus on the site means that great things are in store, because it usually means that I'm out touring -- cake touring, that is. :P And indeed I was. Not only do I have a whole bunch of bakeries from around Iceland (I did manage to go west and north this time around, in addition to finally reviewing every single bakery in Rvk - minus the suburbs), but I have a few offerings from the Maritime provinces as well, which signal the beginning of what I'm calling the Great Canadian Cake Tour (yes, all capitalized)! I'll alternate between the two until I'm done to keep it exciting. Check back regularly. :)

Nevertheless, it took a little more searching this time around to find more bakeries that still needed to be covered. In fact, I knew of one in Vesturbaer from my last trip and I was headed there when it started pouring rain -- I was at the university too! -__- So, I was forced to turn back and had to do a little more research to find this place.

Sveinsbakarí is a bakery with three locations and they seem to operate mostly from their suburban Breiðholt location; their branch on Skipholt is pretty easy to miss. Tucked in between home decor stores and offices on a not very pedestrian street, it nonetheless had quite a crowd, despite it being late in the afternoon. Prices were reasonable, but not cheap. As with a great many Icelandic bakeries, they had a shelf of fairly standard pre-packed cakes (apple cakes, etc.) Their selection wasn't too phenomenal behind the glass, with the remainders of two varieties of "vienna bread" in slice and single danish format being pretty much the single must-eat-that-day baked good. There were a few squares (among them rice crisp squares O.o) and some French-inspired pastries as well (at least, that was my impression; I vaguely remember some sort of meringue creations). Lacking some of the usual yeast-based buns and doughnuts, focus seems to be on pastries; rather, I'd say it was more on sandwiches and their website is exclusively special occasion cakes, but besides this. At the very least on pastries it remained for me. ;) 

For my first bakery purchase of my 2014 World Tour, I couldn't resist a piece of danish (265kr) with the pink icing, of course. I'd been feeling a little disappointed with danishes lately, and so it was nice to try something new and somewhat different. Sveins was unusually thin and it being thrown into a simple plastic bag, it actually ended up folding and curling like a crepe (surprisingly, it did survive for the photo ^^). With a thin layer of marzipan inside and some baked-in custard on top, I thought at first that I'd be disappointed, but it proved to be pretty tasty. A little too generous on the sugar to one side, but it was still nice and flaky and it was actually perfect with just the thin layer of marzipan as opposed to it oozing it out like other places. At any rate, it was yummy dough.

It wasn't the best I've ever had and selection as well as service weren't the greatest, but out of the three danish slices I had this time, I'd say Sveins came in a fairly close second. Seeing as it's fairly accessible from the city centre (as opposed to the others I reviewed this time around), it's very likely I'll return on a future trip. ;) 

Rating: ***

The Dutch Shop

Bakery: The Dutch Shop
Address: 52 Main St W, Grimsby ON
Website: http://www.dutchshoponline.com/
Style: Dutch
Price: $

While waiting for my cord to transfer my pictures from the camera for this year's World Tour (get ready, it's coming :DDD), I thought I'd go back and do some belated posts I haven't done yet.

Not to be confused with The Dutch Shop in Burlington (I certainly wouldn't blame you, that's for sure; the two, however, are not related to one another), The Dutch Shop in the centre of Grimsby isn't that different in terms of its offerings. Mostly a delicatessen with all your favourite Dutch products, it sells the same home-based baked goods from other bakeries as its long-lost cousin and also features a few of their own treats, all pre-packed in larger trays and coming, I believe, in sets of six. As with the others, the variety isn't the largest and it's limited to just squares and individual items that can withstand a longer period on the shelf.

Especially when, seeing as I took almond tarts everywhere else, I can safely say that Grimsby knows their stuff. Their almond stuff, to be exact. These were the best Dutch almond tarts ($4.99 for a pack of six) I've tried so far! A generous filling, perfect all-around glaze, and great texture and taste, these really wowed me. Though the little cherry bits on top tended to fall off and one was missing. *pouts*

Equally notable were the coconut raspberry bars ($4.99 for a jam-packed tray). Not that big a fan of coconut, I didn't that this would appeal to me all that much, seeing as it's pretty much coconut and a layer of shortbread dough filled with raspberry jam. Surprisingly, this was quite yummy though, especially because of the chewiness of the coconut. It was really chewy and I like chewy! Then you have that hint of raspberry -- mmm, this pay not be a bakery in the most standard sense of the word, but the Dutch Shop (the Grimsby one ;)) is probably the best Dutch bakery in the area.

Rating: ***

Stany Greek Bakery

Bakery: Stany Greek Bakery
Address: 1015-1/2 Pape Ave, Toronto ON 
Website: n/a 
Style: Greek
Price: $ 

Located next door to the Danish Pastry Shop and nearly hidden by the awning, Stany Greek Bakery actually required a bit of a back track, since it took me a while for me to notice that I'd passed a bakery. Unfathomable. Anyways, Stany Greek Bakery is a hole-in-the-wall bakery and deli with everything from sweet bread to feta cheese crammed in as tight a space as you've seen. It's quite cute, in fact. ^^; The selection isn't so great, especially in terms of sweets. There's probably more savoury options (cheese and spinach pies) and breads (among them sweet breads and sweet sesame twists resembling egg/challah bread, but nonetheless, the classics are there: a few slices of cream cake, rum baba, and that's pretty much it, if you don't include the baklava, of course.

These come in two trays and have a definite homemade feel to them: the traditional well, baklava (triangle edition -- yes, it was so soaking that it was dangerous removing it from the box :P) and noodle-like kataifi, both loaded with nuts and a total steal at $1.75 each (that's taxes included) for a gigantic piece. Add that onto the fact that these things weigh a ton! If this were a priced per weight sort of place, you wouldn't be too pleased; four pieces must have weighed two kilos -- no, I'm not kidding you. One complained that the honey mixture was a little watery, but everyone else didn't seem to mind all that much. One even said it beat nearby Serano Bakery. The kataifi was especially delicious and the favourite all around. And it'll last forever... if you can resist the temptation of gobbling it up right away. Bang for your buck, for what little there's there.

Rating: ***