Viking Bakery [RIP]

Bakery: Viking Bakery
Address: 2207 Danforth Ave, Toronto ON 
Website: n/a 
Style: Icelandic (!) 
Price: $-$$ 

[This one was one of the greatest bakery upsets I've had: Viking Bakery -- the only ICELANDIC bakery in this part of the country -- quietly shut its doors and the owner went to work at the DANISH Pastry House instead. x.x I'm all for bakery variety and it was nice to have an Icelandic bakery around, though not much really reminded me of Iceland... oh, and I'm very concerned about the quality of the baked goods at Danish Pastry House with their expansion plans I've heard about here and there; to be quite frank, it simply isn't close to how amazing it was in the earlier days and just turned quite unexceptional. I guess I'll have to return to St. John's, Newfoundland and review the country's only remaining Icelandic bakery... disappointing.]

If anyone knows of my love affair with Iceland, which is my favourite and most beloved place on earth, (not to mention that I've probably reviewed 75% of the small country's bakeries ;)), you can imagine my utter amazement when I heard that an Icelandic bakery had opened in Toronto. Yes, an Icelandic bakery. In driving distance from my house (i.e. it's not in Manitoba). Holy. Cow. My jaw hit the floor. I probably stopped breathing for a couple minutes. I knew of Icelandic happenings in the area (I'm a lurker on the Icelandic-Canadian Community of Toronto site ^^), but never in a million years did I think I'd be doing a review of an Icelandic bakery outside of Iceland. Whoaaaa!!! *cue the fangirl squeals*

I've actually hardly ever ventured east of Greektown for Cake Tour purposes, mainly because it's such an absolute pain to get to, whether I brave the one hour/one way transit ride across the whole TTC or drive the whole way. Knowing the latter option would be quicker, I endured the constant traffic jam and pretty much ran one day after having heard about the existence of Viking Bakery. I was both excited and disappointed to find a big Icelandic flag outside and well, an equally large line-up out the door; the disappointment involves the fact that the bakery looked pretty much cleaned out, despite the fact that the owner seemed to be trying to catch up with freshly baked goodies coming in. The bakery smelled of cinnamon and mulled wine spices; it was delicious! At any rate, the kleinur on the picture were gone and I'm not sure whether they even make the danishes, "wedded bliss" cake, and other goodies I've enjoyed on my Icelandic Cake Tour; the bakery is tight and I'm not exactly sure where they would be able to house it. Everything is clearly labelled and priced. On that very hectic day, only a couple varieties of cookies and one vinarterta (which looked very different from the other place I've been meaning to order from?) remained. Unfortunately for the people behind me, I grabbed all the remaining cinnamon buns. ;P

So, yes, I did take the "Icelandic cinnamon buns" ($1.99), available in either white or chocolate icing. Personally, I wouldn't say offhand that these were Icelandic. I've had a few varieties, from very gooey cinnamon with pink and choco icing or more of a Danish dough. Though the former is more prevalent and recognizable, I'm not really a big fan of them, so this was, actually, much better than what I consider Icelandic cinnamon buns. This one had a slightly fluffier dough and sprinkled more than drenched in cinnamon with a nice amount of icing. I heat this up before eating.. mmmm, so good! I'm not exactly getting the Iceland-vibes, but I was happy nonetheless. This is the kind of cinnamon bun I love! *-*

I also bought a pack of four ammas ($3.99 for the bag): cinnamon cookies that are very flavourful and had a great texture, not soft, but not hard either. Tear it apart like a cinnamon bun, but it's a cookie. I loved these as well. :P

Although the goodies are rather simple, almost home-made in feeling and it's not necessarily the equivalent of walking into a bakery in Iceland (*sighs* I miss you, Iceland!), Viking can nonetheless satisfy your need for an Iceland fix. That is, if you have that need. If not, you can still sample some pretty tasty goodies. I was going to give it a ***1/2 for the treats alone, but then... it's Icelandic! *gets all melty*

Rating: ****