T&T Supermarket [Updated!]

Bakery: T&T Supermarket
Address: 715 Central Parkway West, Mississauga, ON (multiple locations across Canada)
Website: http://www.tnt-supermarket.com
Style: Chinese, Asian
Price: $


For those who aren't aware, T&T is a chain of Chinese/Asian supermarkets nation-wide. Of course, the majority are in the Vancouver area and around here in Toronto. Oddly enough, despite my not being the biggest fan of Chinese baking, T&T also happens to take home the silver medal for best supermarket bakery (Whole Foods, if you recall, won bronze)! It can be somewhat hard to believe, but T&T, with their sweet and savoury bakery department put other big chains to shame. Most goods may not be to my taste (and you really have to watch out with ingredients-lists here, as some items are pretty loaded with preservatives (especially the on-counter goods like coffee cakes), artificial colours and flavours, and other very delicious sounding chemicals) but their variety is was amazing, with goods ranging from store-baked baked goods like Chinese buns, coffee cakes, cookies, tarts to products from other bakeries, including mainly Korean and Filipino stuff.

T&T also sells a whole bunch of cakes with varying levels of tastiness; if you're curious, definitely try the Asian flavours: green tea (the best is by far their Japanese Green Tea), taro (aka purple yam), mango, durian, etc. They do venture into more "European"-inspired cakes (as well as some occasional baked goods), but I recommend staying away from these, unless you love that "bombarded by Cool Whip" feeling. My brother once bought a "fruit cake" for someone's birthday and it was disgusting -- I haven't bought any cakes from them ever since.

However, I do still keep coming back for the tasty variety and the amazing prices, with single buns around one dollar and larger baked goods for more people never being more than $4, with the exception of their Japanese cheesecake. *see below* Plus, at least in the Mississauga location I shop at, if it's not freshly baked, they often have products reduced two-three days before the due date, so you can snag stuff (like the aforementioned cheesecakes) even cheaper. ;D

Here are a few highlights/past purchases:

It's hard going here with the intent of buying something different for Cake Tour purposes, since I adore this first item so much and have to get it every time I do ^^. The English name being "Steam Cake" ($1.49) and with the little bear stamped onto the top, I was a little sceptical at first and thought it might be meant for little kids. It does have this digestive cookie-like taste to it, but that's what makes it so good; they occasionally have mango or chocolate flavoured as well. It's so light and fluffy, the sweet dough being steamed just like a Chinese bun (available at the Dim Sum counter, btw :)), and just super yummy! *-*

Another recommendation is their similarly light and fluffy "Japanese cheesecake" ($1.69 for a single//$6.49 for a large -- I'll have to back and verify this to make sure. I forget. -__-) I'm not sure how they make this, but I believe they make a sort of dough and mix the cheese directly into it, so you actually just have a hunk of cheese. This is amazing, and especially in comparison to N. American cheesecakes (which I personally cannot stand), really worth it if you want a nice, tasty cheesecake without feeling like you just ate a tub of Philadelphia cream cheese. :| Highly recommended.

You can also snag yourself a cupcake ($1.09), which is a Chinese bakery staple that T&T makes pretty well, although they sometimes do the mistake of packing them too soon and they get really mushy. It's not the best I've tasted, but it's a hard thing to screw up, seeing as it's just dough. ^.~

You can, of course, head over to their wall of packed buns and pick up yourself ($0.99) one from a whole variety. Sweet buns are usually flavored with coconut or pineapple. The one pictured at the very top is a pineapple bun. It's definitely another regular item at bakeries and well, it's a pineapple bun. ;) (yes, I'm so failing here....)

For the purposes of putting something more traditional or interesting up, I also picked up this strange, flat "Red Bean and Black Sesame" cake ($1.09) for my more adventurous brother. Expecting it to be stuffed with red bean paste, it was actually a denser, sweet dough baked with full red beans; he really liked it though, so I guess T&T really can do no wrong with their Chinese and Asian goodies.

Overall, this is a great place to sample a whole bunch of Chinese baked goods; with a majority being baked constantly in store, the T&T bakery is really a bakery that other supermarkets (it's pretty laughable, for instance, that Loblaws now owns these guys) should take notice of and, maybe, try to emulate a little more. And while there, you can buy yourself a small tub of chili chicken for $3.99 at the hot food counter. ;DDDDD

[EDIT] As you may have noticed, T&T used to possess the silver medal for the best supermarket bakery. This, however, I've decided to take away, simply because even looking up at my post makes me realize that the bakery section (the supermarket as a whole, in fact)  has gone really downhill in a fairly short amount of time. Actually, in my usual T&T location in Mississauga, 80% of what was mentioned in this post is no longer available. The bakery section has been reduced; selection is down and so is the amount of filling in things like coconut or red bean buns. Individual buns are vacuum packed (doubtless so they don't need to be freshly baked every day??), don't feel fresh and don't even look appetizing. With all the other little and big changes in store (like hot food now sold by weight), I can't say I want to go to T&T anymore, at least not until I really need to buy staples. Take that, Loblaws. :/

Rating: **

Rischart [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Rischart
Address: Marienplatz 18, Munich, Germany (plus many more around the city)
Website: http://www.rischart.de
Style: German
Price: $-$$

Ahhh, it's been a while since I did a "World Tour" post, so here goes. I went back to my travels several years ago to Munich *weeps* and was surprised that I didn't chronicle my sweets purchases as much as I thought I did. On top of that, I have ZERO location shots and I can't find a street view of it, so I've had to steal them.. (I have the Merkur online won't be visiting this site XDDD I didn't have the heart to steal from individual sites) :/ There's only a few from my second and none from my first trip, so this will have to do. Oddly enough, just looking at the pic is enough to get my memory triggered as to the taste. ;D

Rischart is just everywhere important in Munich, so you're bound not to miss it: there's one in the Hauptbahnhof (central station) and another in the pedestrian zone next to the Marienplatz and another one further down the street, and yet another along the Viktualienmarkt. Yup, you can't run away from these delectable sweets and freshly baked breads. Even if you're just visiting the city, you've probably seen at least one, though you may have not bought anything (because you're dumb obviously XDDDD). Their signature is plum cake, with the plum slices stacked nicely and either covered in glaze or powdered sugar. On my first trip, I had the former, but no pics of it. It was a pain in the neck to cut into it, but well, you know I do love plum cakes, so it was worth the effort. ^-^

The last time I went (I don't want to count how many years ago because it makes me depressed; Munich is my favourite city in the world. I love it to bits... and yet, no one wants me to teach English there ;___;), I took two items on separate occasions, both, I believe, from their Hauptbahnhof (my travelogue is helping me a lot here XD). The first was their apple strudel, which I can't remember how much it cost... sorry. The prices are always reasonable though, 1 something, 3 euros tops, but yeah, I got a pretty generous slab in the traditional German style: layers of thin dough surrounding a mass of apples and raisins. Just looking at this reminds me of my verdict: the dough was super buttery. I think it was a little overwhelming; I mean, I'm happy they use butter, but it's not necessary to use so much, in my opinion. ;P It was so delicious though, and definitely better than the Austrian one I bought, just so I could say I bought an Austrian apple strudel. ^_~

The highlight was definitely what was then called the Jubiläumsartikel (anniversary item; 1,25 euro) which was being offered at a special price to celebrate Rischart being 125 years old. I thought that cute. Of course, I also found that totally amazing!! 1,25 for a beautiful, heavenly slab of... GERMAN POPPY SEED CAKE!!!!! ... Yes, can you not tell I *adore* these things; aside from poppy seed buns (Russian-style), I could eat these things all day. It's just so good: nothing more than a tiny sliver of dough, superb poppy seed mass and a little crumble and icing on top. Heaven in a cake. *-*

Rischart ended up being my fave konditorei in Munich and I definitely can't wait to return to go and try if they continue to live up to their reputation (this is, of course, a rhetorical question ;D), especially in regards to those delectable poppy seed goodies. ^^;;

Rating: ****

BnC Cake House [RIP]

Bakery: BnC Cake House
Address: 631 Bloor St., Toronto, ON
Website: n/a
Style: Korean
Price: $-$$

[And with this, all Korean bakeries-proper in Koreatown have died. ;__;  There is still the walnut cookie place (a future CT post; be sure of it... I'm here once a month and I still haven't reviewed it, which is shameful, but it's coming.), but the only place you can still get Korean bean or cream stuffed buns is inside the supermarket; sorry, guys, no more cakes, though]

This is the original/alternate location of BnC Bakery in Mississauga (the review I did of it can be found here), although I'm not at all sure why they don't list this address on the latter's website, nor do I understand what makes one a Bakery (though I'm sure they do actually have baking facilities in Mississauga) and the other a Cake House (which is then listed under BnC Patisserie); the most confusing of all is that both have exactly the same products. However, the experience was slightly different, so I thought I'd review both separately and well, I do need some more under the "Asian" category as well. :P The Korean bakery I once had a few years ago closed down, since I couldn't find anything else except another bakery which had nothing baked on Saturday morning. *pouts*

Just like the first location, the Koreatown location features a bunch of baked goods, individually packed, cakes (like that delicious green tea one) and various individual cakes and cookies. We wanted to try something different, so yeah:

First off, because I really liked it the first time I bought it and didn't get a pic of it, I bought a slice of Opera cake (99 cents/piece), although was a bit disappointed, since in the Mississauga location, you could buy a coffee-cake slab of this strangely delicious cake for, I believe it was either $2- or $3.99. Seeing as the sliver of an individual piece is a dollar, I didn't find this great value, despite the fact that they were advertising this as a "special sale". The cake itself was pretty tasty, although pretty dry (maybe special sale referred to reduced before due date??) and didn't want to stick together. Still, I really like this taste with the alternating chocolate and vanilla cakes with a layer of crumble on top; I definitely don't need the extra calories, but it could have used a wee bit more cream between the layers. Good, but again, not really "bang for your buck" as my brother always says. ;P

We then scoured the store for something decidedly more "Korean"; the vast majority were savoury baked goods, so I had a hard time. I finally settled on a, so the sign said, "red bean doughnut" ($1.49). It was deep fried, so what else could I think it was? I brought it home and divided it up amongst the guinea pigs.. err, the brothers and lo and behold it was far from being a red bean doughnut, but rather it ended up being a giant "croquette", the outside resembling a large tempura, with potato and egg salad in the middle. I'm not sure if someone dumped this in the wrong section (there were other savoury goods in the deep-fried bin) or there were no red bean doughnuts at all, but I just got super disappointed. Seeing as there was more than one when we bought this, I'm assuming they didn't take down the label when the red bean ones disappeared and just slid the rest over. For what it was, my youngest brother claimed it wasn't bad and would make a pretty good lunch. Apparently the egg and potato were separated, since my other brother took a bite and gave the rest to the other, who then found it too eggy and pretty gross. :/ Suffice to say, it definitely isn't what I was expecting, so I'm a little unwilling to return. Sadly, with this and Cobs Bread several blocks away, the bakery scene isn't that great in the Koreatown/Annex area, although I'm really intrigued in seeing if Kensington Bakery, an organic one, has any sweets... Next time, perhaps.

Rating: **

What a Bagel (Richmond Hill) [Updated!]

Bakery: What a Bagel
Address: 9330 Bathurst St, Maple ON
Website: http://www.whatabagel.com
Style: Jewish, Russian
Price: $-$$

[Update: What a Bagel recently changed locations. Actually, I thought they'd closed down for good and, purely by luck, I found they'd simply moved to nearby Bathurst/Rutherford Rd; however it's a far cry from "one of the best bakeries in the GTA", as I called it many years ago. Most products have disappeared as of the most recent update, many aren't very generous at all in terms of fillings, and the cakes -- without a doubt the highlight of any trip -- are trying to look the same, but it's clear they're not made by the same person nor are they of the same quality. They're lacklustre, at most. Dry, mismatched layer and all uniform in appearance with the same sticky, unpleasant coating. I didn't enjoy the latest one at all and I'm not sure if I'll be returning to this new spot] 

Get ready for this one: What a Bagel is probably one of the best bakeries, in the Toronto area. Keep in mind that, although this is a chain of several locations, I'm only referring to this location in particular. I discovered this place purely by chance (we were actually hunting for the new Korean supermarket that had opened, H-mart, and popped into this place in the same plaza for some bagels... and I was blown away. Really, it's tragic that the majority of people that shop here come here exclusively for the bagels, because their wide selection of Eastern European baked goods is... amazing!


In this little place (they did expand a short while ago) you have everything, and on top of that, their on-site pastry chef makes the tastiest, most beautiful cakes. If you won't come for anything else, try a stunning cake ($27). This isn't your supermarket cake with layers of vanilla cake, cool whip and disgusting icing on top. Actually, this is pretty much as far as you'll get from that: multiple layers of nutty doughs, whole pieces of fruit, delicious mousse and creams, topped with soft, meringue-based or rich, flavourful icing. Sadly, I've been taking these pics for years now, so I'm not sure which is which, so you're treated to a gallery's worth. ;)
Besides this, I highly recommend all the baked goods, and are definitely worth a try, especially if you don't want to invest in the cake. My fave, which you might have expected, is their gigantic, extra generous poppy seed bun ($2.20, pictured); the best I've ever had. Period. :) Places are usually super skimpy on the poppy seed, but this is completely slathered in it and the buttery mass is perfect! Waahhh, I love it! ^__^ ... Which is why I'm so devastated to find that this, more than any other baked good, has just taken a big turn for the worse. Not only is it a third of the size, it's so sloppily rolled and really doughy. Still generous on the poppy seed, but not as much as in the past. I wish they would just raise the price. Seeing my photo and the one I had today, omg, I'm pretty disappointed!!! :(

Other special mentions include their Berry Ring ($9), which I'd been waiting forever to try and it was worth it: flaky dough folded in with oodles of homemade berry jam and dusted with powdered sugar.

My brothers' favourites include Kefli (~$2.25, pictured), which doesn't look so photogenic, but is apparently very good (I've never tried it) and weighs a ton. It's dough rolled with nuts and fruit jam, I believe, with a bit of crumble on top. This is the thing both of them every time we come here, and even when you propose to them something else, they refuse and take the kefli anyways. O.o

On a recent trip, my youngest brother decided to try their baklava ($1.99?/each; ) and took one of each shape, excluding one or two. Supposedly, they were also very good.

Anyways, just GO to this place and try something, anything, everything! You won't regret it, I promise you. ^__^v

[NEW! NEW!]  So What a Bagel! renovated a while back, though it took me a long time to actually update this and share the news. Sadly, with the latest renovation (including table service at the seating area) things just seem to wow me less and less. Many baked goods have changed or disappeared. To my absolute despair, the poppy seed bun is gone. Vanished. Nonexistent. ;___; Fillings in the larger items (the poppy seed cake is still there, but I think the berry one is likewise gone) have gotten a tad skimpier. As one may expect from most renovations, prices have gone up on everything. The cakes (the ones sold in the case) are still as amazing as ever, with the outside constantly evolving -- if it weren't for these stunning cakes -- the best "cakes" I've ever had -- I don't know how willing I'd be to still keep this "best bakery" honour. I'm a little saddened with the changes this place has through in the years I've been going to it. :(

Rating: ***

Whole Foods Market [updated!]

Bakery: Whole Foods Market
Address: 301 Cornwall Rd (Oakville, ON) // 87 Avenue Rd. (Toronto, ON)
Website: http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com
Style: Supermarket, North American
Price: $$

[Supermarket bakeries absolutely *suck* around here. Hardly anyone has any sweets or baked goods for sale, let alone something decent. Most, even the higher-end groceries like Longo's, can barely make the grade when it comes to baked goods. You can get yourself store-baked loaves of bread pretty much everywhere, but when you want to go beyond that, good luck. Pre-packed goods that never seem to be fresh, despite the expiry date in two weeks, gross cakes and nothing else. The big name stores -- especially Loblaws -- fail the most at this and you're stuck looking elsewhere. The three award-winners in the GTA for best supermarket bakeries go to the following (you may have your own opinion; let me know what it is... although I'm not sure if I'll be able to agree with you ;DD): Starsky, T&T Supermarket, Whole Foods. Consolation prize goes out to Highland Farms (this place is so far from me, so I don't have a chance to go so often) for their pretty impressive variety.]

Starting out with 3rd prize, I still have to say Whole Foods is one pretty good bakery. Oddly enough, whenever they do secret product comparisons in the newspaper, they always seem to pan Whole Foods for everything from their barbecued chicken to their baguettes, but I will disagree with them on this point. They don't have so much variety, but what they do have is really tasty stuff: quality ingredients (I'm not sure if everything is organic or just all-natural) and prices printed clearly on the tag, unique offerings that always seem to be fresh, especially their store-baked goodies like muffins, scones, brioches, cookies and danishes.

My absolute fave is their Bundt-like Low-Fat Berry Muffin (pictured -- $1.79 + tax), which sadly seems only available at their Yorkville location. Whole berries in a dense, not quite muffin dough coated with vanilla glaze. I love this thing! ^^;;

Another treat to try is their clafoutis-like cherry and blueberry danishes (also $1.79... I think :P) which I don't have too often, since they can be soggy sometimes and then it's not very appetizing; they should think of a better way of presenting these things, but the cherry ones are so good, and the best danishes you'll find in the area, since this isn't a forte of Toronto's. ;) Their cinnamon bread ($4.79, I'm almost sure) is already pretty good, but try and catch it when it's on sale and you'll pay $1 or more less for it. ^__~

For one birthday, we actually went to try a cake from them as well and chose the Apple Spice cake ($21.99), because the name (not so much the appearance) sounded alluring. The inside was a tad bit too plain for me and overall a little too "North American" (which isn't something I'm particularly fond of; pies and brownies and whatnot... not for me XP), but maybe that's also because I'm used the elaborate cakes from What a Bagel. :D Nevertheless, cinnamon spiced cake with chunks of apple with two layers of spiced cream cheese icing. The latter was too rich, especially when it was, along a light dusting of nuts and crumbs, all over the outside too. Still, it's gotten me interested enough in trying some of the other delectable-looking goodies behind the glass. ^^

Nevertheless, venturing beyond the store-baked goods in the baskets and the lovely stuff behind the counter (both made my them and brought in from the most accessible commercial bakery of all time: Dufflet. (yup, will be preparing a post on them in the future ;D)) brings you into the $$-$$ range, and that's something I've never tried. This is usually brought in from small, mostly local, bakeries. I mean, I'm sure their $17 pies are probably good, but really, $13 for an apple pie. No thanks; I'd rather bake a pretty decent one myself. :/ Other pretty ridiculous finds include a small box of $7 biscotti bites or imitation two-bite brownies for the same jaw-dropping price. I realize that they might be tasty -- they probably are -- and the ingredients are worth the price, but at the same time, I'd prefer taking that money to a small, local bakery (we've seen a few on here already ;)) and getting more bang for my buck, as my brother loves to say. ^^

[NEW!] I'm so excited to have a whole bunch of Easter-related goodies to review. Here's one we came across by fluke (Whole Foods is one of the only stores in the province that are open on Easter Sunday): WF's Easter baked good: a chocolate babka ($6.99) which was a yeast babka folded in with high-quality cocoa and chocolate chips, sweetened with honey and drizzled on top with chocolate syrup. I was a little afraid of trying this, since I don't like chocolate so much, but this was a great thing for chocolate lovers and non-fans alike. Plain dough lightly coated and folded almost like a cinnamon bun (their cinnamon bread is similar in taste and texture... and is also really good ;P) made a nice light snack with your tea or coffee. I was actually pretty surprised with this and, considering how much yeast babkas go for at Polish places, for instance, this was a decent price too! What a (pleasant) surprise!!

Rating: **1/2

Der Brotkorb

Bakery: Der Brotkorb (aka The Breadbasket)
Address: 2458 Dundas St., Mississauga ON
Website: n/a
Style: German, European
Price: $$

Yeeess, I've returned with more reviews. Sadly, all the places I've been to don't have location shots (this is usually because they're on plazas and my mom went out to buy me something and won't take any pics for me -__-), so I'll add that later.

Nevertheless, Der Brotkorb (they changed their neon sign lately and included the name "The Breadbasket", which is the English translation of the original name, but also confuses matters a bit) is pretty close to my house, but I don't ever remember there being anything there; hence, I haven't really thought of returning for cake tour purposes. Perhaps originally they were more bakery focused, but now this is mostly a lunchtime cafe serving soups and Eastern European favourites such as goulash, cabbage rolls and pierogies. That being said, their small variety of baked goods never seem very fresh. While there, my mom noted that the filling in the tarts had sagged to 50% of the height of the shell, which is a sure sign they've seen better days. But since on the constant quest for, you guessed it, poppy seed anything, I got super excited to get two things from this place.

The first was your pretty standard (German) poppy seed bun (I believe it was $1.49 -- my mom can't remember, only that she paid around $5 for both) in spiral format, but boy, aside from looking the part, this was pretty disappointing: dough was flaky, somewhat stale and had absolutely no flavour. The poppy seeds (which were maybe sitting out in the open air for too long or something) didn't help matters much: they tasted like nothing. The two together was just super bland; perhaps if they used butter in the dough, you'd get a hint of some sort of taste, but like this, I just couldn't believe how tasteless it was. I definitely prefer the same thing at Dimpflmeier's. Definitely.

The second was a slab of poppy seed strudel ($2.99) Now, after the bun, I was really concerned about this thing. If it didn't taste like poppy seed then I don't know what I'd do, but fortunately, this had a lot more taste, although it wasn't too fresh either. And there were a little too many raisins. Still, as you may see, this was jam-packed with poppy seeds and really (excluding those pesky raisins) nothing but poppy seeds. The dough was exactly the same as the bun (i.e. really bland), so didn't do anything except keep the whole thing in shape. Not bad and a whole lot more flavourful than the bun, but not the greatest either. I don't know if I'll be coming back again for the baked goods, though...

Rating: **