Dolcini by Joseph

Bakery: Dolcini by Joseph Inc.
Address: 10462 Islington Ave, Kleinburg ON (one other location)
Website: http://www.dolcini.ca/
Style: European, Italian 
Price: $$$

(Yet) another hiking trip, yet another Cake Tour. ;) This time, the brother went to Kleinburg, a northwestern offshoot of Vaughan, and brought back two lovely treats from Dolcini, a fancier patisserie where unique desserts seem to border on works of art. ^^ The name, however, seemed so familiar that the first thing I did when my brother brought back the box was run and check if I hadn't already reviewed their other North York location. Nope. As such, I have no idea where this deja vu came from, unless, that is, I'd put it down on a past to-visit list and had never had the opportunity to try it out.

Nonetheless, I did get my chance this time! :) Dolcini is, like said above, certainly more of a cake/pastry shop than a bakery, but I'm sure that doesn't bother anyone, with several individual and larger desserts, many of which resemble multi-layered mousse cakes. It's not overtly clear what anything is, in terms of flavour, and there are no prices (to help matters, the brother can't remember how much he paid, only that the place on the whole screamed "expensive"... and yet he doesn't remember how much it came to. *rolls eyes*); he picked out one chocolatey one -- which turned out to be a cheesecake -- and one lighter one, this ending up being a citrus mousse.

The first: this was more or less a chocolate cheesecake coated in chocolate and then topped with chunks of walnuts and a layer of dulce de leche. Don't forget the drizzle of what seems to be white chocolate on top. In taste, this was very good, but, the description alone being enough of an indication, this was RICH (Yes, in capitals ;D) and two samplers pointed out that it was also too sweet. In terms of size, it didn't look like that big, but I'm not sure how one person could wolf this down in one go unless they were in the midst of some mental crisis (LOL) and needed a lot of indulgence. Certainly not for the calorie-conscious, that's for sure... but then again, you wouldn't be here if you were~~ ;P

The second cake up for trying proved to be a sort of grapefruit mousse with white cake in the middle and... it was delicious! Mmmm... everyone went crazy for this one and the purchaser said that it was like biting into a piece of fresh fruit, that's how intense the flavour was. Not too sweet with a little bit of citrus tanginess, this was incredibly good. In fact, I'd trade the chocolate cheesecake in for another one of these!

And thus, despite the somewhat cheesy name (dolcini = little sweets), this place proved that they take those little sweets seriously -- fantastic find!    

Rating: ***1/2

Cukiernia Sierosławy Dziakowskiej [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Cukiernia Sierosławy Dziakowskiej
Address: Ul. Karola Miarki 23, Kamienna Góra
Website: n/a
Style: Polish 
Price: $$ 

Well, this has been sitting in my pictures folder for a while, so I thought I'd finally purge myself of these older, pending Cake Tour posts. Nevertheless, in October a person who wishes to remain anonymous went on a visit to Poland, more specifically to the rather small city of Kamienna Góra, in the southwestern part of the country and about an hour from Wrocław (if that still doesn't help then, well, just go along with it ^^). On their last day there, they picked up a few slices of cake and, just like that, I had myself another World Tour for this year! Suffice to say, I was a very happy girl. :)

There are actually two pastry shops on this street leading to the main square, but this one, according to family and acquaintances, was the better one, supposedly. So, knowing my affinity for poppy seed, this special person got the poppy seed cake, filled to the brim with a softer mass and topped off with a shortbread dough at both end, and of course, one must never forget the sugar glaze poured over everything, perhaps a little too generously in some places. I think that in doing these World Tours, the assumption is that you'll find better baked goods in the country of origin as opposed to the ethnic bakeries we have here in various parts of Canada. This assumption, however, very often turns out to be wrong and this was the case with this first step in the Polish Cake Tour (there should have been more since my brother and mom went two years ago and stopped for a few days in Warsaw, but they went *nowhere* so it looks like I can't rely on either her nor on my official international correspondent -___-): the poppy seed cake was disappointing on many levels. The poppy seed mass was very good for this kind of cake; good texture and just the right amount of dough, but way too much sugar icing  which wasn't even that tasty and too many raisins (again). The dough was alright, but the biggest problem: flavouring. The Polish love their little bottles of aromat, available in around a dozen different flavours from orange to almond to cream. And this tasted like a whole bottle was used up in the making of this cake. Bitter and with an overpowering, distinctly artificial perfume in every single bite. In the end, I'm not sure that all that effort was worth it. :/

Rating: **

Muscoreil's

Bakery: Muscoreil's Fine Desserts and Gourmet Cakes
Address: 3960 Niagara Falls Blvd, Tonawanda NY
Website: http://www.muscoreils.com/
Style: Italian, North American
Price: $$-$$$ 

Another trip to Buffalo, another bakery. (And looking for this place made a Danish bakery in the Buffalo-area pop up. O.O You so know where the brother is going next time to bring me back something!)

Anyways, this was the chosen destination purely by chance (and the unwillingness to go off the usual route and find something new ;)) and, while it resembles more a banquet centre (or maybe a greenhouse) than a bakery at first glance, it seems to be more well-known for their cakes than anything else. Both their website, a visit to their bakery, and online reviews seem to indicate that this is indeed the case. None seem to make a note of the various Italian-inspired "individual" pastries and desserts offered, although they have quite a large selection of the usual staples; perhaps, though, there's a reason behind the omission. At the very least, you won't go away from Muscoreil's feeling hungry. Although the prices are, in theory, quite steep -- at around $5 per item, one would think you're at a French patisserie -- you get a lot in return. Yup, these things were huge. I've never seen an individual tart so gigantic; it was bordering on a six-person flan! And that tiramisu! D: In the latter case, especially, Muscoreil's does manage to prove that bigger isn't always better.

More specifically, the brother brought back two items, which were, believe me, big enough for five. XD The first treat was the pear frangipane ($4), which, although the shell was probably too big for the contents and made it a tad too doughy with not enough fruit, was alright. Well-cooked pears. Nice, albeit subtle flavours. Pretty good.

In this way, the big no-no was the tiramisu ($5). And "big" is literal here. This towering dessert was massive and so tall that it was difficult to eat -- or to remove the plastic support around it. This was layers of cream and ladyfingers topped with a chocolate coating -- and lots of it. In creamy desserts, the key to making them work is that the cream, well, needs to taste good and this cream didn't taste good. Whether it was because there wasn't any actual cream in it (we suspect whipped topping) or there was some sort of flavour added to it, but both taste and texture were off-putting. It was too stiff, and just didn't have that great taste you come to expect. These are one of these things that after the second bite, you really can't eat anymore. Compared to the frangipane above, which was the bakery's redeeming factor and has bumped up the rating, this was a "big" flop.

Rating: **      

Max's Market

Bakery: Max's Market
Address: 2299 Bloor St W, Toronto ON 
Website: http://www.maxsmarket.ca/
Style: European, North American 
Price: $ 

Years ago, I could have sworn I went into Max's Market (this being pre-Cake Tour days) and that they had a whole array of in-house pies and pastries behind the glass, but the selection now doesn't match with how I remembered it. Which means that either they changed things around or I'm simply very, very confused. O.o Nonetheless, yes! I randomly decided to pop into Max's Market, hoping to get something for the Cake Tour and came out quite pleasantly surprised in terms of the interesting treats I picked up... and how little I paid for them!

Well, perhaps I should begin with a better introduction than that? :P Max's Market is more or less a higher-end deli and your source for gourmet prepared foods, from quiches to salads to meat pies. They also have something for dessert, both behind the counter in the form of cakes and individual tartlets (courtesy of the perennially popular Dufflet) and some made by them, such as lemon meringue pies or (I recall) some sort of mousse cake. In addition to this, they feature two self-serve cases filled with goods from Tartistry (on my to-visit list), but at more than $3 for a butter tart, I'm not sure if it's necessarily worth the price -- though the samples they were offering that day *were* good. ;) What's more, they have two racks of baked goods of their own sitting next to the entrance. With everything sweet priced at $1.49, they're really well priced. I paid $3 on the dot for two items -- that's great value, especially considering the quality of the ingredients, like buttery croissants, wild blueberry (yes, you read right) danishes or something in between a chocolate danish and a pain au chocolat. Everything has this mildly European feel to it, though you can't really attribute it to one country or style.

So I had the latter two. The first was the wild blueberry danish ($1.49), resembling more of a pasty than anything else with a slightly flaky, pie-like dough on the softer side with rock sugar on top. Some had kind of collapsed in the middle due to too much filling/too thin dough, so it took some searching for one that wasn't punctured through. Tasty dough and a wonderful filling -- and really, how often do you find anything made with wild blueberries? What a (tasty) steal! :)

And speaking of tasty steals: the chocolate danish ($1.49). Again, yummy dough on the outside, but the highlight is definitely the delicious filling of chocolate and hazelnut. Sometimes the filling in chocolate baked goods resembles more syrup than anything else and it's so sweet too. This was.. I don't know what they used, but was it ever good! I swear, they had to have melted Bacio chocolates or something. O_O Yummy, even for someone not that into chocolate like I am!

Max's is another great addition to the Runnymede bakery strip and I can't believe I didn't think of popping in again the last well, two times I've driven here. Good stuff yet again!

Rating: ***

Delicia Bakery and Pastry

Bakery: Delicia Bakery and Pastry
Address: 2864 Lake Shore Blvd, Etobicoke ON 
Website: n/a
Style: Portuguese
Price: $$

Same area, same day: while I was in the neighbourhood on the hunt for Polish baked goods, Delicia was stumbled upon purely by chance. The name alone seemed to give off those Portuguese-bakery vibes, so in this sense, I wasn't too surprised to see two tables of self-serve custard tarts and coconut buns. However, in addition to all the usual treats, these guys also had a pretty atypical selection of baked goods I haven't seen elsewhere, such as two varieties of apple cake, pastries stuffed with chocolate, and a nice selection of deep-fried doughnuts, breads, and churros. Sounds good? Well, it certainly looked good; I was a little unsure of what to get, since quite a lot had piqued my interest. As with the vast majority of Portuguese bakeries, however, there are neither prices nor labels on anything, so it's another one of those intuition-based places.

Anyways, so I was waiting for the man in front of me to pick his baked goods. Actually, I was still undecided and saw him just make a run for the custard-stuffed doughnuts ($1.75); not only that, when he picked it up with the tongs, the dough made this crunch and all of a sudden, all I could picture was fresh doughnuts, still with that deep-fried crunch intact. *-* ((not to sound too shameless, that is...)) Thus, the custard-filled doughnut it was. There are actually two varieties: with the custard and with a sort of lemon jam. I claimed the last custard one. :) For one, this was one mammoth of a doughnut! I may be a sucker for doughnuts, but I don't think eating one of these can be that healthy. :P At any rate, I donated the other half for sampling, even if I somewhat regretted it after taking a bite. Delicious doughnut dough: denser and wonderfully moist on the inside, crunchy on the outside with a tasty lemon custard on the inside. Sometimes, the custard doesn't turn out that great, but this one was fantastic. No wonder you run for these! ;D

The second item was a sort of pastry ($2.85) made of puff pastry and filled with chocolate cream and that tangy lemon custard. This was something I'd never seen before, and so I was curious. Just like the doughnut above, this was really great-tasting, not to mention unique. Not too doughy, as these sorts of things tend to me sometimes, but with the right proportion of dough and custard.

Well, so I certainly wasn't expecting anything before finding this place, so this was a tasty surprise! What (another) find in Etobicoke! :)

Rating: ***1/2

Fine Bakery and Deli

Bakery: Fine Bakery and Deli 
Address: 3011 Lake Shore Blvd W, Etobicoke ON 
Website: http://finebakerydeli.com/
Style: Polish
Price: $$ 

On a quite cold Saturday afternoon a couple of weeks ago, I decided to return to Lake Shore in Etobicoke to check out one other deli that people online had mentioned had great baked goods. A trip to the deli proved that the review must have been outdated; at any rate, there were, besides three loaves of bread, no baking to be seen. Fortunately, the trip was not in vain, since I came away with two other bakeries for the reviewing. Nice. :)

The first of these two is yet another Polish bakery! Not to mention a Polish bakery where the bakery actually means there's some baking going on, this including their homemade cakes and baked goods. I was amazed the first time around with Peter's, but it's starting to look like common practice. Maybe it's just a GTA thing that delis just ship everything in and then call themselves a bakery... whoa, I really need to get out of the suburbs. O_O Anyways, Fine Bakery is, as I just said, a bakery with not too big a selection, but selection nonetheless with a few yeast baked goods, a sheet of sugar-coated Polish doughnuts, and a handful of distinct cake slabs, including several varieties of cheesecake, apple cake, and a few creamy tort-like slabs in the fridge. Nothing is priced and contents are pretty much based on intuition, which can be a little frustrating; they're not as cheap as other Polish bakeries either -- I paid $7.80 in total for two items: one poppy seed bun (probably around $1.50) and one of the smaller slabs of cheesecake (sold by weight; around $6.50)

And yes, you heard me right: they had poppy seed buns. ;) At first glance, it actually didn't look like it, since this style is usually reserved for plum or cheese buns, but the expert can always spot them. This turned out to be quite unique and so good, too! Fresh, fluffy dough wrapped around a delicious poppy seed mass, quite un-Polish if I say so myself, of pretty much pure poppy seeds, a couple of raisins and some sort of jam?? -- at any rate, something to make it stick and it seemed to have a bit of a tang to it. Top that off with icing and crumble; mmm, what a find!

The same can be said of the cheesecake. I was actually debating between the plain cheesecake and this one (I was also contemplating the fruit and meringue cake, but I was worried it would fall apart before I photographed it), but settled on this one because the almond crumble topping looked tasty. And I'm very happy I did, because not only did it have that tasty crumble with slivered almonds, there was a thin layer between that and the nice, fluffy cheesecake of apple jam. Not so overbearing as some Polish cheesecakes, this was lighter and had some complexity to it. Yummy!

In the end, I came across quite a few not only promising, but fantastic bakeries in the Etobicoke Lake Shore strip -- return trip, definitely.

Rating: ***1/2