creme brûlée Archives - Macarons and Mischief

January 21, 2013

Dine Out Vancouver 2013: Joe Fortes Seafood & Chop House

Dine Out Vancouver began on January 18 this year and I made my first Dine Out Visit at Joe Fortes Seafood & Chop House. For those reading my blog and don’t know what Dine Out is, it is when many restaurants within Vancouver has a three course meal at a great price- either at $18, $28, or $38. It’s a great value and opportunity to try new restaurants!

Joe Fortes menu is $38. Luckily, I went with a group of four friends and we ended up getting everything on the menu and got to try each other’s dishes!

1 meu — Joe Fortes Dine Out Vancouver Menu

We started with warm bread that had a crunchy crust. We dipped it in some sort of lobster oil with oyster sauce that the server gave to us in a separate dish. Not your conventional bread and butter here!

Then came the appetizers! There was clam chowder, shrimp cocktail, and ceasar salad.

I had a bite of the shrimp cocktail, the shrimp was plump and flavourful and the sauce is great- has a bit of a spicy kick!

I ended up with the ceasar salad since I wanted some vegetables. It was delicious, but basic, however I wish it was a bigger plate since this is a $38 menu.

Then came the entress. There was a choice between Steelhead Trout, Sautéed Prawns and Scallops, and New York Steak.

I got to try some of my friend’s steak; it was cooked very well. Even though it wasn’t drenched in sauce, the steak was juicy and tasted perfectly as is. The mashed potatoes were creamy delicious too.

I ordered the Sautéed Prawns & Scallops with artichoke ravioli. I was a bit surprised when the dish arrived that I was like “this is my meal?” and the server came back to ensure that I ordered what I wanted. When I think of “sautéed prawns & scallops” I imagined lightly browned scallops and prawns….however…

The scallops and prawns and the ravioli was covered with creamy sauce. I did enjoy it, as both the seafood tasted fresh and the ravioli was huge. But I wish I knew it was cream sauce, as I am quite limited to the amount of dairy I can consume. I also prefer white creme sauce over any other sauce. It was a solid, filling dish; but not what I expected.

I was most excited (as usual) about dessert- tiramisu, chocolate lava cake, and Tahitian Vanilla crème brulée. Something about the presentation of glorious, sweet food always gets me. Desserts are always presented wonderfully, whether it’s just put on a simple white plate or it has whipped creams and berries.

Although this is a small piece, it was a cocoa-coffee-heavenly piece of tiramisu.

I don’t know why I ordered crème brulée when I can make it, and I was torn between this and the tiramisu, but I ordered crème brulée anyway. This was a large dish of crème brulée! The hard caramel on top was very hard, so when I tried breaking it, I didn’t get little shards of caramelized sugar, but giant pieces of it. It was very creamy and had lots of vanilla flavour (not eggy.) The cinnamon biscotti was well chosen to accompany crème brulée the biscotti tastes good when it is dipped in the crème brulée or the little scoop of whipped cream that came with it.

My favourite part of the meal was dessert. The entree took my by surprise, but at least I got to try something new and unexpected. $38 is still a bit pricey to me, and I feel this meal should have been on the $28 level menu instead, given its basic choices of food. After tax and tips, I paid almost $50!

Nevertheless, I ended up feeling very full and satisfied at the end of my meal and it was a good start to my Dine Out Vancouver 2013 experience. I will have more posts on different restaurants revolving around Dine Out Vancouver 2013 in these coming weeks!

January 7, 2013

Macarons in Hong Kong: Jean Paul Hévin

I was trying to find Laudrée at Harbour Grand, and I was so short on time in Hong Kong, I deeply regret not being able to go to one of the most renowned macaron places of all time. Despite that, I did see another macaron store at the mall, which is Jean Paul Hévin. Never heard of him before, but I had to get the macarons anyway. These macarons are very expensive compared to Vancouver – $25HKD for a macaron- and I bought a box of 5 for $125 HKD – which is equivalent to $15.90 CAD for 5 macarons, or $3.18 CAD each!

The box holding the treasure is very important too!

These macarons weren’t wildly coloured, but they were one of the best macarons I ever tasted. I got 5 flavours – coffee, dark chocolate, crème brûlée, fig, and mango coriander.

The first one I ate was the dark chocolate- it had the perfect combination of dark chocolate’s bitterness and minimal sweetness. I love dark chocolate ganache.

The coffee macaron was moist, like a molten cappuccino; but it was still airy with a crunchy exterior. The coffee macaron had a white coffee biscuit and creamy coffee ganache.

The winner out of the five was definitely the crème brûlée macaron for me. It tasted exactly like the dessert, not too sweet, and it also had the caramelized sauce when I bit into it. Hello heaven!

Sorry for the blurry picture- had to take a quick snapshot of the inside fast enough without spilling it everywhere!

The mango coriander macaron was very delicious as well – it had two layers of flavour and it packed a lot of mango flavour in it. The mango coriander macaron had an orange biscuit with mango juice cream with coriander.

Last but not least, was the fig macaron. I didn’t take a picture of it. The fig macaron has a deep purple and dark chocolate shell with chocolate and fig ganache. I’m not sure how fig actually tastes like, but I did taste a lot of dark chocolate (yummy!) and a bit of weird tarteness of the fig- it wasn’t a bad macaron; I just didn’t know what to expect of it!

The macarons at Jean Paul Hévin are definitely one of the best I ever tried. I am a bit sad I didn’t get to Laudrée but then I would’ve never had such a delicious crème brûlée macaron!

Have you had macarons from Hong Kong or anywhere overseas that surprised you? 🙂

May 21, 2012

Snack of the Day: Beard Papa’s Creme Brûlée

Beard Papa (Richmond Centre location) have started selling Creme Brûlée for a while now, and I decided to finally get one and try it. I prefer their other desserts rather than their cream puffs, because I find it too creamy/milky/much for me! To see my previous review on Beard Papa’s Mango Ice shower, click here. It’s one of my favourite desserts, and Beard Papa’s is the only place where I know you can get creme brûlée to go. It costs $2.99 + tax, which is a pretty good price, compared to restaurants that charge $8 plus for a creme brûlée. Is Beard Papa’s Creme Brûlée on par with other restaurants?

Photo 2012-05-21 4 04 31 PM — Creme Brûlée

It is a fairly small, personal sized dessert- which was fine by me since I could finish it all! I’d say the diameter was roughly 3 inches. The hardened caramel on top the creme brûlée had some burnt bits, which was rendered inedible. It was hard to break the caramel into smaller pieces to eat with the custard part underneath. The temperature was a bit between warm and cold, since they have been putting the creme brûlée in the freezer, but the caramel was warm. So the whole dessert had a temperature inconsistency.

Photo 2012-05-21 4 04 26 PM — Hardened Caramel of Creme Brûlée

After getting through the hard caramel, time to taste the custard! It tasted great, and in my opinion, I don’t see the difference between this $2.99 custard vs $8 custard inside a creme brûlée. It was smooth, creamy, and had a vanilla taste.

Photo 2012-05-21 4 05 44 PM — The custard

Despite a bit of burnt caramel, I found this creme brûlée comparable to the higher end ones, and much rather pay for Beard Papa’s for more convenient indulgence. I don’t need fancy presentation for a simple treat like this. With $8, I can consume 2 2/3 of Beard Papa’s creme brûlée! It’s hard to find a cafe where you can walk in and just order creme brûlée, so I’m glad Beard Papa’s have that option.

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