Tasty Ice Cream at Moonmilk

Moonmilk
Location
: 1695 Dundas Street West, Toronto
Website: https://moonmilktoronto.com/

I’ve had the ice cream at Moonmilk once before, and I thought it was quite good.  I just tried another scoop, and it was even better; clearly, Moon Milk has got the goods when it comes to top-notch ice cream.

Moonmilk

Moon Milk serves about a dozen flavours of ice cream, along with a few cakes and pastries (I tried one of the cakes during the most recent Du West Fest and quite enjoyed it).  On this particular visit, I had the Jelly Donut ice cream.

Moonmilk

It’s seriously good.  And the extent to which it’s able to recapture the flavour of a jelly doughnut is actually quite impressive; there are swirls of sweet jelly throughout, and the ice cream itself actually does have a doughnut flavour.  I have no idea how they’re able to capture that flavour in ice cream form, but they’ve done it.

And the quality of the ice cream is great, with a very rich, smooth texture.  It’s a seriously delicious scoop.

Quick Bites: Slow Jams, Emmer, Mascot Brewery

Fried chicken sandwich from Slow Jams
Fried chicken sandwich from Slow Jams

Slow Jams is a pop-up that specializes in Filipino BBQ and fried chicken; I tried their fried chicken sandwich (“coconut & lemongrass brine, spicy banana ketchup & soy pickled cucumbers”) at last year’s Taste of Little Italy street festival, and it was quite tasty.  The bright red sauce its slathered in kinda tastes like the stuff you’ll find on sweet and sour chicken balls; it’s a bit overly sweet, but the pickles do a pretty good job of balancing things out.  Otherwise, it’s nice and crunchy, and the dark meat within is pleasantly juicy.  It didn’t rock my world, but it’s a solid fried chicken sandwich.

Pistachio Croissant from Emmer
Pistachio Croissant from Emmer

The pistachio croissant is probably the thing that Emmer is the most well known for, but every time I’ve gone, it’s been sold out.  They had just put out a fresh tray of them on my most recent visit, and yeah, of course I got one.  It’s good!  And it certainly looks impressive, with the generous layer of crushed pistachios on top.  The croissant was maybe a bit overbaked (it was slightly dry) and I think inherently, a pistachio croissant will never be as good as an almond croissant.  But I still quite enjoyed this; it’s got a nice pistachio flavour, a good balance between the croissant and the filling, and its sweetness was very well balanced.

Buffalo Wings from Mascot Brewery
Buffalo Wings from Mascot Brewery

Mascot Brewery, nestled away in an industrial area of Etobicoke, is a definite hidden gem.  They’ve got a nice patio, a decent selection of sharable snacks and sandwiches, and  — as you’d expect from a brewpub — a bunch of interesting beer on tap.  I had the Buffalo wings (“Honey Buffalo Sauce, Buttermilk Ranch”), and they were quite tasty.  I didn’t particularly notice any sweetness (they tasted like pretty standard Buffalo wings to me), but these were otherwise quite tasty, and the buttermilk ranch was a definite upgrade over the standard jarred stuff.

Another Delicious Doughnut at Dipped Donuts

Dipped Donuts
Location
: 161 Baldwin Street, Toronto
Website: https://www.dippeddonuts.ca/

It’s been a few years since I’ve been to Dipped Donuts, and I figured another visit was probably in order.  Every other doughnut I’ve had from this place has been great, and hey, guess what?  It’s still great.

Dipped Donuts

I’m a big fan of the flavours here, which manage to be unique without ever coming off as gimicky.  Whoever’s coming up with the doughnuts clearly knows what they’re doing.

On this visit I got the saffron pistachio: “filled with pistachio pastry cream and topped with rich saffron glaze, pistachios and rose petals.”

Dipped Donuts

It’s so good; the pistachio filling is creamy and packed with pistachio flavour (and it tastes like real pistachio, not pistachio extract), and the glaze gives it a really nice floral hum that complements the nuttiness perfectly.  It’s sweet, but doesn’t punch you in the face like so many doughnuts do.  It’s great.

And of course, the doughnut itself is as tasty as ever.  Is Dipped Donuts the best doughnut shop in the city?  It might be.

Tasty Cookies at Felix & Norton

Felix & Norton
Location
: 8601 Warden Avenue, Unionville
Website: https://www.fncookies.com/

I should note that I cannot possibly be objective about Felix & Norton.  My high school was right across the street from this cookie shop.  I was a fat kid.  Cookies were a very, very regular occurrence.

So I don’t know if these cookies are actually delicious or if it’s just the nostalgia talking, but either way I like them a whole lot.

Felix & Norton

On this visit, I had two of my favourites from back in the day, Menage a Trois (which features white, milk, and dark chocolate) and Caramelt (milk chocolate and caramel).

They have that slightly cakey texture you get from cookies that are designed to be perpetually chewy; I’m normally not crazy about that, but it works here.  Again, it might be the nostalgia.

Felix & Norton

The quality of the chocolate is pretty decent, and the cookies themselves are sweet, but not overly so.  They’re quite good.  They also have a flavour I can’t quite put my finger on, other than to say that it is unmistakably Felix & Norton.  That flavour is thoroughly ingrained in my brain, and has remained unchanged over the years.  I don’t know what it is, but it makes these cookies taste noticeably different from anything else I’ve had in the GTA.

Solid Gelato at On Third Thought

On Third Thought
Location
: 6 Markham Street, Toronto
Website: https://www.onthirdthought.com/

I recently saw On Third Thought on a list of the best gelato in the city, and I thought, wait — this place serves some of the best gelato in the city?  And I haven’t heard of it??

Obviously I needed to try it ASAP.

On Third Thought

They have about a dozen flavours on the menu, mostly fruity.  Interestingly, they have a handful of booze-infused scoops for a one dollar upcharge.  I went alcohol-free and got chocolate and caramelized fig.

On Third Thought

It’s not bad at all.  I personally wouldn’t put this in my top 10, but I’m certainly not mad I ate it.  The gelato is served at the perfect temperature and is decently creamy, and while the fig flavour was more tart than I was expecting (and both were leaning a bit sweeter than I prefer), the chocolate had a richness to it that I found quite enjoyable.

On Third Thought

They also serve the gelato in a glass bowl with a metal spoon if you’re eating on the patio, and I found this to be unexpectedly delightful.  You wouldn’t think it would make a difference, but there’s something about it that just feels better than eating out of the usual disposable cup.