It's always been a distant dream of mine to open up my own bakery. I don't think I would quit my day job any time soon, but you know what's crazy? Someone already opened up my dream bakery. (The audacity!)
Introducing Mari Bakeshop! It's everything I've imagined, and more. Cute little space with tempting treats, savoury options, and fresh bread. Decor is minimal and clean; the walls painted in a muted palette of pink and grey with wooden slat accents. If IKEA designed a bakery, this would be it.
Located in Calgary's East Village, Mari Bakeshop is just a few months over a year old. They sit at the base of a condo tower, neighbouring other trendy boutiques and businesses. It was actually a bit of a struggle to get here due to construction downtown but it was definitely worth the frenzy and detours.
Mari is the Korean word for roll, and that's exactly what they specialize in: pretty roll cakes with swirls of coffee, coconut, or fruit-flavoured cream. Also not to be missed is their choux, or creampuffs.
If you're not into sweets (if so, we can't be friends), they also have savoury options such as quiche and baguette sandwiches. Bread is also baked in small batches throughout the day so you won't have to wake up early to get a loaf fresh out of the oven.
Out of eight available flavours of choux, we got a box of six ($14.00). (In hindsight, we should've gotten all eight. Or a box of twelve. Or, actually, make that twenty.) I believe they have a set core of flavours, and will introduce some new ones for limited runs.
From left to right, top to bottom, we got vanilla, mango, matcha, chocolate, strawberry, and rocher. All the creampuffs are the perfect size for a small sweet treat. They feature a craquelin shell, flavoured pastry cream in the centre, and a white chocolate button as the cherry on top.
Craquelin is a paste that goes over top of choux dough before baking. It turns into an amazing crunchy and crumbly topping. The choux at Mari is thin but sturdy enough to hold all the pastry cream that they generously pipe inside. I had the vanilla and matcha flavour and they were both so delicious!
Before I knew it, my sister also devoured both her chocolate and rocher choux. The rocher choux was especially decadent -- filled with hazelnut cream and dipped in chocolate and chopped hazelnuts!
Truthfully I didn't think the roll cake would be anything special. My mom would get roll cakes from Chinese bakeries, but we would never be able to finish an entire loaf by the time it got stale. Maybe because they are nothing compared to the roll cake at Mari. I only managed to have a couple bites of the matcha roll cake ($4.50) before my mom finished the entire slice. The cake portion was super light and fluffy, and the cream was lightly sweet with a nice matcha flavour. Although I'll be coming back to Mari every time I'm in Calgary for their choux, I also wouldn't say no to picking up a roll cake or two.
And that's it. Bakeshop of my dreams.
Mari Bakeshop
529 Riverfront Ave SE
Calgary, AB
(587) 356-4461
- CT
0 comments:
Post a Comment