Alexandre Bakery and Pastry Shop, Yaya
Centre
I have a
confession to make. As someone who considers herself a “junior foodie”, one
would imagine I would be up to date on all things food in this city. To my
great shame, I only recently found out about Alexandre when a friend of mine
suggested we meet there one Saturday afternoon.
In my [poor]
defense, living minutes away from The Junction means that all other malls have
been properly neglected. My visits to Yaya Centre have been limited to the
infrequent visit to the Post Office on the 1st floor (and even
that’s every few months, if I even remember to get the mail). I seem to have
imaginary blinders on because each time I have been to Yaya, I have simply made
a beeline for the Post Office and I am out in under five minutes. Now, if I had
bothered to casually stroll around the mall, as people are wont to, I would
have noticed Alexandre’s location on the ground floor. And once you notice it,
it’s pretty hard to miss it.
The café section
of the bakery is brightly lit and simply furnished with a few tables and
brightly colored chairs. It was very busy when I got there and was unable to
find a seat so it’s probably the kind of place you visit during off-peak hours
or simply do a quick take-away. The showcases in the bakery section are
chock-full with all kinds of pastries, breads, cakes, and cookies—a kind of
pastry heaven (if you’re into that kind of thing). Even with the hive of
activity in the café section, the staff members are very helpful and it wasn’t
long before one had secured me a little table, wiped it down, and offered me a
menu. With the tables practically touching, it was certainly not the place or
time to have a chat with a girlfriend so I was quite pleased to notice an
upstairs seating area which was much quieter. The mezzanine is furnished
bistro-style with wrought iron furniture and is fairly small but perfect for a
light meal especially when the sun is out though it can get a little draughty.
Luckily for us,
it was a lovely evening so we ended up looking at the dessert section of the
menu. The menu is quite varied, offering pastries, desserts, sandwiches,
quiches, tarts, and even salads. It had been a while since I’d had an ice-cream
so I got my fix courtesy of the “Dame Blanche”, a classic made of vanilla
ice-cream, whipped cream, and warm molten chocolate. Their portions are very
generous and it took me a long while to finish my ice-cream. It’s certainly not
an adventurous ice-cream but it was certainly yummy and I was very pleased with
it. The ice-creams come with peculiarly shaped spoons which, if nothing else,
make for a great talking point. My friend had the tiramisu which comes with
espresso-soaked ladyfingers and a creamy mascarpone filling. Fortunately for my
friend, I don’t care much for tiramisu so I didn’t sample any of it but she
gave it a definite thumbs-up. We weren’t there long so we didn’t try much of
the menu. Their website boasts of a cinnamon-apple bread that’s supposedly very
popular so I will definitely try that soon and see if it lives up to the hype.
I’m happy to
have discovered Alexandre( however late it might have been) and will be sure to
stop treating Yaya like some forgotten stepchild and see what else I’ve missed.
