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best 2 café reviewers take toronto

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THE RED BENCH (guess who this one is dedicated to.. hhh!)

there wasn't a post last week! they were just out of sync. this week, they synced up and met at the prestigious red bench on young, near bloor. he got there and parked on nice a side road. they got to the red bench, but it was too cold to sit on the actual bench, so they stayed inside.

there were so many things to choose from, that they had a crisis. the british/austrailian accented barista understood. they figured out what to order. she ordered the most complicated thing ever; even the barista needed clarification. his order was much simpler.

she got two half cookie ice cream sandwiches. one was a classic chocolate chip cookie with white chocolate raspberry ice cream and white chocolate chips. the other half was a cookie and cream cookie with vanilla ice cream and toffee chocolate chips.

he got everything peanut butter in spirit of hhh. his cookie ice cream sandwich was a nutterdam cookie with peanut butter ice cream and peanut butter chocolate chips. the nutterdam cookie is a peanut butter cookie with nutalla inside! so amazing. how did they do it? he doesn't know.

they both got "organic" hot chocolates. what makes them organic remains a mystery.

they expected the cookies to be soft and chewy. their expectations were wrong. she tried to take a bite, but the ice cream fell out! luckily, she caught the ice cream in her hand, and it was all gravy, baby. but actually though, her ice cream melted into gravy. he found out the trick was to use teeth to bite the cookie.. ingenious!

after they consumed the cookie ice cream sanwiches, they proceeded to wash the ice cream off their hands. the washrooms at the establishment are trying to be fancy, but there just isn't enough real estate.

the "organic" hot chocolate wasn't "organic" enough for him, and it was too "organic" for her.

they brought eachother gifts! she got him a ripley's book, which had crazy people in it, such as michelle pfeiffer. they tried to read it, but he was reading too slow, and they couldn't focus. they also tried to read the "coffee news" newspaper, which they kept as a souvenir.

he got her gum and hand lotion, except it wasn't actually hand lotion. it was hand "scrub" which apparantly means it is to be used alongside water. they tried using it without water anyways. it wasn't working! they made another trip to the tiny washroom. however, the hand "scrub" smells awesome; even the barista took a whiff and loved it. the barista commented that it smelled like cookies, but the barista was acutally baking cookies the whole time, so the barista's nose is not to be trusted.

on the coffeedotpng-meter...

both of her half cookie ice cream sandwiches scored a whopping 10

his peanut butter cookie ice cream sandwich scored an 8.7

their "organic" hot chocolates scored a 5.8

afterwards, they went to the car, and were so happy he didn't get a ticket, except upon closer inspection, he did. he got his first parking ticket ever, and she was his mentor, since she has more expeience in the parking ticket business. it was once again, all gravy, baby, because they drove home, listening to lady gaga and marvin gaye.

after he dropped her off, he didn't go the regular way back, and got lost. he didn't feel like turning on the gps, so he drove through random neighborhoods, and discovered these really huge mansions!

overall, their experience scored the red bench a 8.2 on the coffeedotpng-meter.

oh, and that big blue tree from a few weeks ago is still there!

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AROMA ESPRESSO BAR (dedicated to the risktaker, heartbreaker)

this weeks adventure includes a special guest, aaa. the plan was simple: meet at the aroma espresso at young and eglinton at 7:45ish. this is the story of how it all went down.

he got there and parked in the same sketcky street as the first adventure, near the police station. it was solid. he walked to aroma from there, and met aaa! 2/3 arrived on time. but there was a subway delay and she was running late. oh no!

he and aaa waited, scouting out nice spots to sit. they moved from the window seat to a booth. news had arrived that a lady had fainted on the subway, and an asian guy ran into the alarm to stop the subway. what should she do? she got off and walked the remaining distance. he and aaa were chatting about life, work, and school. then she arrived!

the washroom quality at the establishment was less than good.

they all spent time and a half trying to figure out what to order. they serve breakfast! she got french toast and an iced coffee. aaa got a breakfast sandwich, french toast, and a mixed berry smoothie. he got an aroma coffee and some oatmeal. they moved to a different, nicer booth.

aaa couldn’t wait for all the food to arrive for the picture, so he broke the rule and ate his breakfast sandwich before they could take a picture. this is a tragedy.

the oatmeal was dry and in a sealed container. how? why? they had to go back to the counter and ask the lady how to make oatmeal. apparently, just add hot water. okay. they got the lady to make the oatmeal for him.

they ate the food, drank the beverages, and discussed whether aaa hated her or not. aaa had to talk on the phone using headphones, and then aaa had to buy a phone using a laptop. the table was getting messy as they consumed all the goods.

alright! the iced coffee was too bitter, and adding sugar didn’t work since it wouldn't dissolve. the smoothie looked good. the aroma coffee was very sweet, and had melted chocolate that looked weird at the bottom. the french toast was very nice, especially with all the syrup. it was healthy too, since it came with fruits on the side. the breakfast sandwich looked good. the oatmeal tasted like extra soggy cereal. the raisins were great. after he added 5 sugars, it was delicious. however, it was very hefty and filling. water was needed but not obtained. the trays of food included little tiny pieces of chocolate to enjoy. how nice! this place will be her new william’s, and she will stop by on her way to work.

on the coffeedotpng-meter…

iced coffee scored a 3.3

mixed berry smoothie scored a 7.0

aroma coffee scored an 8.5

french toast scored a 9.2

breakfast sandwich scored a 7.0

oatmeal scored a 5.4

after they finished, the place was closing, so they went outside the aroma espresso and sat in the building lobby, where they tried to bond. however, it remained a mystery to her, whether aaa hated her or not.

they left and walked to the sketchy street, got in the car, and drove home, listening to lady gaga.

overall, their experience scores aroma espresso bar a 6.8 on the coffeedotpng-meter.

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p>oh, and bus #61 is actually a garbage truck.

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SNAKES AND LATTES (dedicated to hhh again)

this time they planned it all out. they spent their days at work exchanging emails about their next spot to visit. snakes and lattes was the obvious choice. it’s a board game cafe near bloor and bathurst.

they made all kinds of contingency plans. he made sure he knew where to park. she made sure she knew how to use the subway to get there. she got to use the green subway line for the first time! or did she? he brought thick socks, a hat with pom poms, and two layers of sweatpants. she brought mittens.

it was going down smoothly. he parked the car in the predetermined parking lot, which turned out to be so sketchy. she got off the yellow subway line, but instead of getting on the green one, someone misinformed her and told her to just walk there.. what? huh? okay. it was all good though, because they arrived!

apparently, this place is the bee’s knees, and could have long wait times, but they got there at the perfect time, got a pretty sweet table, and tried to figure out what to order. they both got lattes; she got a caramel one, and he got a nutella one. instead of being “so waste” by not getting anything to eat, even though they were hungry, they shared a cookie from the sea of salt.

his nutella latte was okay, it only kinda tasted like nutella. it was less sweet that they expected. all the nutella was at the bottom, and there was no spoon to scoop it out! ahhh! why were they trying to ruin our lives?!

her caramel latte tasted better. it was less bitter than the nutella one. she gulped it down before they even started playing the board games.

their cookie was crumbly but so good because apparently, there exists no cookie that isn’t bad. they finished it in like exactly 1 second(s). they were expecting it to be extra salty, but it tasted pretty regular on the saltiness scale. what is sea salt? khayef.

on the coffeedotpng-meter…

caramel latte scored a 7.4

nutella latte scored a 4.3

sea salt cookie scored an 8.1

now for the board games, which ones to play? there were so many! some other people were playing guess who, so guess who couldn’t play guess who? him and her. they had to wait for those people to finish their game. so they went to the shelves to search for cool and unique games, which happened to be color coded:

blue was good for two people

green was easy to learn

yellow was crazy

red was even crazier

since yellow and red were only for crazy people, they were looking for blue and green games. they spent TIME AND A HALF looking and found the weirdest games. by that time, the guess who game was returned to the shelves, so they quickly grabbed it as well. they had collected 4 games:

guess who

blockers

boggle

liar’s dice

guess who was obviously the one they played first. susan was broken to pieces, “just like [her] life”, apparently. but she won all of the guess who games they played except one, when he got lucky.

boggle was disgusting. it was so gross. clearly, someone with the grubbiest of hands had played with it previously. but anyway, he sucked at that game! it was way too complex for him, so he lost all of the boggle games too. his vocabulary consisted strictly of 3 and 4 letter words.

liar’s dice? how were they supposed to play that? there were no instructions! just containers of dice, and a cute little pouch. they couldn’t figure it out, so that game automatically sucks. these games are supposed to be easy to learn. lies! how ironic.

blockers! it was so strategic and fun. she kept using all these insane tactics to defeat him. he only won twice and she won all the other times. purple was the losing color.

on the coffeedotpng-meter… the board games scored an 8.2.

okay, after they finished the games, they went outside. there was this crazy big bargain store. they spent 2 minutes trying to cross the street. but the store had closed at 9pm! now they had to walk all the way across the street again!

they went on a trip back home, and passed by all the places from last week, like the police station, the gold star cafe, the crosswalk that they crossed once, the sketchy streets, all of it! they saw new things too, like a big blue tree, and the rom museum.

overall their experience scores snakes and lattes a 7.0 on the coffeedotpng-meter. that’s pretty decent.

oh, and they gave us free water, how dope is that!

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STARBUCKS (dedicated to hhh)

it all started when they needed coffee. they discussed the situation and were going to meet at young & eglinton to go on a café adventure. he got there on time, and parked. it was a sketchy street on which a cop car was also parked. he called her but she didn’t answer! #stressed. she sent an ‘sms’ saying she was on the subway and almost there. that explains it, there is no reception on the subway.

ok. they needed to find a parking spot near a café. they drove up young, but couldn’t find anything. they came back to eglinton and found a spot basically where they were in the beginning. hooray!

should they walk up young, or down young? down. it was like 9pm and they didn’t find anything open, except starbucks, timmies, and some weird place that is weird (gold star café). it was so cold, his feet and ears were falling off, and her legs were frozen. they went back, so they could go up young instead.

they were on their way to jedd’s frozen custard. it apparently sells coffee and tea. it was taking forever to get to. they passed david’s tea, and wondered whether or not to settle for david. they didn’t. they got to jedd’s frozen yogurt shop.

it was supposed to be open. not only was it closed, it was closed down. someone replaced it with another coffee shop, that was actually closed.

their body temperatures were dropping at an alarming rate. they had to do something quick. it was across the street, where they settled for one of the many starbucks on young. to be specific, it was at 2451 young street north.

he got a caramel dolce latte and a lovely apple cinnamon slice of cake (left). she got a vanilla latte and a decent lemon marange slice of cake (right).

the caramel dolce latte was sweet and delicious. the vanilla latte wasn’t as sweet, but came with a creamy sensation.

the apple cinnamon cake had a great texture to complement it’s terrific taste. the lemon marange cake was very lemony and cold. if the weather was warmer, it would have been more appropriate, and probably would have tasted better.

on the coffeedotpng-meter…

apple cinnamon cake scored a 7.6

lemon marange cake scored a 5.2

caramel dolce latte scored a 6.8

vanilla latte scored a 6.6

overall, their experience scores starbucks a 6.6 on the coffeedotpng-meter. not bad.

oh, and that sketchy street turned out to have a police station on it, which explains the cop car.