Dazzling Cafe 蜜糖土司專賣

Profile

Address:    台北市忠孝東路四段205巷7弄11號

                  No. 11, Alley 7, Lane 205, Section 4, ZhōngXiào East Rd, Da-an District
Phone #:   02-8773-9229
Website: http://cafe.dazzlingdazzling.com/

Price Range:   $$

Accepts Credit Cards: no

Attire: casual

Good for kids: yes

Take out: yes
Waiter Service: yes
Outdoor seating:  no
Alcohol: no

Rating

Food Quality: 3.7 out of 5
Decor:  4 out of 5
Service: 4.5 out of 5
Overall: 4.06 out of 5
Recommendation: Fancy cafe with delightful desserts and drinks.

Review

Dazzling cafe is a very bling bling eatery located on the east side on the alleyway behind Luxy. They feature a honey toast dessert that is very popular item. They have a wide assortment of drinks available to pair with the honey toast or meal proper.They also have many types of pasta dishes, sandwiches, and a few dinner entrees to chose from. The honey toasts run about 280 NT per order and drinks are around 120. I have not tried the hot food, so I will have to fill that information in on a later date. The place is a good place to kick back with some coffee and dessert.

The cafe really made sure that they were dazzling enough to own up to its name. The whole space is white and lit up pretty well. That combination caused an aura of brightness to the place that could only be described as dazzling. This is a popular joint, so you should make sure you have a valid reservation. Otherwise, you can expect to be seated at 8:30pm when you arrive at 4pm without a reservation. There also is a wierd Care Bear theme to this place, which is very odd as they sell care bear merchandise to a market that probably have never grew up with or heard about care bears aside from this store. They also seem to showcase/sell jewlery and fashion accessories from time to time. 

The place is way packed and my photos do not do any justice to showcase the space and lighting. Dazzling cafe is rather chic, and their server ratio is pushing equilibrium, so that everyone is attended too. They work really hard due to the sheer volume of customers, but still are able to serve with a smile, good attitude, and with promptness. Their decor and use of artifacts make this restaurant design above average, and their service staff were above average as well. They come and ring up your order quickly, and if you order the honey toast, they individually help slice and prepare the toast for you.

 Naturally, I ordered the hazlenut latte, which was made with Lavazza espresso nuts. They get high points for this interesting plating and pretty foam art. The coffee itself was good: you only get a hint of mild espresso flavors, not too acidic, and more creamy and hazlenutty. They blended the espresso well, and it must be made espresso first because I hardly tasted the acridity associated with an espresso last preparation. You shoud take your 120 NT here instead of feeding it to the Starbucks monster if you have the time to chill.

They also serve an assortment of fruity drinks like this strawberry lemon tea. At first glance it looks very sweet and syrupy, but to my surprise it was refreshing and only semisweet. There is a 1 drink minimum per customer policy at this store, so be prepared to get something. I suggest coffee or hot chocolate to go with the toast.

On to the main attraction: the strawberry lover honey toast. It was packed with honey toasted interior, topped with strawberries, ice cream, and icing, all sprinkled with powdered sugar and drizzled with strawberry jam. They also stuck two chocolate sticks for looks/additional munching. This is the before picture of the desert. When you are done oggling at your prey, you call up the waitress and she will cut it up for you to consume. She first moves the toppings individually to the side of the plate, then cuts up the inside into smaller strips of toast.

You end up getting this disembowled mess, but it is a tasty mess. We shared this amongst 3 people, but I recommend you split between 2 max. I could probably eat the whole thing myself minus the crust. For a price of 300 NT, it is reasonable enough in terms of value. I took each individual slice, lathered it with the strawberry ice cream, and topped it with a slice of strawberry. The resulting combination of honey, strawberry, and cream was a delightful meld of sweet strawberriness overwhelming your taste buds. Also, the texture of crunchy toast with melted ice cream was great, creamy yet with substance. It's like icecream and apple pie, except strawberry ice cream on crunchy toast with strawberries. I can't really descibe this sufficiently, it's just berry good. I was glad I had coffee to wash this down and to constrast the sweetness. I am curious if their hot food stands up to the name "dazzling" as well, so I will have to go back and check it out soon.

Update 6-10-2011

Revisted Dazzling and had the chance to try a couple other items. I still like the strawberry lover honey toast the best because of my affinity towards all things strawberry-licious.

 The Bananna Chocolate honey toast was not very bananaesque, or it was just too faint to realize its subtle hints of banana. It tasted more like crunchy sweet toast with vanilla icecream. The most banana thing about it were the slices of banana surrounding the toast. The toast is dry, but I like smothering my pieces in ice cream, so it is perfect when paired together. I am not that into chocolates and bananas, so this was not that great to me.

 Also, I tried a danish toast. This one is the Mango Tango Danish Toast. The picture they had on the menu was filled with a lot of mangos, and I was quite disappointed that the amount of mango did not live up to the picture. This dessert relied mostly on the custard and mango icecream to make it good. The danish is less dry, more like moist and flakey. So people who don't like the borderline crouton feel of the drier honeytoast can give the danish toasts a try, but I feel the topping to bread ratio is too low, and so maybe Dazzling can consider to thin out the danish or something.

I reordered the Strawberry Lover Honey Toast, and took this video clip of its preparation:

While they serve the toast, they introduce its anatomy and give serving recommendations.

 I discovered a surprisingly good milk shake-esque drink, but I forgot the name. It probably has the words milk, chocolate, and strawberry in the name. But this was like the more liquid millkshake. It is not too sweet and is suitable to pair with honeytoast and other types of flour based desserts. I do not know how you can drink juice-type drinks with honey toast.

Stay away from the panini column of the menu, because these flimsy rectangles they use as bread does not cut it. Save your money and go get at Toasteria instead. This chicken panini seemed to be more of a lettuce panini. I am not sure if Dazzling is worth the time for a regular meal, but their Honey Toast is a real spectacle to be witnessed at least once in your life. Made some appropriate decuctions to the food rating as a result.