Hot Chocolate Festival: Bel Cafe

Along with the Dine Out Festival, Hot Chocolate Festival has returned to Vancouver. They will be in town from Jan 17th to Feb 14th - perfect timing for some chocolaty sweetness! These events are always a delight to explore since I get a chance to experience fun and creative dishes made by Vancouver's very loved cafes and restaurants.

Below is the list of the participants: 

• 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters + Lucky’s Doughnuts
• Bel Cafe
• Bella Gelateria + To Die For Banana Bread
• Butter Baked Goods 
• Chez Christophe 
• Chocolate Arts
• Chocolaterie de la Nouvelle France
• Diva at the Met 
• East Van Roasters
• French Made Baking
• Gem Chocolates
• Glenburn Soda Fountain & Cafe 
• Koko Monk Chocolates
• Last Crumb Cafe
• Mink Chocolates & Cafe
• Schokolade Artisan Chocolate
• Soirette Macarons & Tea
• Terra Breads 
• Thierry Chocolaterie Patisserie Cafe
• Thomas Haas 
• Uva Wine Bar + Bittered Sling

This year, I have chosen Bel Cafe since it is the place that pops up in my head first when I have sweet tooth. I also wondered how the awards winning chef  David Hawksworth's hot chocolate would look and taste like.

Vancity Foodie: Coast Review (...where we are not going back?)

As a former Torontonian, I am a Dine Outs craze (= summerlicious or winterlicious for Torontonians by the way), where I get to pamper myself with pretentious small portion food at Fixed Price menus offered by big brand named high end restaurants. My girlfriends and I got together (including Vivian & Alexa) for this opportunity. We set a date for an evening all three of us were available and made a reservation with Coast.

It was last Thursday, January 15th that we all got together. Walked into the restaurant wet and cold, and asked our lovely waiter Alex for a dine-outs menu. Alex looked positively flustered why he has forgotten to bring dine-outs menu and revealed the fact that it does not start until tomorrow! ....which we all knew it starts on 16th! So there we were. :-)

We had 3 main plates with deep-fried oysters on the side and couple desserts to satisfy all of our tastebuds. 

Vivian had White Miso Glazed Sablefish ($38.95) found under signature dish & was beautifully cooked! You can never go wrong with the soft texture of sablefish - however as much as I love the dish, I found it rather salty. It is definitely flavourful and we had no problem finishing the dish as it was the best one of the three.

Missing the Sunshine..

Hi all,

the weather hasn't been nice in Vancouver lately and I am wishing the sun to come out soon! I wonder what it's like to live in places where there is only sunshine. Would I miss the cloud and rain? Just a random thought on a gloomy day in Vancouver. 

xoxo

Vivian

Disney On Ice 2014 Review

After days of nagging, my husband bought tickets to go see Disney on Ice. I remember being very excited & going to one as a child - and as a Disney fan, this was a necessary outing even on a week night. 

*** Watch the full video of Mickey & the Magical Brooms from Fantasia - Disney on Ice Version! :-) Apologies on the sound! ....***

Main Street Cafe Tour: Sweet Revenge

"Living well is the best revenge" - George Herbert 

Yes it is, and if you add some sweetness to that, it's undefeatable. Sweet Revenge on Main street Vancouver is one of those places that provides you sweetness and comfort helping you escape from all those stressful moments you had during day time. The opening time of the cafe is quite unusual; unlike most places, they open from 7 PM to 12 AM  during weekdays and 7 PM to 1 AM for Friday & Saturday.

Etsy Holiday Pop-up Shop

Vancouver is full of good surprises during Christmas season - especially for a person who loves cute, romantic things to celebrate the holiday!

My good friend who is well aware of my craze for cute things told me about Etsy Holiday Pop-up Store at 434 Columbia Street in Vancouver. A pop-up shop is a store that opens for a short term providing exclusive products to the customers to introduce the brand. Etsy being an online shop, and hence I don't get to see the actual products before I make a purchase, I thought this would be a great opportunity to see the products and local Etsy shop owners.

Artist Island - Granville Island

Located under the south end of Granville Street Bridge, Granville Island was originally a industrial manufacturing area. Later when the factories started to move out from the area, the Canadian government invested $19 million and created exhibitions, theatres, parks, etc. Now Granville Island became Vancouver's top tourist attraction and earns $35 million per year!  My husband and I visited Granville Island a few days ago and I would like to share some stories and pictures I took.

I filmed a short video to properly capture the atmosphere from my visit. You can hear the street musician busking away and that really completes it all. More about my day in Granville Island after the jump! :-) 

Vancity Foodie: Tableau Bar & Bistro

Hope you enjoyed Natalie's Circle Craft posting yesterday. 

The Craft fair was certainly a pleasant surprise; we never knew we would be there for so long! Our unexpected excitement in craft hunting almost had us miss our reservation at "Tableau Bar & Bistro" and that would have been the end of the world for us. 

Tableau has been a "foodie's must" since their debut in 2011. From brunch to dinner, the restaurant is packed with people looking for casual french bistro.

Today's Sky

I wanted to document the beautiful blue sky from today - for in this Raincouver, I wouldn't be surprised it continues to rain for 5 months.
Let's just hope that be shortened to half of that for this winter. I love you, Vancity! <3