the Walnut Maple Roll

I have tried Panash Bakery & Café numerous times as they have an outlet one block from my house – and they are a reliable source for no fuss fresh baguettes and baked goods. My favourite of theirs is the Walnut Maple Roll, which looks very similar to a Cinnamon Roll but far tastier. Yes, I’m sure that sounds very subjective.

I took a stroll through yet another new mall in Tsim Sha Tsui’s iSquare. Not much was opened but that was not the point. The point being it was very uninteresting so I thought I would start my search then, at Panash Bakery & Café. It was a new shop of theirs that opened – the only difference is it seemed much more upper class than their usual outlets. No matter, I had my coffee and realised that they did a HK$55 tea set which is not bad with a 6 range choice of cakes added to a tea or coffee.

But this wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted my Walnut Maple Roll so I decided to order my cappuccino and cross over from the seated café into their bakery and buy my Roll. I discovered a new delight aptly called the Tea Time Cake. I thought why not – it looked different and was only HK$6. I sat down and ready to drink my cappuccino I was told they need to double charge me for my HK$8.50 favourite - my Roll. Not that that would have been a big dent into my budget but the fact they shun you and then charge you for eating their own product in their café confused me. Anyway, the lady who challenged me was rather nice in the fact that I said I didn’t fancy their cakes or tea set and just wanted my Roll instead. So she said, OK but don’t eat it in the open. I sat quietly in my corner, stealing little pieces of my Roll every now and then from its plastic bag and dipping it into my not so great cappuccino.

By the way, the Tea Time Cake was a great new find, it held within its moist sponge, fruit and nuts and just like my Gran’s infamous carrot cake! And then I footed my cappuccino bill – HK$38 plus 10%. Never again.

Panash Bakery & Café

G04 Ocean Terminal, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong

G/F, 1 Soares Avenue, Ho Man Tin, Kowloon, Hong Kong

1/F, Shop #158-159, 8 Chung Wa Road, East Point City, Tseung Kwan O, Hong Kong

G/F, 250 King's Road, North Point, Hong Kong

G/F, 163 Queen's Road East, Wan Chai, Hong Kong