Sherman's Food Adventures: Calhoun's

Calhoun's

We were planning to have some dessert at Abigail's Party; but the noise level, lack of light and extremely sparse service was beginning to annoy us. When we finally got the attention of our server, which seemed more difficult than crossing #3 Road in Richmond, Bear canceled his dessert. The server seemed genuinely disappointed at that. We wasted another 20 minutes trying to get her attention regarding my double-charged beer. As a result, we headed to Calhoun's for some dessert. Calhoun's? Isn't that what Bread Garden used to be like? Yup, but at 2:00am in the morning, there are not a whole lot of choices for some beverages and dessert. In fact, Calhoun's used to be a regular hangout during my University days.

Not much has changed here except for the free WiFi. It was nice to be at a place where there was light and quiet enough that I didn't have to yell to have a conversation with the person next to me. I got a slice of Key Lime Cheesecake and a Steamed Milk and headed over to grab a seat. I liked the fact it was a baked cheesecake. On the other hand, I didn't like the crust. It was hard and a poor compliment to the smooth cake. I did like the lime topping, it was sweet and tart. Lionel Hutz had already gotten his slice of Carrot Cake and before he could dig into it, I hijacked it. I ended up taking it to another table where there was more light to take a picture. All this time, he was shaking his head. Despite that, he let me try the cake and it had a lot of carrot, raisins and walnuts. It was pretty good and not too sweet. I proceeded to do that with Boss Woman's Banana Cream Cake and Bear's Berry Bar (that just sounded quite funny...). I chose to ignore the stares from other people wondering WTF I was doing. I didn't like the banana cake. There was far too much butter cream and it was quite sweet. Boss Woman didn't seem to like it that much either. I didn't get to try the berry bar since it was quite small and you never want to disturb a hungry Bear.

It was nice to have some time in peace and quiet to chat about things with friends at Calhoun's. It definitely brings back memories when we would come here after studying, clubbing or a case of insomnia. As for the food here, don't expect too much. After all, most of it is refrigerated in the display case waiting to be nuked. Their pastries and desserts are alright; however, better can be found in many other places. With that being said, their freshly made sandwiches are not too bad. But it's comfortable, spacious and inexpensive. The main draw here is that it's open 24 hours and if you needed somewhere to go for coffee and a snack at 2:30am, there is really not much choice.

The Good:
- Open all the time!
- Decent selection of drinks and food
- Comfortable

The Bad:
- Food is what it is
- Don't expect service, it's do it yourself

Calhoun's Bakery Cafe on Urbanspoon

4 comments:

KimHo said...

One word: Speedlite. You should coerce them to get you an external flash for Christmas, that way, you won't be taking their plates to another table for better lightning! Of course, the fact is is "flashing" might be annoying as well but, when you are in a large group, nobody pays attention to that, hehehehe.

Sherman Chan said...

LOL... Trust me, I've sent a letter to Santa already!!!

Chris said...

Seems like a decent late night option. I can't think of many places around Edmonton, other than Humpty's and Denny's, where I could get a late night fill of pie.

Sherman Chan said...

I've been to Edmonton 3 times and yes, there were not too many late night options that I remembered. On a side note, I did have some decent sushi on Whyte Ave, but don't remember the name of the place.

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