PDA

View Full Version : Review: Nectar Desserts



Si_FlyGuy
04-24-2007, 10:24 PM
Nectar Desserts
1216 9 Ave Se
(located in Inglewood, on the second floor of a building almost directly across from Kane's Harley Diner)
http://www.nectardesserts.com/

Food - 9.25/10
Ambience - 8.25/10
Service - 8/10
Value - 8.5/10

Tasted:
1. Cream on Cream ($12) paired with Domaine de Durban’s Muscat Beaumes de Venise ($8)
2. Chocolate Experience ($12) paired with Domaine Du Traginer Banyuls ($8).

Completely out of this world creativity and taste. It's nice to finally see a high end dessert place, and I truly hope that they do well because a lot of higher end restaurants consider desserts to be an afterthought, resulting in sub-par offerings. It's an especially great place for a date.

You'll be amazed at how well chipotle on hot chocolate tastes, the delicacies of sea salt on caramel chocolate, and at the freshness of their macerated raspberries on the French influenced fromage blanc cheesecake.

Owner/Pastry Chef Rebekah Pearse has also worked in several of my favourite restaurants in Calgary, including Il Sogno, Mercato, and River Cafe; as well as apprenticing in France after graduation from Sait's culinary program.


:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

HybridTheory
04-25-2007, 11:52 AM
Hmmmm wow, that place definitely sounds interesting. Did it just open up recently?

GQBalla
04-25-2007, 02:41 PM
whoa crazy. definatly have to take the gf to this place.

Isaiah
04-25-2007, 02:46 PM
Good review! Will check them out.

Si_FlyGuy
04-25-2007, 03:27 PM
They've been open for 3 weeks or so I've been told, and the best part is that they're open until midnight on some days. I can't wait to go back.

89coupe
04-25-2007, 03:40 PM
If you want to hit up a Restaurant that serves out of this world desserts, check out Tribune on 8thave and 1st.

SilverGS
04-25-2007, 04:44 PM
Will have to check it out and compare it to the dessert places in NY.

BebeAphrodite
04-25-2007, 05:27 PM
Oo, I'm glad theres finally more options than the Chocolate Bar.

sdiep
04-26-2007, 08:36 AM
Thanks for the review. It looks pretty tasty too.

max_boost
04-26-2007, 04:02 PM
Awesome! Can't wait to check it out.

HybridTheory
04-26-2007, 11:12 PM
After seeing this thread, I got curious and decided to try the place out

Food - 9/10
Ambience - 8.25/10
Service - 8.5/10
Value - 8/10

I had the Pavalava (sp?) It was meringues with a passion fruit mousse, chantilly cream and mango. Everything just went together so well. I didn't try it with the wine pairings, maybe I'll do that next time around.

And I agree with what Si_FlyGuy said, its nice to finally see a dessert place that offers more high end desserts rather than just the standard brownies and cheesecakes. It's definitely a nice place to take a date since its quiet and cozy. I'm definitely going back to try out some other stuff. :thumbsup:

01RedDX
04-27-2007, 09:48 AM
.

98GA 2.4
04-29-2007, 10:42 PM
I have been here three times and I find it gets better every time I go. As long as you open to the idea of going to a place for deserts and some very tasteful wine or tea/ coffee. This place is awesome. Also I got the hours mon- sat 10am-12am.

Highly recommend!

Kritafo
04-30-2007, 07:39 AM
i love pavlova but usually make it myself, it's very easy and looks great.

I will be checking this place out. It's hard to compare when your best friend is a pastry chef from France...;)

max_boost
05-02-2007, 11:33 PM
Food - 9/10
Ambiance - 10/10
Service - 10/10
Value - 8/10

Went there tonight with my GF after reading reviews and persuasion from her.

Both her and myself were pleased with the layout of the place. We both enjoyed the mismatched furniture and agreed that the decor suited the shop's offerings.

I ordered the Apple Brulée and my GF ordered the Pavlova. I was impressed at the creativity and presentation of both dishes, in particular the Apple Brulée. It was an interesting take on a dessert "classic." My GF was thrilled with her choice, the selections of passion fruit curd, Chantilly cream and fresh mango were wonderful compliments to the sugary, chewy meringues.

The service was top-notch. Both our server and the owner/chef made themselves readily available to answer any of our questions and cater to any of our needs.

I will definitely be returning. The take-out selections were equally as enticing, as both the presentation and taste were perfectly matched.

Of note is their home made ice cream and cheeses. I am looking forward to trying them on a return visit.
:thumbsup:

Altezza
05-03-2007, 04:13 PM
I wonder where (and under who) she apprenticed while in France. Interesting...I'll have to try it this place out and do a wine pairing while I'm there.

Good to see that there's an alternative to Manuel Latruwe.

Isaiah
05-03-2007, 05:26 PM
I tried them last week and had the apple brulee and don't recall the name of the second dessert but it was chocolate served with a little espresso size cup of cocoa on the plate.

The desserts were good, Rebekah came out to say hello, and the decor was appropriately suited to the ambiance.

Having said that, I was slightly dissatisfied with the selection, and would like to see greater variety from which to choose in the future.

James
05-10-2007, 03:04 PM
Nice Review, I have to go check this place out. I use to work for the Custom Cabinet making company that built everything inside. Delivering all that stuff up those stairs sucked big time! lol.

Isaiah
05-10-2007, 03:08 PM
Rebekah and Nectar were featured on Breakfast Television the other day.

Altezza
05-10-2007, 04:19 PM
I tried this place the other day. I asked the waitress a lot of detailed questions about the desserts, Rebekah, Rebekah's background, Rebekah's training, where/who she apprenticed, etc.. Of course the waitress didn't know all of the answers. She said she'd have Rebekah come speak to us when she returned.

When Rebekah returned, we noticed the waitress specifically point us out to her. We thought, great, we can speak to her now. However, Rebekah snobbed us out the entire evening. She didn't come over at all to speak to us. It's not like it was very busy, perhaps 6 other people there at the most not including us. And she just sat at one of the empty tables. We just concluded she probably didn't apprentice under anyone famous and that her experience in Europe wasn't that glamorous, LOL.

Overall, the desserts were alright. Nothing spectacularly out of this world but they were pretty good. Service was excellent. Prices were pretty good as well.

USED1
05-11-2007, 10:40 PM
Just went there this evening. I had the cream on cream and the GF had the apple brulee.

Chef Rebekah Pearse brought us out our dishes and described them to us and let in the evening she returned with a complimentary dish for us to try.

Overall the experience was great. Loved the food as well as the decor.

Will return in the future. :thumbsup:

max_boost
05-12-2007, 02:47 AM
Originally posted by Altezza
I tried this place the other day. I asked the waitress a lot of detailed questions about the desserts, Rebekah, Rebekah's background, Rebekah's training, where/who she apprenticed, etc.. Of course the waitress didn't know all of the answers. She said she'd have Rebekah come speak to us when she returned.

When Rebekah returned, we noticed the waitress specifically point us out to her. We thought, great, we can speak to her now. However, Rebekah snobbed us out the entire evening. She didn't come over at all to speak to us. It's not like it was very busy, perhaps 6 other people there at the most not including us. And she just sat at one of the empty tables. We just concluded she probably didn't apprentice under anyone famous and that her experience in Europe wasn't that glamorous, LOL.

Overall, the desserts were alright. Nothing spectacularly out of this world but they were pretty good. Service was excellent. Prices were pretty good as well. GEesh, why the hell were you asking so many questions! Just go in and enjoy the desserts :rofl:

phreezee
05-17-2007, 10:42 AM
Food - 7/10 - average
Ambience - 8/10 - nice
Service - 7/10 - good, but quality check was way late.
Value - 6/10 - overpriced

I got some friends together and tried it out. Overall, I didn't feel like it was anything spectacular, not enough to justify the pricing.
When I'm paying $12/dessert, I'd expect some OOOHHH AHHHH after the first bite... no one at the table experienced this.

Red Velvet Cake - I've had better at Salisbury House for $2.99
Toffee Pudding - Decent, but portioning was the main complaint. A thimble of ice cream and a square of pudding.
Cream on Cream - same as above.

I've had $500 dinners for two and thought they were worth every penny, so I wouldn't call myself cheap, but I look for value in the pricing/taste/portioning and this was definately not worth it.

Overall worth a try, but I'm not going back anytime soon.

Worst of all, they were out of Orangina! Anyone know where I can get this stuff locally?

Isaiah
05-17-2007, 12:04 PM
Originally posted by phreezee

Worst of all, they were out of Orangina! Anyone know where I can get this stuff locally?
Any italian supermarket stocks it. Lina's on Centre St, or Scarpone's by the mail processing plant.

phreezee
05-22-2007, 11:05 PM
Originally posted by Isaiah

Any italian supermarket stocks it. Lina's on Centre St, or Scarpone's by the mail processing plant.

WOW, thanks for the tip! I'm there! I got hooked on this stuff after trying it for the first time in a Paris subway station, weird cause in Rome all they had was Fanta everywhere.

Isaiah
05-23-2007, 03:01 AM
If you're downtown, you can also stop by Mercato on 4th St.

chefgirl
01-23-2008, 12:12 AM
Rebekah has never worked as a Pastry Chef. Red Velvet Cake and chocolate cakes come straight from Martha Stewart.

98type_r
01-23-2008, 12:58 AM
Originally posted by chefgirl
Rebekah has never worked as a Pastry Chef. Red Velvet Cake and chocolate cakes come straight from Martha Stewart.
:drama:

shawtie
01-23-2008, 01:15 AM
:drool: Hungry now :(

spyce
01-23-2008, 12:18 PM
Sounds interesting. Always thought a good decently late nite dessert place would be cool to go to

We definitely give it a try some time soon

avow
01-25-2008, 05:26 PM
damn it. i was going to go there tonight with some friends but now i read on their website that they are closed in half an hour for a privet function for the rest of the night.... who the fuck closes at 5 on a friday, thats so gay.

icecreamvan
01-25-2008, 06:06 PM
Originally posted by chefgirl
Rebekah has never worked as a Pastry Chef. Red Velvet Cake and chocolate cakes come straight from Martha Stewart.


chefgirl
Newbie

Registered: Jan 2008

OooOoOo chef catfight. Meow!

avow
01-30-2008, 01:26 PM
alright, i am going to try this place again on friday. see how this works out :banghead:

kiteflyer
02-09-2008, 08:15 PM
I am going to Nectar for my birthday with two other people. We'll probably get 3 or 4 desserts and share them. What should a person eat for supper before, or does the dessert work as supper in itself? Thanks!

dragonone
02-10-2008, 12:24 AM
the cakes were pretty good, to my liking anyways

the $12 desserts were a litttle small ie. cream on cream was the size of 2 2/3 scoops + strawberries

it was good, but maybe i don't know how to appreciate food of this sort. girls dig it tho, the atmosphere, maybe even the price lol
i guess i'm more the big apple crumbler with vanilla ice cream guy

TimG
09-16-2008, 08:42 AM
Food - 6-7/10 - "ok"
Ambiance - 9/10 - very good
Service - 9/10 - very fast and courteous
Value - 5/10 - overpriced

me: red velvet cake
wife: chocolate malt cake
both: americanos

after hearing all the hype about this place we decided to head down there on saturday.

From the first bite you can tell that the ingredients were all fresh and high quality. That being said, neither of us could finish our cakes. the icing on my cake was sickly sweet and the chocolate malt cake had a very odd taste.. the flavours really didn't seem to work well together. i was expecting a LOT more for the price.

The americanos were also below average. it's like they had a bad filter on the espresso machine and the coffee ground made it thru and into the drinks; there was a film/residue on the inside of the cups and the drink overall was bitter. I've had better americanos at starbucks.

The atmosphere and decor was great, but we definately won't be going back there anytime soon.