Beard Papa's

Original/Vanilla Cream Puff
Matcha/Green Tea Cream Puff

Restaurant: Beard Papa's - Cream Puffs
Cuisine: Desserts/Cream Puffs

Last visited: September 4, 09

Area: Multiple/Franchise
Price Range: $10 or less

1: Poor 2: OK 3: Good 4: Very Good 5: Excellent 6: Tres Excellent!!

Food: 5 for a cream puff

Service: n/a

Ambiance: 2

Overall: 3

Additional comments:

• "World's Best Cream Puffs"
• Since 1999
• Natural ingredients
• Fresh, puff pastry made day of / filled with custard upon order
  
• Originated in Japan
• 220 calories per puff
• Light pastry puff
  
• Cream is custard-like, but not as thick or sweet
• Served not "piping hot", but room temp. or cold
  
• $1.75 per puff
  

**Recommendation: Matcha, Original/Vanilla

Almost everyone has tried a Beard Papa cream puff, and if you haven't you need to try it. The reason why it's a 5/6 is because I haven't tried it's competition, and I can certainly imagine someone coming up with a better recipe in the near future. It's only cause Beard Papa's is the first to start the cream puff craze that it's so popular. I can't compare it to other cream puffs, such as European ones, because they're different. These are lighter, almost the "healthy" version of a cream puff. They are really fresh and you can taste that the ingredients are natural, but the pastry shell could be better. I've definitely had better pastry shells before, so I know they could do better, but it's pretty darn good as is. The cream they use is the part that deserves a shout out.

Note: Don't go by the pictures you see on their website, I've never gotten that much filling.

On the table:

• **Original/Vanilla
  
• This is the original. So you have to try this first before you move on to other flavours.
  
• The cream is just so light and airy, and you don't get that greasy feeling in your mouth after you eat it. Not too sweet either, so you can eat more than one :) It is a really good vanilla flavour. They dust the top with confectioner's sugar before they serve it.
  
• **Matcha/Green Tea
  
• I like this better than the original. It's my favourite flavour. It's always sold out at the Aberdeen location (probably because it's popular to the Asian demographic) and it's only available on certain days. It's really good. They use the matcha powder to flavour it, and they put just enough so that it's not bitter, but you can obviously tell it's matcha. They also dust the top with confectioner's sugar mixed with matcha powder, which I like. It's the only cream puff I would actually crave.
  
• Chocolate
  
• This is a light chocolate - I like to call it the "Asian chocolate", where everything "chocolate" is always a subtle chocolate flavour. It's never really THAT chocolatey, so don't expect this chocolate filled cream puff to be any different - although it is made with a blend of 2 different European chocolates. It's still not that rich, decadent chocolate lovers taste though - which is good cause otherwise it would be too much.
  
• Eclair
  
• It's the original cream puff simple dipped in chocolate (just the top)
• The chocolate is just a plain chocolate - not a supreme quality or anything, just regular. It chocolate hardens onto the pastry shell as it dries, it doesn't crack into pieces when you bite into it - which I like. I'd eat it if it was there, but I wouldn't care to order it myself.
  
• Strawberry
  
• It's a fresh strawberry puree they use to flavour it. I'm not really a fan on strawberry flavour, but this is actually not to bad. I couldn't tel it was fresh strawberry puree though, I though it was powder. But they do claim "all natural" so I guess it was real strawberry puree. Just by how it looks and the texture - you wouldn't guess it was real.
  
• Mango
• I like the mango! It's probably flavoured with fresh pureed mango, but you can't tell because it's not like you get real pieces of mango or can see the bits. I like it better than strawberry, you can definitely tell it's mango cream. I'd order this again, but not as first choice.
  
• Pina Colada
• This was unexpected. I think they were just testing it out, cause I haven't seen it on the menu again. It was pretty good actually, a nice pineapple and coconut flavour. A tropical cream, it wasn't citrus tasting or anything, maybe more on the coconut side. I'd order this again too, but not as first choice.
  
• Coffee
  
• I wasn't really a fan of this. It's sweet and still bitter kind of coffee taste. It still isn't that heavy though, everything is light here - yet all the flavours are so obvious when you try them. Most of their flavours taste like what you would expect.