Weets Eats: The Alley Luxe hits the sweet spot
One of the newest bubble tea players to enter Singapore, The Alley from Taiwan has upped its game. It has expanded into a cafe at its latest outlet at Cineleisure Orchard.
It opens on Saturday and is named The Alley Luxe. It will be the first outlet in the world to serve an array of pastries alongside its drinks.
There is a lot of window space and light for that drink-in-hand selfie, and plain walls to make sure your product pictures pop.
Just please do it quickly and let others have their chance too.
But I do understand the appeal, especially with the signature Brown Sugar Deerioca Fresh Milk ($5.30). Perhaps it is because I have been cutting back on sugar, but the first time I tasted the drink, it was nirvana.
There are so many of these brown sugar drinks available, and this is one of two that I will gladly break my sugar fast for.
I was afraid of the Snow Strawberry Lulu ($6.30) because it looked too sweet. I think it was the pinkness of the drink. But it was refreshing and that layer of cream took the edge off the sweetness. It is an indulgent drink, but great on a muggy day.
Now that cruffins are the hot new pastry, it is not a stretch that a youth-centric cafe would serve it. They go for $5 here, but hey, being trendy is expensive.
The big surprise was that it was actually quite tasty. I really liked the lemon curd meringue version because while it was sweet, the tang gave it dimension.
The kaya version was good too. The kaya was not on the level of the one at Violet Oon Singapore or Antoinette, but it was decent.
A lot of the stuff at The Alley Luxe is sweet. When the drinks and the food are mostly sweet, it becomes too much.
So the savoury gourmet sausage cheese croissant ($5.80) was a welcome change.
It is made with Johnsonville smoked bratwurst and is infused with mozzarella and cheddar cheese, plus wholegrain mustard sauce, and this gives each bite hints of saltiness and umami.
I tried eating the croissant with the sweet (and so pretty) Northern Lights ($8.80) drink, and the balance made me appreciate both items more.
Nothing annoys me more than a dry scone, and the cheddar cheese scone ($3.50) was like parchment. But I could not stop nibbling on it because I needed some savoury counterpoint.
Perhaps a blob of butter would have made ir better.
Hopefully when the full menu is introduced, there will be a balance. Sweet on sweet may appeal to a group of people, but a lot of us still want some variety.
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