Faubourg

I remember before all my finals and leaving Vancouver for Christmas, I spent my last "free time" in Kerrisdale and randomly saw a cute, little cafe along 41st Ave., next to Asa Sushi. Maybe because it was new, this small cafe was packed with people eating, drinking, chatting, and, standing waiting for tables.

During one weekend, when I was (always) having a hard time deciding where to go for lunch, my friend, EU, brought "Faubourg" back to my mind.

Faubourg ("fo-boor")?.....What is it?


Faubourg
2156 W 41st Ave, Vancouver BC

"Fauburg is an ancient term meaning a quarter or 'suburb' jsut outside the gates of a French city. Growth saw faubourgs enfolded within city walls and many streets still retain their old names. Therefore each Faubourg relates to a chapter of Paris history."

Ratings (Lowest-1 Highest-5)

Food: 4 (Haven't tried their bistro though)
Price: 4.5
Service: 2
Ambiance: 5
Overall: 4.5

• 7am-7pm
  Breakfast (M-F) 8am-11am
  Lunch (M-F) 12pm-2pm
  Brunch (Weedends) 9am-3pm
• They also have high-tea/afternoon tea now.
  (M-F) 12pm-5pm
  (Weekends) 2pm-5pm
• Famous for their breads, which are made using traditional French recipes.
  You can always see people coming in and buy loaves of bread :)
• They have 5 baking times: 8am, 10am, 11am, 2pm, and 5pm.
• The picture above is only the coffee shop part, with the pastries and breads on the left-hand side. Behind that is the bistro part, which have about 10-15 seats I think.
  You can find the menus on their web here.
• There are quite a lot of servers in the coffee shop...but that what causes the trouble. You lineup. Ordered. Went to pay, but since there are too many orders and too many servers, mistakes happened.
• Basically, I will say they have "everything": sandwiches, pastries, desserts, drinks, and bistro. Given that wide selection of foods in such a small location, I am quite impressed by Faubourg ;)
• Other than food, they also have drinks. However, they do not have a lot of tea choices; they have latte, brewed coffee, mocha, espresso...etc etc.

Mediterranean Grill Panini-3.5/6

• $4.80
• You can either choose 1/2 or whole. (The above picture is a 1/2 order.)

• It has spinach, tomatoes, some olives, onions, and feta.
• The inner surfaces of the bread are flavoured with some vinegar. I could taste it right away in my first bite :)
• My server asked me whether I wanted to have my panini grilled. Of course, I did but disappointedly, the panini didn't look/taste it had been grilled. Grilled marks? No. Lukewarm? Hmm...not really.
  Maybe because of that, the bread is quite hard and tough to cut.
• Forget the bread. The ingredients are fresh and tasty, but if they can add a little more ingredients to the panini, it will be perfect.

Ham & Cheese Panini

• $4.80
• Contains ham, cheese, and asparagus.
• When I saw four long green asparagus are included in EU's panini, I couldn't help but smile. :) First, the presentation is cute. Second, I like to see when restaurants give you the exact and enough ingredients you see on their descriptions.

After the paninis, EU did not wait and went straight to the desserts. Anyhow, DESSERTS are her main purpose to come here :P Even though I'm sick, I still decided to give their Lemon Tart a try. (Yes, have I ever mentioned that I am a citrus-dessert fan? :D)

Lemon Tart-5/6

• $5
• Simple. I am sure you already know what it is without any description haha.
• Just when I wanted to dig in and cut through the lemon filling, I got...ahem, "stuck". Why? It's because the base is way too hard! I couldn't cut it with a fork nor a spoon.
  So, I began eating the top and waited for the base to cool-down a bit...

• Finally! The white bottom part is the vanilla foam, which actually tastes like egg white. The yellow part is the zesty lemon filling, of course. It is very tart. I like it very much :) It is also very dense and smooth.
• The small white cubes on the edge are sugar, to balance out the pungent flavour of the lemon.

Matcha Raspberry Mille Feuille (Napoleon)

• $5
• There is also another napoleon in store: with lemon and raspberry instead of with matcha.

• I tried both the matcha and raspberry creme. Maybe because I had my dessert first, I couldn't really taste what they taste like.
• At first, EU and I thought napoleon would be crispy but the one here is different! It is "soft", not as soft as marshmellow, but you can gently use your spoon to break the napoleon into parts. What a huge difference to my Lemon Tart :/g

Before we left, I got myself a cup of hot Faubourg Brewed Coffee and EU got a cup of non-fat Mocha (both are not pictured, oops!). The hot coffee is great, I like it a lot. EU also enjoyed her cup of mocha and the white layer of foam on top......while she shared her "mocha experiences" with me......

Okay, done with the food. I just want to explain why I have stopped updating my blog in the past few months. The reason is...well, school work. This year is a new beginning for me, and the workload just keeps increasing and increasing and increasing......
However, I am still passionate about food blogging; bringing my camera and taking food photos are just too fun to forget! :) So, please bear with me....drop in sometime or you can follow my twitter for new updates) THANKSSSS!! :DD