Nothing is better than having a nice cup of tea in the afternoon and something sweet, especially when you are having a stressful day at work. Enter Luv Cravings. Unfortunately for me, they’re about a 5 minute walk from my office, so I am a frequent visitor. Luv Cravings is a small café and dessert shop in the Olympic Village area of Vancouver. They offer almost 100 different types of loose leaf teas and delicious in-house made desserts. I am also INLOVE with their tea lids. Seriously, a filter built into the lid! What a good idea, no more soggy cups from drippy tea bags. A large cup of tea with tax will run you $ 3.41. Which isn’t too bad for a cup of loose leaf tea. It’s probably more than Starbucks, but you are getting premium loose leaf tea and you’re supporting a small business! In addition to coffee and teas, Luv Cravings offers a variety of cupcakes in regular and bite sizes. I love their bite size cupcakes because you can try a few different flavours or get something small to get you through your sugar craving for the day. Their regular sized cupcake is smaller than what you’ll get at a place like The Original Cupcakes but they do taste great and I like that they are not overly sweet. They are also made in small batches, so you know they’re fresh. My favourite flavours are: Chocolate Hangover (chocolate stout beer cupcake with beer flavoured cream cheese frosting) and Cookies Extreme (chocolate cake atop a chocolate sandwich cookie, with cookies ‘n cream frosting, crowned with a second chocolate sandwich cookie) They also offer a wide variety of cakes and other desserts. Check out this cute heart shaped chocolate truffle mousse cake! Yumm. Luv Cravings is worth your visit if you are in the Olympic Village area! So, stop by and grab a tea and a cupcake(or two)!
Peony L.
Place rating: 3 Vancouver, Canada
The interior is pretty nice and the atmosphere is really nice and quite. I had the New York cheesecake and it’s not too bad. However when you get to the outer end of the cake, it’s super hard and it just taste like bread Lol
Shila B.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
I saw this page on the front page of Unilocal on July 20, 2014 and based on the awesome pictures I had to come here. It’s close to the King George Skytrain station. Firstly I love the name of this place«Luv Cravings» it is almost as though it is giving me permission to give into my cravings. They have really good cupcakes. The cake itself is not too sweet which balances with the frosting. I appreciate cupcakes that don’t give me a cavity assault. I got two different mini’s to save on the calories, money and to sample. The green tea cupcake = awesome. Rose lychee cupcake had a balance flavor of both. Lychee as a flavor has a habit of washing away against the batter, however, this managed to showcase both incredible flavors. The ambiance is black with pink, lots of space and large tables. It was very quiet inside which was perfect for studying and spacing out my books. They serve loose leaf tea, however, rather than putting the tea in a fabric bag the lid sipper acts as a filter. I’ve never seen tea cups like these before. The hours are very accessible 7 days a week open late. Note to self, they don’t have artificial sweeteners for your tea but then again if you’re coming here for sweets = game over anyway. a tsp of sugar at this point wouldn’t matter. The downside is the customer service was terrible. The girl at the til looked as though she didn’t want to be there. She wasn’t rude, however, she seemed dis-interested in serving customers. In terms of selection it was slim. I saw pictures of macaroons, however, there was non at the shop. Disappointed. They only had a few cupcake flavors.
Aalsheha Z.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
One of my favourite spot to enjoy my time and relax. Beautiful atmosphere and super friendly staff. If you’re a fan of tea, then this place has an excellent variety of teas.
M K.
Place rating: 2 New York, NY
Been here twice and it was really the 2nd visit that was the big let-down. The first visit was alright. It was quite a good experience but nothing over the impressive line. The second time I was here I decided to order a small cupcake with green tea icing and a flute cookie for decoration. Umm the flute cookie was stale; the icing wasn’t very fresh tasting either. So how long has this been sitting in the store? I mean the fridge could have been the reason why the cookie was stale but then again, maybe not. If you are looking for a dessert place, this is pretty much the only one around the King Edward area. I still think it’s an ok place to go if you can’t find anything else but nothing worth dashing to.
Kenneth N.
Place rating: 2 Vancouver, Canada
It’s a pretty store in the area, and that’s about it. Convenient for the skytrain commuters from King Edward station, only place to grab a drink or croissant, which I found were just alright; once you have Footo delight in DT by the library, everything else is second-rate lol. But less impressed with the service; 3 ppl in the lineup, and takes forever, that’s two times. Also have a private seating area for high tea, which heard was overpriced.
Susan C.
Place rating: 3 Seattle, WA
Mind you, I’m not a dessert-y person, and when everyone suggested we have dessert, I thought, «Well, there goes the calories I would’ve otherwise rolled into a cocktail.» Some crave sweets, I crave an Old Fashioned. Both will get me fat, but at least the alcohol will take off the self-loathing that follows immediately after ingestion. Found this place via Unilocal,and it was close to our hotel. It’s very Asian chic — and by this I mean the funky, hip décor, the clientele and the desserts. Everyone inside was Asian — quite possibly Chinese — and it was very quiet, as they were on their iPods with the headphones, or playing games on their cell phones. The desserts were just OK. My friends had a cheesecake doused in butterscotch-y syrup and I got a matcha and blueberry macaroons thinking they would not be *that* fattening. I was wrong. These things packed a very sweet punch, as the«jam» in the middle was extremely sweet. The flavor was good, especially the matcha, but just wasn’t my thing. The coffee drinks were fine — latte, cappuccino. My Caucasian friend(the only one in the place) was also overwhelmed by the Asianess of it all, but she probably just needed a big Hello Kitty hug… Rather forgettable experience. And bitter, since I had to forgo the alcohol for this.
Joy P.
Place rating: 3 Richmond, Canada
Been looking for a dessert place that opens late since most dessert places in vancouver closes at 6pm(dnt know why since thats dinner time). What Ive ordered: Lemon Macarons: — not too tangy which i like — chewy cookie and i dont think the filling was buttercream — not bad i like Heavenly Hummingbird Cupcake: — i think thats what its called i remember theres the word«heavenly» in it — coconut banana bread cupcake with a pineapple cream cheese frosting. I couldnt figure out if the pineapple flavor was in the cake or the frosting — really good and different Earl Grey Latte: — was OK, i could make this at home Mucho Matcha Cupcake: — totally taste the matcha — not too sweet PRO: — they have nights that they open until midnight which is PERFECT — very cozy place, free wifi, friendly service CON — not much cake choices i think — they specialize more on teas — a bit pricey — cupcake were a bit dry OVERRALL; — ill probably come here again if all the dessert places are closed.
P C.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
Came here with 3 friends after dinner as we needed something sweet to finish off our spicy meal. Thanks to Unilocal I found out this place is open late on a Thursday night — perfect. One of us is a die hard crème brulée fan so he was sold when he saw one of the pics on Unilocal. Upon coming through the door, we already noticed this is a total date place: two couples on opposite sides of the café. I guess the name of the place, «LuvCravings» kind of gives it that vibe too. What impressed me was their selection of loose leaf teas and you can choose to have it in a cup or a pot. You can take a whiff at each of the sample tea cans to find the one you like. There were no Crème brulée in the pastry shelf, but there were cupcakes and sliced cakes, and tiramisu. I was hoping for more selection, but their Chocolate Raspberry cake was not bad. The Provence loose leaf tea I chose was fragrant with a sweet scent. It seems like my friends really liked the drinks they ordered. The Italian strawberry soda was the bomb, according to the younger brother of my friend. She ordered the iced red tea latte(decaf) and she really liked it too. I think I may come back again and hopefully there will be more desserts to choose from next time. :)
Kitty Z.
Place rating: 3 Toronto, Canada
The first time I come here. How to say it. Free wifi, high tea & when you’re lugging furniture, they open the door for you! The food is good for me. They looks delicious. But the price is too expensive. How adorable is this spot?! I’m getting in there with a solid 3.5 stars on first impressions, namely because they have a great selection of kitschy tea pots that ALL seemed to be on-sale. A tea set for $ 34?
Rie N.
Place rating: 3 Vancouver, Canada
very catchy décor. i feel like i’m at a nightclub/lounge instead of a cake shop! I guess it’s not a bad thing… Cakes and cupcakes are pretty good ! A bit too sweet for me, but I like how the selection of the tea section is huge, i can smell the tea leaf before deciding which tea to get…:D
Andrew S.
Place rating: 3 Vancouver, Canada
This place is pretty big as there’s more seating in the back. The front has seats along the wall and a couple in the middle so there’s room to walk around. The tea and coffee were good, but I guess I expected it to be a little better as they have a big selection of tea and are a coffee/tea/bakery shop. I had the Red Americano which was rich and flavourful. My friend and I also ordered their Red Velvet cake and Lychee cupcake. The Red Velvet cake was dense, and not fluffy which was surprising. Usually cakes are light and fluffy, especially red velvet cake. The lychee cupcake was good and lighter than the cake but for the price($ 3.50), I was expecting more. Ok I’m not hard to please but when you go to a coffee/tea & bakery shop, one expects to have reasonable and good food. Hopefully the next time I go, it’ll have lighter and fluffier cakes and cupcakes.
Rosalind W.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
Lovely quaint café. Warm and welcoming ambiance. Staff are nice and helpful Desserts are delicious and so are the London fog & red tea latè
Julie L.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
Yuzu Yeow. Yuzu Yeow. Yuzu Yeow. Yuzu, as was explained to me, is a Korean citrus fruit, which tastes like a mix of grapefruit and mandarin. There were bits of this tangy fruit in my Yuzu Yeow cupcake. The couple of chunks I tasted seemed to be bits of really good handmade fruit gelee mixed into the batter. The citrusy flavour of the cake and the buttercream frosting on top, well… it’s just the best combination ever. I could eat a bowl of their buttercream frosting; not too sugary and not too buttery. I was getting bored of cupcakes until I tasted this one. But it was expe.n.sive. More than $ 7 for a cupcake and fruit tea. Ouch!
Jody B.
Place rating: 3 Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Free wifi, high tea & when you’re lugging furniture, they open the door for you! I popped into this little spot for a cupcake break during my LONG six block trek from skytrain to home(oh shush, I was carting luggage! In heels!). How adorable is this spot?! I’m getting in there with a solid 3.5 stars on first impressions, namely because they have a great selection of kitschy tea pots that ALL seemed to be on-sale. A tea set for $ 34? Yup. Yup i’ll be back.
Annie M.
Place rating: 4 Vancouver, Canada
Nice and decent coffee shop on Cambie & King Edwards. I was finished lunch at Copa Café and walked out there then saw this shop on my way return to my car. It so new and special, my curiosity forced me to check it out. When I walked in, I checked out every single corner coz I like the nice table n chairs at the back and décor. They have some bakeries(cupcakes, croissants, sandwiches) and ton of tea/coffee to choose and they have large area for you to relax/enjoy the coffee. I high recommend the Belgium hot chocolate made from real chocolate, fascistic! Definitely will return to try other beverages.
Vikki K.
Place rating: 4 Seattle, WA
Clean, comfortable seating area. They have a generous offering of teas, cupcakes, desserts, etc. Tried a couple items: Oolong Latte —(Yes, oolong!) The oolong tea aroma comes through but does not overpower the drink. Lightly sweetened and topped off with a frothy milk cap: 4 stars. Tantalizing Taro Cupcake — one of their specials that changes periodically. Nice, light taro flavor throughout with a denser, but smooth and moist cupcake. The frosting was a little sweet on its own — but that’s why you eat it together with the cake: 4 stars. They are still going through a soft opening, so I am curious to see how they grow in the future!
Christopher F.
Place rating: 5 Vancouver, Canada
The quality of the pastries is outstanding. You can taste the natural ingredients. The sandwiches, coffees and teas are wonderful too. Plus it’s a comfortable and relaxing setting. Don’t miss this place.
Vera N.
Place rating: 4 Kensington-Cedar Cottage, Vancouver, Canada
Love tea? Love Coffee? Love desserts? then this is the place for you! Love that they have over 80 types of loose tea to choose from! Tea lattes and hot chocolate were really good as well! U can order separately or get a Combo! A cupcake and drink came up to just $ 5! It’s a very nice place to hang out with friends over tea or coffee or desserts! Lots of seating and very conveniently located!(right across the Cambie skytrain station). Lots of free parking around as well! Been going back almost every other day! And will definitely go back!
Megan P.
Place rating: 2 Vancouver, Canada
It was just ok. The cupcakes were about 1.5″ in diameter and cost $ 3.50. They were tasty and I don’t mind the cost, but they should be 3x the size for that price. The coffee was mediocre. If it was better they could make a killing, considering how close they are to the King Edward skytrain station. Needless to say I felt a bit ripped off and am not in a hurry to return.