Zoë Café

It was a surprise. The presentation of the cake and pastries is awesome. Each cake is delicately decorated. The taste is unforgettable. Although the cake and pastries are pricey, ranging from $ 40 and up for each, but they are well worth it. Definitely we walked away like spoiled customers.

Zoe Café, located near Times Square, is another one of those little shops serving artisanal cakes and pastries. My mother and I went there the other day at around 9pm, hoping to get some dessert before heading home.
The café is in sort of a weird location — it’s opposite the Canal Road Flyover, kind of close to the market — not the fanciest place for an upscale cake shop like this. It used to be near Lee Gardens, which is a far more fitting location but obviously also much more expensive to rent. Anyway, the café is pretty big and there were no customers when we went in. The interior of the café is bright and very clean-​looking — there isn’t much color; everything is white or a pastel color.
We were informed that there was a $ 50 minimum charge per person, which if we each order a cake and a drink is doable. Before coming here, I was thinking of just getting one drink and two cakes to share between the two of us, but that was out of the question with the minimum charge rule in place. Eventually, we settled on the double decker chocolate cake and the mango cheesecake, and two hot lattes.
The double decker cake had a very rich blend of chocolate and hazelnut, though I thought it was a little sweet for me. I loved the mango cheesecake — there are little balls of mango on top and they taste really sweet and fresh, and the cheesecake itself is creamy and refreshing. The base of the cake is crunchy and tastes a bit like a cookie, which added a very nice touch to the cake overall. The lattes were very good as well — rich and served piping hot.
While the cakes and coffee here are good, I feel they are very overpriced. The cakes are $ 38 and are so small I could easily finish each in a minute, and the latte (I forgot how much this was) was one of the smallest lattes I’d ever drank! If I’m not wrong, there was a 10% service charge too.
Unfortunately, I don’t think the quality of the food, which no doubt is high, is able to justify the high cost of it. If I’m ever back, it’ll only be because I’m feeling extra special and deserving that day, and I will be taking away my cake instead of eating in.