Just Opened: Sweet Flour Bake Shop

Just Opened: Sweet Flour Bake Shop

Where the magic happens: Sweet Flour Bake Shop, in Bloor West Village, offers instantly cooling cookies, made to order

Kim Gans, the owner of Sweet Flour Bake Shop, is not from around here. We don’t just mean that she’s from Cleveland (she is); we mean she’s from a wonderland where cookies defy the laws of physics and take just two minutes to reach a state of gooey goodness. Gans brought her desserts to Bloor West Village in the spring when she opened Sweet Flour Bake Shop, a café-style bakery where fresh cookies are made to order. Customers pick from over 20 mix-ins (sprinkles, figs, mini-pretzels, etc.) and from three fast-cooking doughs (peanut butter, plain, oatmeal). Wait two minutes, and then the cookie ($2.50) is laid on the “frost top,” which instantly takes the piping-hot treat down to an edible temperature.

Also available: Stumpless muffins (Photo by Catherine Hayday)

Also on offer are cookie sandwiches ($2.25)—two thin, crisp cookies stuck together with a dollop of sweet spread—and a wide selection of pre-made cookies bearing such cheeky names as the Daily Grind (chocolate-cappuccino toffee). Or skip the formalities and go with a straight-up shot of cookie dough (75 cents). The make-your-own format is attracting everyone from purists (who add only chocolate chips) to the guy who tried to make the Epic Cookie: two custom cookies, three ingredients each, plus a spread in between, dough on the side and a milk chaser.

The mix-ins (Photo by Catherine Hayday)

Gans’s background is in product development at General Mills (having made cookies her business, she gets to say things like “ice cream is a competitor”), and her professional cred gives Sweet Flour polish. The place just opened in the spring, but people coming in off the street assume Sweet Flour is a franchise because of its effortless finesse. This is not a business headed to the nearest mall; Gans is determined to keep Sweet Flour community-centric.

Peak hours at Sweet Flour are the after-school and mid-stroll rushes (2-5 p.m.), but good coffee (I Deal), free Wi-Fi, stroller-friendly table spacing and a breakfast menu (steel-cut oatmeal $3.75, yogurt parfait $5) are solid reasons to spend all day in a cookie shop.

Sweet Flour Bake Shop, 2352 Bloor St. W. (at Windermere St.), 416-763-2253, sweetflour.ca.