40 Days of Starbucks Alternatives

Anyone who knows me now, can attest to the fact that I am a Starbucks addict. My addiction started about five years ago and only worsened once a drive through was opened less then 10 minutes from my house. What would surprise many people is the fact that A) I don't really drink coffee (maybe 5 cups of coffee per year) B) I don't drink many espresso beverages (maybe 30 lattes per year) and C) I used to hate Starbucks.

Yup it’s true, the Starbucks addict once hated the brand that has become the elixir of life. It started back when I was at Niagara College and my friend Brittney and I would drive to Starbucks every day. Initially it was her choice, but soon I was enjoying the beverages just as much as she was. When I moved back home my Starbucks habit continued and I was making multiple trips a week for my fix. My go-to drink is a non-fat no-water chai latte… I find this comforting, warm and just my happy place. At Christmas I LOVE an occasional ristretto, half-caf all Egg Nog latte and this year became addicted to the Chai Nog latte which was a combination of Chai and Egg Nog. In the spring my favorite indulgence has been the Mocha Coconut Frapp (which hasn’t come back this year) or the caramel flan latte. In the fall I will have an occasional salted caramel mocha or a caramel apple spice, and often for breakfasts a strawberry protein smoothie. I wasn’t kidding about the addiction…. Just writing this post makes me want Starbucks!

My addiction was so crazy earlier this year that when my goddaughter brought up Lent, I knew I needed to prove to myself – and everyone else – that I could take a 6 week break from Starbucks. It was hard - especially since Brian and I drove down to Maryland during that time – but it was a success!

I made it into a fun challenge to step outside my Starbucks zone and try other café alternatives. Fun fact…. The Pickering/Ajax area has a number of cafes that I didn’t even know existed until recently.

Here are a few of my notes.  

Independent Canadian Places

Queen Beans (Port Perry): The hot chocolate wasn't memorable – it tasted like cheap powder mixed with some milk. They also had a strange concept of chai latte as they talked about it being a cup of chai tea mixed with a little milk. I dumped both out.

Piano Cafe (Port Perry): While I didn’t really enjoy the food they made an excellent chai latte. It reminded me of a café I used to work at that made amazing chai lattes. I will definitely be coming back here for drinks! 

Ray's Café (Pickering): Very cool atmosphere and they made an awesome chai latte. Tasted rich and had the hint of spice that I enjoy. I will go back here and try some of their other drinks.

Debbie’s Boutique Café (Ajax): I liked this place a lot. Not only did they have board games you could play, but they also had a great drink/desert menu. The hot chocolate was really good, but I didn’t really like the lattes – a little too sugary sweet for me. This is a must-return too and the staff are super friendly as well.

Canadian/American Chains

Panera: Their chai latte is just okay. Not good but not horrible.

McDonald's: Excellent hot chocolate, it tastes very rich and yummy. Their Mocha is also good but according to Brian it’s “recipe driven but with no heart”. I don’t know what a heartless mocha tastes like, but apparently Brian does and McDonalds makes one.   

American Chains & Independent Locations  

Caffe Bean: Makimono meets Starbucks. Very Asian inspired in drinks and food. Mocha doesn't combine well - low quality ingredients and tastes chemical. There is a burnt coffee taste in their drinks. Aztec Hot chocolate horrible - no taste besides a super dark chocolate. Whipped cream kind of lumpy and tasteless.

Bean Hallow (Ellicott City, MD) Mocha was okay – not wroth the money, it’s better to just get coffee there. They use too much regular milk rather then steamed milk – so you end up feeling very full afterward. Nutty Irishman not what I anticipated but good. Without espresso it was a milk steamer with Irish cream and hazelnut. Tasted like Nutty Irishman drink but warm and non-alcoholic. This place was a bit pricey but their biscotti was worth it!

Little French Market (Ellicott City, MD): OMG I wish I lived closer (well of course I wish I lived closer to see Brian’s family more) but this comes in as a secondary reason. The Santa's Hat was hot chocolate with cayenne pepper and it was amazing. It has this spicy bite at the end with a lush chocolate taste. The Peppermint Chai was a vanilla chai latte with peppermint syrup, and it was incredible! vanilla chai is a bit sweeter with less spice then Starbucks and the peppermint syrup adds something nice. I may have to try this at Starbucks! Junk Girl Java – which was Brian's drink – and had a salted caramel taste after each sip. Now that moacha had heart!

Dunkin Donuts: I like their coffee but nothing else (but I fully admit I have low coffee standards). The almond hot chocolate was horrible – very watery, tasteless.

Einstein Brothers Bagels: The hazelnut hot chocolate was made with machine and tasted watery and powdered.  The Mocha was also machine made and similar to Tim Horton’s.   

Soul Full Cup Coffee House (Corning, NY) Turkish coffee was not good - used regular grind not special Turkish roasted grind. Tasted like espresso with beans left in. Hot chocolate was okay - but not anything special. I could make better at home. Service was fantastic! 

Poppelton Bakery (Corning, NY) - Sipping chocolate was incredible. Rich, delicious, and everything sipping chocolate should be.

Old world Ice Cream and Café (Corning, NY) – The mocha got a Brian shrug. It was cold and tasted just okay – apparently another heartless mocha!

Max Brenner: The Italian hot chocolate was incredible as was the white chocolate chai tea. The mocha tasted more like a hot chocolate but everything was yummy, indulgent, rich and chocolaty – just as you would expect a chocolate store to be! I adore this place and am thrilled there is one near my sister-in-laws house. I told Brian Max Brenner will be completing all of our MD trips from now on.  

All Things Christmas [Part Three – Various Traditions]

In addition to the Festival of Lights, I have a few annual Christmas traditions which add a lot of love and fun to the holidays. Isn't that really what the season is all about? Spending time and making memories with those we love? 

Shopping with Nanny: Up until I was 7 years old, my dad would take Adam and I shopping for our mom. Each shopping trip followed the same pattern – go to the mall, hit the main box store (Sears, Zellers or The Bay), go to housewares, pick up a pot or something kitchen related, buy it, then head to an electronic store to look at the remote control products. I was against this for a number of reasons – First, mom didn’t even like to cook. Secondly, I hated remote controlled anything. And third, I wanted to look around and find the perfect gift. I don’t know exactly how it happened but I eventually complained to Nanny about the injustice of it all and from then on she would take me shopping. I treasured these Nanny-Chantal trips as we would spend hours at the mall going from store to store. She never rushed me and put up with my obsessive need to keep looking (usually only to go back and buy the first thing I saw) and we would usually stop and have lunch or pie at Gallentry’s (man, I miss that place!). Once I was older I tended to shop more on my own, but every Christmas there is at least one day that we go shopping together. Usually Mom and/or Aunt Honey join us, but the fact remains its still our tradition and has always been “our” thing! (Eventually Dad and Adam stopped with the kitchen-related gifts and began actually picking out things mom would actually want/enjoy!)

Christmas Shopping with my Brother: While on the topic of shopping traditions this is another one I have. Adam and I are very different. That’s not to say we don’t get along but we don’t really have many similar hobbies or interests. A few years back we started spending one day together at Christmas and shopping for our parents. A few times these shopping trips resulted in brother-sister arguments over what to get them (the worst one being when we both refused to budge and my dad ended up with a monkey table and a wine holder) and more often then not they ended with older sister picking up the tab amid promises of “I’ll pay you back later!” Regardless of all that, they are moments that will always have a special place in my heart because it was just us.    

This was what Adam ended up getting Dad the year we had a huge argument over gifts. I personally hated this thing and still do, but Dad loves him.  

Cookie Baking with Amanda: For about the last 6-7 years Amanda and I have gotten together to spend a day baking. She makes her usual short bread cut outs and I usually make something else – this year it was my Nutella cookies. We spend the day hanging out in yoga pants, drinking wine, eating some incredibly bad for you-yet-delicious take out and being silly. A few years back she gave me these ABC gingerbread men cutters (Already Been Chewed) and someone else bought me a set of Ninja Gingerbread Men ones. Most years our cookies end up being a strange mix of traditional and silly. This year Amanda confessed that she absolutely hates baking these cookies, and only does because it’s our tradition. That’s definitely a sign of a true best friend! 

Distillery District Christmas Market: For the last few years Brian and I have been going downtown for this. It’s Toronto’s version of the European Christmas Markets with little booths set up selling handmade products/edibles and various food/drink vendors. We’ve always gone on the weekends and it’s been packed with swarms of people – couples, friends, families – it’s become a huge tourist attraction. This year was by far the worst. I don’t know if its because we went closer to Christmas or because it was a Saturday night – but either way it was chaos. The booths are all full of interesting and unique items but the prices are often insane so we don’t tend to spend a lot of time looking at them anymore. Usually we only visit the beer gardens to have a quick drink or sample something (the Cider and Mulled Wine being my favorites) and go elsewhere for food but this time we decided to eat there. That was an adventure in itself! We each had a traditional sausage and shared some fancy poutine – both of which were good albeit over priced. Then Brian spied these huge Turkey legs and wanted one as well. We waited in the 30 minute line up only to realize it was the only booth that didn’t take debit. Brian ran off to find an ATM and I remained in line letting people go ahead of me. I think there were about 5-7 people who didn’t realize I was in line and letting people go ahead of me, and these people started throwing fits that I was “budding in” – That was fun. Meanwhile Brian went to the 4 ATMs on-site only to find them ALL out of money and he ended up having to leave the site and find a bank. He had been gone about 50 minutes and was just heading back when the booth announced they were down to their last 10 turkey legs. At this point I pulled out an American $20 and used that to secure one of the 10. This sucked for me as it was taken on par, at a time when the US dollar was much higher then ours. But Brian got his turkey leg – which unfortunately looked a lot better then it tasted! We didn’t stay much longer after that. The crowds were making it impossible to move and it just wasn’t as fun as it had been. Next year we will go back but we will make sure to go earlier when they first open – and we will probably go back to eating elsewhere. Still its a fun tradition that we have. 

The beautiful Christmas Tree! 

The end result of the Turkey Leg Drama 

One of the cute booths - this reminded me of the market in Budapest where I bought a bunch of handmade products as souvenirs. 

A collage from last year's market! 

Christmas Light Drives: I love driving around the area and checking out all the amazing Christmas light displays. It’s a fun way to spend the evening – sipping a candy cane hot chocolate and seeing all the bright lights. The brighter and crazier the better is my motto. Brian is much more into the traditional décor – white lights, classic and simple – but I love seeing the various colors and the whimsical decorations and absolutely love the over-the-top houses. I've already told him that when we have a house of our own I'll have dad send him out of town for "work" around Christmas and when he returns our house will look something like these! This year I found the show "The Great Christmas Light Fight" which quickly became my new favourite holiday TV Show! 

On the topic of Holiday drinks - I did find a new favourite at my beloved Starbucks - a Chai-Nog Latte. Basically it's a chai tea latte made with egg nog instead of milk. WOW! It's pretty much the most amazing drink I have ever tasted and made some of my holiday traditions extra special.  

Gingerbread House Decorating: This was a new tradition Brian and I started this year. I had actually never decorated a Gingerbread House and wanted to give it a try. We wanted to actually bake our own houses but no matter how hard I searched I couldn’t find the cookie cuter set that would make that possible, so we settled on a kit from the store. We each got a house and spent an afternoon gathering up supplies from the Bulk Candy store. I managed to find one of the rare stores in the area that carried Necco wafers as according to Brian they are a crucial element to Gingerbread roofing. Looking back, I took this way too seriously. I think because it was my first time doing it I was both overwhelmed and hit with the desire to make the perfect house. I am a little ashamed to admit this but I re-roofed my house 4 times! Once I managed to let it go a bit, I had a lot more fun. Brian’s house was a bit more traditional – he did the Necco roof and made it very simple with a bit of candy mixed in. Mine however was a bit over the top and became a house worthy of being a palace in the Candyland Realm!

I learned a lot from this attempt and will definitely give it a try next Christmas. One main thing I will keep in mind is that sometimes less is more!   

My Candy Palace! 

Brian's traditional house!

Watching Sappy Christmas Movies: Sappy Christmas Movies are my guilty pleasure. I spend all of Nov/Dec searching the TV guide and taping movie after movie. Often Dad and I watch them together – or at the very least discuss which ones we have seen. While there are ones that air year after year, there always seems an abundance of news ones to choose from. The Hallmark Channel isn’t something we get here, so usually we are a year behind in terms of those Holiday movies. But the W network and Showcase always have a great selection. Of all the movies I saw for the first time this season, the following were my favourites:

The Christmas Shepherd, Window Wonderland, Christmas Hope, Christmas at Cartwrights and The Christmas Ornament. Of course I also have a list of ones I watch year after year like The Sound of Music and Love Actually.

Pottery Painting: A few years ago I took Paige to a local paint-your-own-pottery studio so that she could make some Christmas gifts for her parents. Now it’s become a tradition that we do annually. This year we tried a new place that is closer to where I live – The Clay Emporium. I am so glad I found this place! While I liked where we used to go, I much prefer this place. Not only is it closer, but it is much larger and better laid out. The tables/chairs are more comfortable and the selection of pieces and colours is much better. Over the past few years we are joined by other family/friends - this year it was Paige, Amanda, Nanny and myself. I am not really the most artistic person but I love pottery painting! It is such a fun activity and an opportunity to be a little bit creative. This year Paige painted a beautiful mug for her dad and a purse bank for her mom. I did a mug (it didn’t turn out how I planned) and a trinket box for Paige. Nanny made a vase and Amanda did a mug and Christmas ornament.

Overall it was another wonderful Christmas season filled with some amazing and fun times. I really am blessed to have such great family and friends to share the holidays with.

Me and my Godmother!

The Scottish song that we sing every Christmas Eve - "You Canny Shove Your Granny Off a Bus"

Christmas Themed Girls Night 

Pappy and his Granddaughters!

The History of our Backyard

When I was 16 years old, my family moved from the house I had grown up in to a house my dad designed and built. It was his dream house, and all of us were excited; especially me in terms of the amazing bedroom I was getting. It was a 16 year olds dream – walk in closet, my own bathroom, a gas fireplace and due to fire regulations, a balcony. Looking back, if someone had told me then that 12 years later I’d still be living in this house – now with my husband – I would have laughed. I am proof that life doesn’t always take the course one plans!

The house we moved into in 2001

While the new house had a lot of exciting features, I was disappointed about leaving my friends (who the majority were within walking distance), no longer being able to walk to school (it was directly behind our house) and most of all, leaving our backyard. Our house had the most amazing backyard! It was a corner lot that backed on to the school property – which meant no neighbors, it had a large deck where we had numerous summer parties, a large grassy area which was awesome for badminton and games, and best of all an incredible pool. The pool went in when I was around 5 years old, and was used almost daily in the summer. Growing up, my house was the place to be in the summer as my friends were always dropping in, and I was having get together and parties. Family was over often, and Adam, Mom and I spent every nice day outside and in the pool. According to my dad now, “The pool was never used!” but he’s completely wrong. He hardly used it (as he isn’t a strong swimmer and worked a lot), but the three of us did.

So though the new house was a dream come true, the backyard left little to be desired. There was hardly any grass in the backyard instead it was full of bins and electrical material. There were these beautiful old trees everywhere, but a few were rotting and the surrounding area was a mess. Over the course of the next few years, this only got worse. More electrical materials started arriving and piling up, along with bricks and stones (for eventual use). Our driveway was paved a few years later, and that just added a large strip of asphalt instead of all the rocks and pebbles that used to be there. It was such an eyesore that our neighbors once nicely requested we make an effort to do something, or else they would get the town involved. (I spent hours searching for old photos, but haven’t been able to find any. Likely because it was so hideous I didn’t bother taking any!)

This was actually clean! 

Eventually a garage was built at the back, but this didn’t change much. Now there was just another structure back there, with more mess. At this point the house next door was being used for electrical supplies as well, so no one really used any space outside the house. We essentially didn’t have a backyard instead we used my grandparents house and made use of their pool, picnic tables and grassy areas. A few years ago my dad got fed up with the backyard and decided to build an outdoor kitchen. It was mostly completed, but took up the entire backyard of our house, and over time became a place to store more junk.

A typical view!

When Brian moved in things slowly started to change.  He spent weeks laying sod, cleaning up everything, building a wall, planting a garden and making as much of the backyard livable as possible. He and dad built a shed, and worked on cleaning up the garage and finding places for all the random junk spilling out everywhere. The pizza kitchen got cleaned up as well, but since it still wasn’t completed we didn’t use it as much. I can remember only using it a handful of times which was a shame because it is a great space. 

Definite improvement! But still a long way to go!

Finally this year it was decided that it would be completed. Dad had Brian clean up the remaining mess and got a guy over to work on finishing it. Finally, we have a backyard again. While backyard of our house consists of the outdoor kitchen and garage, the property next door has grass, a garden, and a lot of amazing space. A few weeks ago we had the family over to use the pizza oven/outdoor kitchen and for the first time ever, the grass was actually used when a Frisbee game began.

It’s only taken 12 years but finally the house has a backyard, and one that we are utilizing!   

Hopefully the last little bit of trash will be gone by summers end!

Still a bit of rocks but MUCH better!

Making pizza!

It makes a good place to dance! (The back of the pizza oven has all been tiled and done in the weeks since)

The grass is being used!