Delicious filled gourmet croissants @ Le Salon

It must have been my N'th atttempt to try these croissants but they were always sold out as early as 6pm in the evening.

 

 

My second last attempt they only had the Tiramisu flavour and finally on my final attempt there were lots available around 7ish in the evening.

 

I couldnt decide whether to get the caramel or the chestnut so I asked the guy at the counter if the caramel one would be really sweet, then I asked if the Chestnut one would be starchy, I think he got annoyed with me asking too many questions.

Anyway, I rarely get Chestnut products in Hong Kong, because they end up having a really sweet and starchy taste that I do not like.

In the end I got both the caramel and chestnut to try.
When I paid, I gave a $100 note but the guy asked if I had a smaller note, so I found a $50 note and gave it to him.
The cost of two croissants came to $40 so I was expecting $10 in change back, but he gave me $30 back, then I stood there for a while and he realised he only entered one croissant which explains why I have two receipts in the picture.

 

I had already had dinner so I decided to leave the Chestnut last or later because I didnt think I would like it anyway.

When I took the croissants out from the bag, I felt that they were quite oily because the croissant holder had big oil stains on it.

★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Caramel croissant:

 

The croissant was extremely flakey, it was really hard to eat it without creating a mess.

 

There was chunky flakes of sea salt on the croissant which balanced out the sweetness of the croissant.
The taste of the sea salt did not taste like the usual saltyness there was an element of unami in it and even though the pieces of sea salt were quite prominent the saltyness was not too salty.
As well as salt, most of the croissant was covered in some sort of chewy caramelized syrup which gave the croissant some chewy texture.
It reminded me of the Maltose syrup that is sandwiched in between the biscuit crackers that kids like in HK.

 

The caramel filling was still warm and the colour was a autumn golden brown and it was lovely.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
Chestnut croissant:

 

 

After finishing the caramel croissant, I was expecting to feel bloated like I do with the usual croissants because the butter/fat content is high, but I did not feel that way, so I started on the chestnut croissant.

 

The chestnut filling was delicious, it tasted how it should taste, natrual and not starchy or cloyingly sweet.
Even the colour of the chestnut filling was 'natural', there were some pieces of chestnut in it too.
The filling was quite thick and viscous.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★
As the croissants were really nice I tried the chocolate the next day.
Chocolate croissant:

 

 

Out of the three, this was my least favourite because there was too much chocolate paste inside and I found it too sweet.
I was surprised there was some slight sea salt on it, if there was more it probably would have balanced out the sweetness.
★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Mado's ice-cream @ Istanbul Express

After Mado’s closed down in Hong Kong,, I didn’t think I could taste the chewy ice-cream again!

Now Istanbul serves it, they serve the scoop and the slices.

The ice-cream seems to be made by Istanbul or imported but slightly different to the ice-cream at Mado’s, the textures is much more gooey and chewy.
The portion for one scoop was very generous, one big bowl! Either it was their generosity or either because of its elasticity it was difficult to scoop out resulting in a big scoop!

I got two scoops, savoury caramel and sweet walnut. I was impressed they were served in separate bowls so the delicate flavours wouldn’t be mixed together!
The sweet walnut was nice and gooey with bits of walnut, however the caramel tasted a bit off, sort of like overheated milk.

As well as a sweet dessert, it is a good remedy for GI upsets, slows down bowel movements, especially after eating chilli's!