CentrePs ~ The second half of the dessert outing...

Apart from the pastries purchased from Perla's Pastry Boutique, the other selection of cakes were purchased from CentrePs and we have settled with a choice of 5 @ $32 (most of the sliced cakes are priced $7 nett) and lychee macarons. As mentioned on their website, they do allow the purchaser to choose any 5 cakes but this is subjected to availability. Do note that creations like Tien Tien which cost $9.00 will need a top up of $2 when included in their choice tray.

I have first came across Citrusphere on Ice's Centre PS ~ A New Discovery, which is a refreshing lemon and whipped meringue with hazelnut pralines. What caught my attention in her entry was her description of how the light citrusy meringue was infused with crunchy chocolate balls at the innards and often I trust her recommendation without much doubt.

Adopting a dome-like structure, this makes it one of the most beautiful desserts among the selection and its winning factor lies in it not being overly sweet nor sour. The chocolate is neither extremely concentrated nor rich to overshadow the lightness of the meringue and thus the right proportion of chocolate and lemon meringue. Very well-received among the girls for the Saturday outing.

Yuan didn't like it as much as me but described it as a unique contrast of sweetness and sourness. He felt that the proportion of the meringue was probably too much but the saving graze was the right stitch of sourness for the lemon meringue. Overall pretty refreshing if one is looking for the dessert with the slight sour taste.

Mont Blanc, popular among Japanese customers requires no introduction. This creation consists of chestnut vermicelli cream with creme chantilly on a french meringue disc and sable. When this is compared to the equivalence available at Pâtisserie Glacé, this has a stronger chestnut fragrance and a crunchier base. Since I am not a fan of chestnut, I would prefer Pâtisserie Glacé's version.

Yuan pointed out its very light and distinct chestnut taste but since he is also not too big a fan of chestnut, he did not take a second bite.

Douce Fraise is a combination of ivory chocolate with Earl Grey, strawberry jam and hazelnut genoise. Surprisingly the taste of Earl Grey is not strong in this creation and what makes it good is its light taste with a slight sweetness from the strawberry jam. I am pretty neutral with this since I am not a fan of any of the components but yet the combination is not too extreme for me to stomach.

On the other hand, Yuan was kind of put off by the strawberry jam and the rough texture but was pretty surprised with the mildness of Earl Grey in this cake, given that he never fancy tea and spices.

One reason why I didn't order the Grand Cru Royale (which was CentrePs' signature and bestseller) was because I was expecting lots of chocolate from Perla's Pastry Boutique and that I have wanted to order CentrePs' TX5 (Valrhona Fine Chocolate in Five Texture; Cake, Cremeux, Cream, Mousse, and Salted Sheet) since the clique likes salted caramel. But alas, it was not available and was replaced with Chocobanane which I personally felt will be neutral enough for everybody.

As described to be “Grand Cru Chocolate and Banana Mousse with Hazelnut Macarons and Candied Pecans”, I thought it was something different from a conventional chocolate banana cake. Instead of sandwiching bananas slices, CentrePs has adopted a banana mousse which infused perfectly with its chocolate mousse.

As epected, Chocobanane was Yuan's personal favorite of the day and he described it as chocolate mousse with banana Mousse. He felt that what made Centre Ps stands out from the rest is that one will feel the equal strength of both tastes. Typically most are rich chocolate mousse and the banana is just the background taste.

Pisa is something I won't miss out, given Sihan, Evan and Claire's love for pistachio. However, the Bourbon Vanilla Bean Bavaroise with Raspberry Compote was of too high proportion and strong, thus overshadowing the lightly pistachio-flavoured biscuit layers. Since I am not a pistachio purist, I thought this was a unique and refreshing combination.

Yuan also agreed with the rest that the pistachio taste was missing for this cake but he does develop a liking for the jelly-like layer on top which tasted like almond jelly.

During the first dessert outing, I stopped the rest from ordering the Green Tea with Sweet Potato at Nectarie and this time round, I compensate by purchasing centrePs' new creation, Ma-cha-chi which is a matcha green tea cheese torte with almond biscuit and red fruits. Personally, I thought matcha and red fruits doesn't gel.

Yuan felt that readers may not be accustomed to this taste. A mix of Matcha, cheese and what appeared to be corn sponge. Nonetheless, he really loved the layer of Matcha "cream" on the top layer. Just the right proportion of green tea, too much would have made it grainy and bitter.

Jive Jivara, complementary from CentrePs, is their version of Plaisir sucré with the use of Grand Cru Jivara milk chocolate, praline croustillant and hazelnut dacquoise.

To be frank, I do like the creamy milk chocolate which simply melts in your mouth. The chocolate sheets are thin enough but people who fancy BakerZin's version will find that salted caramel is missing in this creation. Personally, I will look out for 2 things in a chocolate creation, its smoothness and the richness of chocolate, although the latter is missing in this, its smoothness is creamy enough to compensate its shortcoming.

Yuan also felt that this is a variant of sweet pleasure but unlike the one we tried from Laurent, the sheets of chocolate fails to stand out. Also, like some of friends, he felt that the praline was kind of creamy.

All in all, I was glad that my friends are fine with the CentrePs' selection of cakes. Its winning factor is the freshness of the cake and not being overly sweet nor dynamic in its taste. Thus, despite having 7 cakes in a row, we managed to finish all.

The weather was extremely hot for that Saturday and the cakes couldn't survive the 1 hour bus journey and were in pretty bad shape, particularly Chocobanane. These cakes definitely look prettier on CentrePs' display of cakes.

Centre Ps Pte Ltd
78 Guan Chuan Street
#01-43
Singapore 160078
Tel: 6220 1285
http://www.centre-ps.com/

Operating hours:
10am to 8pm (Mondays to Thursdays)
10am to 9pm (Fridays and Saturdays)
Closed on Sundays