Glasshouse Creamery

Heard all about the opening of Glasshouse Creamery via social media; not to be confused with The Glasshouse which is a cafe that serves up brunch fare and specialty coffee that has outlets at CHIJMES and Neil Road, Glasshouse Creamery is a new addition to the Tampines neighbourhood. The namesake of the establishment is rather obvious in when one finds out the location of Glasshouse Creamery — Glasshouse Creamery takes over the former premises of Around.’s location within the publicly accessible area of The Alps Residence; the location being a little far flung from the town centre and would most likely require a bus journey down from Tampines MRT Station. The shop unit that Glasshosue Creamery occupies is well-lit considering the high ceilings and the windows surrounding the front and the side of the shop that allows natural light to fill up the interior space. While the transition from Around. to Glasshouse Creamery has been done rather quickly, it does seem that the folks behind Glasshouse Creamery had done a bit of work to the space — Glasshouse Creamery still keeps the interior of the shop unit with a clean and minimalistic look with the large use of grey and white elements in its furniture and fittings with some furniture and fittings featuring wooden and rattan accents ; that being said, the space does feel a tad claustrophobic and tightly packed when there is a crowd. Being a spot that is conceptually similar to the one that came before it, the main offerings of Glasshouse Creamery would be their ice-creams that are prominently displayed at the counter; patrons can either choose to have their ice-cream in cups or with cones — they also do offer a Signature Waffle (Mochi-based) at Glasshouse Creamery as well. Glasshouse Creamery does offer their patrons with a limited variety of Finger Food as well; think items like the Chicken Karaage, Yakitori Sticks, Popcorn Chicken and Spicy Drumlets, while beverages available at Glasshouse Creamery includes pots of tea, espresso-based specialty coffee and a line-up of fizzy drinks.

There is only one type of waffle that Glasshouse Creamery offers and this would be their Signature Waffles (mochi-based) that sees the inclusion of mochi within the waffle. For our choice of ice-cream, we went for the Bluepea Lemongrass, while all patrons going for the Signature Waffle (mochi-based) comes with a complimentary serving of a topping (choose between Oreo Crumble, Icing Sugar and Biscoff Crumble), as well as a complimentary serving of a sauce (choose between Maple Syrup and Chocolate Sauce). For our order, we had opted out of the toppings, whilst we went for the Maple Syrup for our choice of sauces. Rather than serving the waffles as-is when it is ready after the batter is being cooked in the waffle maker, Glasshouse Creamery serves their waffles being all cut up in four sections; all lined up nearly while the maple syrup
that we had opted for comes on the side rather than being drizzled over the waffle. Going for the Signature Waffle (mochi-based), first impressions of the Signature Waffle (mochi-based) was actually how it does look a little dry on the exterior. That being said, it does turn out that a dip into the maple syrup does seem to help things out a little, while the mochi infused within does provide a chewy and stretchy texture that is expected for such an offering. As we went for the Bluepea Lemongrass ice-cream, the Bluepea Lemongrass ice-cream indeed comes in a rather pretty shade of blue; the flavours of lemongrass perfuming throughout the scoop of ice-cream creating a really refreshing and light flavour profile that should work well for those whom prefer their ice-cream to come with more botanical flavours in general — the ice-cream being smooth and creamy, though does not end up with a flavour that is too milky for the ice-cream and is free of any undesired bits of icy that would have ruined the texture of the ice-cream otherwise.

While Glasshouse Creamery does seem to have done well over the quality of the food that they are serving up, Glasshouse Creamery does seem to need to work on other aspects of its operations. No doubt that Glasshouse Creamery is located in beautiful space with a charming interior to boast; the seating space is especially claustrophobic with the dining chairs and tables placed too near to one another — this makes it difficult for both patrons and staff to manoeuvre around the space. The unit in which Glasshouse Creamery occupies also does seem to suffer from problems relating to their air-conditioning and this seemed to have worsened during our visit to Glasshouse Creamery where the home-use wall-mounted air-conditioning units are being used to cool down the space — something which was already not adequate to do so considering the large use of glass for its frontage. This resulted in an especially warm and stuffy space during the day in the afternoon when we made our visit, which we observed some diners simply just leaving after settling down for a while without having placed their order. The mood of the diners whom chose to stay to have their waffles and ice-cream also seemed to have remained rather tense as well. Whilst Glasshouse Creamery also did not seem to be well-staffed to handle the crowd, it does also seem like there is some teething issues where the staff are rather clueless on what they are doing and also seemed fairly disorganised around the cafe operations. Overall, despite the decent food that Glasshouse Creamery serves up, there is still much to do for the establishment in other aspects especially in its environmental and operational factors for one to decide to make a return visit; this is also not helped by the cafe’s location that does require a bit of effort to get to — something in which we do hope they are able to look into for the larger scheme of things in the long run.