The Cookie Museum (former V Tea Room)

I went to the Cookie Museum last Thursday evening, intending to buy about 50 tins of cookies for some friends who are coming over to Singapore. I have bought the cookies from here before and I remember them fondly.

This time, however, I was disappointed. They have increased the price of the cookies to $45 per tin and they do not have discounts even if I buy 50 tins! The lady serving me actually said that some corporate companies buy 500 worth of cookies and they do not bother to give discounts.

The service also seems very lacklustre compared to the previous times I have been there. There was nobody around having tea or food that day yet I had to stand for 5 min before anyone came along to help.

All in all, I walked away disappointed. I have also told friends about it as we are considering to buy new yr cookies for gifts/ presents but looks like we should spend our money elsewhere. I will not be bringing my friends here for tea either.

The Cookie Museum boasts of its wonderful variety of cookies and has a good selection of tea.

What struck me was that the staff clearly knew their cookies well, despite the variety of the cookies. Recommendations are reliable.

You are able to have a sampling of a smaller version of the cookies before deciding what you want. The staff are very helpful in making your selection.

Some cookies, especially the local flavored ones, are a delight to try.

Having had tea on an occasion (between 2-4 pm), the environment was a little noisy unless you get a seat in the interior. The arrangement of the seats appear more organised for tea for two than in large group.

I had to raise my voice a little for my date to hear me. It would probably be a wonderful place to destress or rest from after a hard day of shopping.

Everytime I drop by The Esplanade (which is very often, nowadays), I stop by The Cookie Museum to ogle at the grand interiors and the gorgeous, feminine packaging of their products. I simply love the luxurious, baroque furnishings, it makes me feel like I'm in a miniature French Castle. Anyway, The Cookie Museum is a small cafe and sits only a few. Seats are plush, high backed, regal looking armchairs covered in burgundy tapestry fabric. Ornate gold framed mirrors and antique looking paintings and ornaments adorn the walls. The overall feeling I get just by looking at the cafe alone is that this is one very exclusive, atas place where tai tais gather after watching some performance in their exclusive seats at The Esplanade. I normally shun such high class places because the sheer atas-ness of it makes me feel very uncomfortable. I am afterall, a simple commoner who can't afford to fork out $19++ for a tiny cake. So that changed when my thick skinned friend brought me down to sample their cookies. I told her I'd feel bad but she insisted that the staff were very nice. She was right. I would expect such a place to have snobby sales assistants but I was proved wrong. I have been down to their cafe to sample their bite sized cookies on a few occasions and each time, I was given impeccable service. The kind SAs always allow us to try the various different flavours and they don't pressurize us to buy anything. Even when we leave empty handed, their sincere smile never falters. In fact, they thank us for dropping by and encourage us lowly plebians to come back again. They answer all our queries professionally, but in a warm and friendly manner. I am throughly impressed with their service. It is a total opposite from Aerin's. (Check out my review)

Anyway, to the cookies. I'm a huge fan of the more exotic, Singaporean-inspired flavours. I especially love the laksa flavoured ones, they taste exactly like real laksa, those you could get at the coffee shops. It's almost freaky how a cookie, which is meant to be sweet, could taste so much like real authentic, savoury laksa, but it is in a good way. Remember, in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, there is some gum that Willy Wonka invented to taste exactly like a meal, the one where some bubble gum freak ate then swelled up into a blueberry? The savory cookies here are like that, they taste so much like the real thing. In fact, when I tried the hae bee hiam cookies, I didn't buy a tin despite liking the taste, I thought I might as well eat REAL hae bee hiam since they taste 99% identical and real hae bee hiam is cheap while this cafe's version costs $40 per 500g. The BBQ Enoki is a must try too. It's cheesy with this smoked taste, very delicious. The nasi lemak cookies tastes like the ikan bilis and nuts from real nasi lemak and there's the aroma of real nasi lemak too! The only savory flavour I didn't enjoy as much was their chicken rice flavour, it tasted more like garlic bread but I was told by the SAs that chicken rice cookies comes with some chilli dipping sauce. OMG! How disturbing is that? Haha. I thought it would be great if they introduced more local specialities like chilli crabs or bak kwa flavoured cookies to their range.

I've also sampled the non savory flavours. I don't remember the names but they are mostly fruity flavoured. The fruity taste is strong, yet not overpowering. They are those delicate type of cookies, not the addictive types you would polish up within a day. These dainty cookies are the sort of cookies you would nibble on while having tea in a porcelain tea cup for a lazy afternoon with your girlfriends at home. I think most ladies would like these. They taste very "light" and "refreshing". I personally prefer the more intense savoury ones though.

The cookies are packaged in a round metal tin. It's very presentable and would be great as a gift or treat to yourself. Tourists may find these ideal as souveniers for friends back in their home country too. It's a much chic-er and presentable gift than those rolls of durian cake, chicken essence or greasy bak kwa.

I do wish, however, that the cookies came in smaller servings. 500g of a single flavour, is a little too much! And it hurts my wallet too. Prices range from $40-$45 for a 500g tin. It would be great if the cookies came in smaller servings of maybe 200g, so that I could buy more flavours. Also, the sample sized cookies seem to taste better than the retail full sized ones. Maybe it's because it's smaller and thinner, making the flavours more intense? While, I do think the prices are on the steep side, I have not found another cookie in Singapore that offers such interesting cookies with legendary service to match. I enjoy Famous Amos cookies but I would buy The Cookie Museum's cookies as an occasional treat.

Take note that while the cookies can last up to six months, it would be better to transfer the cookies into an air tight container once opened, to preserve the "freshness".

I will definitely be back to buy other flavours.

Being at The Cookie Museum, I felt like I was teleported back to the Victorian era, where I was half expecting to see ladies decked in lavish ball gowns, looking all poised and dignified, sipping tea daintily. The entire place oozes opulence and luxuriousness.

You can find the most amazing and weirdest of cookie flavours there. We sampled the normal but delicious ones like rum and raisin and chocolate with orange to the really outrageous and out-of-this-world ones like nasi lemak, chicken rice and laksa! It really felt like we were tasting Willy Wonka's creations! Another of my fav was the unlikely pairing of papaya with white almonds. Who would ever have thought that both of them can blend together so perfectly?

Sipping tea from its dainty and exquisite porcelain cup is an art itself. I had the white tea, which was soothing and fragrant.

The Cookie Museum offers regal treatment with the friendliest staff, who takes pride in introducing their company's wide array of cookies and explaining the interesting flavour behind each one. Its not exactly economical but its an experience to savour and promises mouthfuls of pleasant surprises.

For more photos, pls refer to http://wildrocketing.blogspot.com/2009/09/cookie-museum.html

This place makes me feel so uncomfortable it is unreal. I don't have any idea of what they are aiming to do with the settings.

The biscuits and tea are quite nice though. In fact, they probably have one of the widest selections of tea I've seen in Singapore. The biscuits I tried had a biscotti type of texture which is not to hard, not to soft, not too crumbly. Just right.

Aspiring members of the Brontë society may jolly well enjoy their afternoon tea and scones here whilst engaging in entertaining conversation about their estranged relatives who are currently exploring the Orients in search of rare artifacts.

Been there recently after hearing much and reading reviews on it. Yet it was such a disappointment. My friend and I ordered a cup of Queen's breakfast tea and a Liquor Cake - a Bailey's. It was such a let down. Firstly, the cake was just a normal butter cake soaked in coffee, topped with cream and poured over with a tiny whiny bit of Bailey's. I think it is really overpriced for the standard of cake, tastes pretty normal. Perhaps we were too picky due to our occupation.

However, the most disastrous part was when the staff was serving us our utensils. She gave us a small plate and topped it up with one miserable piece of cookie for us to try. How bad can things get when there's 2 of us and yet only one piece of cookie was placed.

So in conclusion... despite the good ambience and the friendliness of the staff, it is still not worth that much... =/

As a hawker kid for the first twenty years of my life, I’ve never seen the point of visiting a restaurant. I can never understand why I have to pay over ten dollars for a meal when I can get it at one fifth of the price at hawkers. Until my friends pulled me into one, I realised there’s a quality difference between standard of food.

I stubbornly don’t believe it fully justifies the price we pay for food. Nevertheless I came to terms with the ambience, layout and the quality time we spent with our treasured companions. Now that makes it worth the penny I pay at restaurants.

When I first stepped foot into Cookie Museum my eyes squinted at the price of ‘35’ per tin I hoped this better worth my time. The Victorian setting impressed me on first impression. I guess 35 bucks for cookies was acceptable.

We were served by a polite, nice lady who patiently introduced their shop’s specialties knowing it’s our first time here. A trolley filled with cookie bits were presented right before us as we requested to test taste different flavours they have in stock.

I can’t remember which ones we tasted but I could remember each and every one’s taste was a genius fusion of different flavours into one. They blend in so well like beautifully orchestrated music that swept my senses away with such intensity I didn’t know where I. Returning was to reality for a moment, I looked blankly at the other cookie jars hoping to get that feeling again.

A must mention is their local delicacy, ‘hebi hiam’, ‘ikan billis’ and ‘nasi lemak’. These cookies are so improbable you’d have to taste it to believe it. No words can ever describe the genius(es) behind the making of these cookies.

We settled for mango and cranberry in the end. Despite being a bigger piece the taste was not as concentrated as the bits we tried earlier. It was well distributed and soothing to the taste buds. Nevertheless those with sweet tooth will be utterly disappointed because the cookies here are all about the beauty of taste.

This place is girly with all its Victorian decor , delicate decoration and so on.
But what the heck!
The Service is one of the best I have ever gotten in my entire life. They are attentive, patient and polite without being pushy or intrusive.

The range of Tea is great.
The cookies, I tried the almond, the lavender they are delicious.
On second time I went, I tried one of their cakes, it was sublime.

It is always very relaxing to be here. The only down side is that is pricey.

Great place to come for afternoon tea or deserts.

Was at Esplanade with parents and daughter and decided to drop in on this oft-praised tea place. Was impressed with personalised and great service as well as the decor. Was even more "impressed" by the prices for the cakes and cookies! My mum shocked me when she ordered the D24 cake without looking at the prices - thought it was quite daring of her even if it was moi footing the bill! I bit my tongue in a bid to swallow any warning in the presence of the service staff and gave a brave smile as I confirmed the order for the cake.

At $22 a slice, it better be from Mao Shang Wang at least! When I told my mum the price later, she wanted to withdraw the order, but I waved her protests away as I was also interested to try out this $22 durian cake. Besides, how many times can you afford to act so generous with your parents esp. since Father's day was around the corner? Unfortunately (or fortunately pocket-wise)they came back to say they've sold out the durian cake. After tutting abit to show my "displeasure" at not being able to demonstrate my filial piety, I declined to order any other cakes.

Instead we had 2 liquer coffees (a Bailey's and an Amaretto) and 1 hot chocolate (made from Italian chocolate). The highlight, to me was the hot chocolate which was on par with that you can get at 2am dessert albeit more value-for-money as it was at least double the amount for about the same price. The 2 coffee liquers were alright and not overly expensive.

Had a great time trying out all the cookies though and my personal favourite was the Laksa one. Bought my mum the hae bee hiam one as she loved it. She said it can be a Father's day gift although she was the one wanted it...go figure! Of course my dad leveraging on the many years of marital experience, wisely did not protest.

All in all, definitely a place to bring your loved ones but not for kids as the idiom "bull in a china store" comes to mind where young ones are concerned. Oh yes, for every $50 spent with Visa at Esplanade, you get to redeem a $10 voucher at the Esplanade Shop opp. of Hagen Daz.

Bon apetit!