Isles Bun and Coffee

1424 W 28th St
Minneapolis, MN 55408
612-870-4466
http://www.islesbun.com/

Category: Café/Bakery

Rating (Scale 1-10, with 10 being the highest):
Food: 9
Service: 9
Ambience: 7

Recommendation: Excellent. If you’re craving something sweet for breakfast, look no further. The smells (and crowds) will draw you to Isles.

Once in a while we’ll get a craving for a particular food and that’s when a quest begins. Luckily the search for sweet rolls ended quickly (all thanks for an mspmag story we came across). We didn’t realize that we had a specialty purveyor of these sweet, sticky rolls close to where we live (we’ve probably driven past 28th and Hennepin a thousand times and never noticed Isles). And now, we’ve been to Isles three times in the past month – after our first visit, Nick ended up getting treats to celebrate birthdays at work.

The menu at Isles is quite simple (sweet rolls, coffee cake, scones and cookies). This place is no bigger than a suburban family room and for those that can find a seat at one of the handful of tables, the mesmerizing smells can lead to food coma (or atleast a sugar high). The Cinnamon Rolls are large and soft – you even get to frost your own roll (although we caution you from going overboard, which is easy to do). Both the Caramel and Caramel-Pecan Rolls also pull apart easily and aren’t as sweet as their frosted counterparts. The pecan rolls have a generous topping of nuts and we like that combination. If you want something less intimidating in size than a Cinnamon roll, you must try the Puppy Dog Tails (a cinnamon twist), which we think allows for an ideal bread to frosting ratio. And you’d be remiss to pass on the Coffee Cake – the base of the cake is pretty much the same daily but the toppings change regularly. The toppings are always decadent and we’ve enjoyed all the ones we’ve tried, including a raspberry-mango, a cherry-white chocolate and a blueberry. In addition to the sweet temptations, there is a nice selection of coffees and teas – we personally didn’t think the coffees were spectacular (and the last time my caramel latte was sweeter than the rolls themselves), but how can you pass up coffee to go with the rolls.

The staff is always friendly and helpful. This place can tend to get crowded so take-away might be your best bet. If you want large quantities, fax in an order ahead of time. Regardless, the small batch preparation ensures that you’ll usually get warm treats, even if you have a wait a few minutes. And this place won’t break the bank either - the rolls are less than $4 each, while the puppy dog tails are a buck.

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