There’s no shortage of ice cream shops near the White Rock pier, where Maya’s, Crazy Cows, Marble Slab, Ricardo’s, The White, Ocean Rock Cafe and Seaside Scoops are all located within a block or two of the wooden landmark.
Enter Praguery, which sells signature “chimney cakes” and ice cream in a shop shared with Coho Eatery’s burgers and pizza, across from the museum.
The handmade, cone-shaped chimney cakes are a twist on a popular Czech street food. Soft-serve ice cream is added and topped with sweet sauces including Nutella, mango-coconut, strawberry coulis, Callebaut milk chocolate, lemon curd and other flavours.
The cinnamon- and almond-flavoured chimney cakes, sold for $8 on their own, are made with dough baked on a rotisserie. With ice cream added, the cone sells for up to $12, depending on the flavour.
Prague-raised founder/owner Jaroslav Mestka opened the “brick and mortar” shop April 14, some seven years after launching the venture as a food truck in Vancouver. In the fall of 2020 a Praguery shop was opened at Guildford Town Centre, but has since closed.
“When we did the pop-up in Guildford we had really good feedback there,” Mestka said. “When we left the place, we got a lot of messages from people, questions, asking, ‘Hey guys, where did you go? Are you coming back?’ We wanted to stay in the area, and that’s why we’re on Marine Drive now.”
After moving to Vancouver in 2014, Mestka wanted to make and sell crepes, but a trip back home changed his plans.
“I went to Prague to see my parents, took one street wrong and ended up at a bakery close to Charles Bridge, the famous bridge,” Mestka recalled. “That’s where I first saw the cone-shape pastry with the ice cream – I thought, that’s it. Ding! There was a huge line, and it tasted good.
“The pastry without the ice cream has existed a long time, originally from Transylvania, but in Prague they innovated with the ice cream,” he added. “And then it went viral, since that. I wasn’t the one who created the cones, I’m just trying to bring it to people here now, with as many good ingredients and from scratch – no preservatives, nothing.”
Elsewhere in B.C., this summer Praguery will operate food trucks in downtown Vancouver, at the base of Sea to Sky Gondola, Lafarge Lake in Coquitlam and at the McArthurGlen shopping mall in Richmond.
tom.zillich@surreynowleader.com
Like us on Facebook Follow us on Instagram and follow Tom on Twitter
