9475 Clarence Center Rd., Clarence Center, NY 14032
Web: Clarence Center Coffee Company and Cafe
Phone: 716.741.8573
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Clarence Coffee Desserts
"The exact second when we knew that we had made a mistake visiting Taco Bell to try the Frutista Freeze came one minute into our wait in the drive-through line."
If the Summer of 2008 is remembered locally for anything culinary, it should be the rise of the mango smoothie. The one from the Clarence Center Coffee Company and Cafe that came from nowhere to win a Taste of Buffalo award this year. Or perhaps the ones from Taco Bell and Starbucks that have surprisingly been featured in advertising campaigns as enticements to come and revisit these sagging national chains. We spent the last week testing two of the CCCCC's mango-infused smoothies, as well as the Taco Bell Frutista Freeze and the Starbucks Orange Mango Banana Vivanno. The winner? Read on to find out.
Clarence Center Coffee Company and Cafe: We knew there was something special about this restaurant's Mango Smoothie even before it was announced as a Taste of Buffalo second-place winner last month - at the end of two hours of gorging ourselves on other foods, it was literally the last thing we tried at the festival, and we left the place realizing we had ordered too small of a portion. A week later, we were back at the Cafe ordering the full-sized version ($4), a tall cup of almost fluorescent orange mango and ice, sipped with a white straw. "You tried it at the Taste of Buffalo?" asked the girl at the counter. "Yeah, it's great," she said. "But next time, try the Wildberry Mango. I think it's even better."
The words echoed in our heads as we sat down to sip the standard Mango Smoothie, which turned out to be superior to the one that we had loved at Taste of Buffalo - served from the Cafe's countertop, it had less need for overbearing ice, as there wasn't as much of a melting risk as at the day-long Taste event. That left the mango a greater opportunity to shine through, and it did, flecks of the fruit now dominating each sip with a flavor that was so intensely, truly mango that we realized we probably had not done this fruit enough patronage in the past. How could the Wildberry version possibly be better?
On a subsequent visit, we found out. The Wildberry, served red to the original's orange, was a tango of competing flavors, for one second letting the mango dance on the tongue, the next a more tart, familiar red berry flavor, swapping positions from sip to sip. Better? No. More complex, and interesting? Perhaps. With a mango smoothie that's so good, competition from another flavor is at best a nice alternative, and at worst a distraction.
Taco Bell: The exact second when we knew that we had made a mistake visiting Taco Bell to try the Frutista Freeze ($2) came one minute into our wait in the drive-through line - the point at which our car pulled up to the sign to place the order. We had seen the commercial, the one touting this drink as a summer escape, and there was something unquestionably appealing about the company's photography. They had loaded a clear plastic cup with bright orange juice, and topped it with some form of red glaze. It didn't look like typical Taco Bell, that unrepentant destroyer of Mexican authenticity - it looked... beautiful.
But then, a moment before we placed our order, we saw the disclaimer on the Taco Bell picture of the Frutista, the one in small white text that probably had to be there by law: the Frutista doesn't actually contain any fruit juice. It was a warning, clear as day, that we probably should have just kept on driving without placing an order. Something had to make that cup glow bright orange. Whatever it was, it wasn't mango.
We ordered one anyway. And true to the Taco Bell vision of stripping everything down to its barest, cheapest form, the Frutista Freeze was basically a Slushie that tasted like mango-hinted Mountain Dew, down to the chemically fake flavor and aftertaste. But to the drink's credit, Taco Bell had topped it with real strawberries - they couldn't have been artificial too, right? - and they distracted enough from the faux mango flavor that we could finish the drink. We wouldn't order it again.
Starbucks: We are, unashamedly, fans of Starbucks. The standard coffee? Eh. The stinky hot breakfast sandwiches? No. The frozen drinks? Ding ding ding. Frappuccinos are a wonderful invention. We actively love four or five of them. And the world of coffee would be a more boring place without these interesting, overpriced cold drinks.
The Vivanno is absolutely not what we expected from Starbucks this Summer. Howard Schultz, the company's CEO, recently made a huge investment in an upscale Italian-style yogurt dessert chain called Pinkberry. Then the company started touting a mysterious upcoming cold beverage "product that is both indulgent and refreshing... steeped in Italian heritage." We figured we had it nailed: it's coffee frozen yogurt! And lo and behold, Pinkberry just rolled that exact product out. Here comes the Starbucks version, right?
No. For some reason, after all the hype, Starbucks did roll out a Pinkberry-inspired drink, but only in Los Angeles. The rest of the country was blanketed with cheesy, awful marketing artwork that looks as if it came straight out of Napoleon Dynamite's notebook, touting Vivanno, which tastes like a blender full of orange, mango, and banana baby food mixed with ice and dropped unceremoniously into a $4 cup. The version we tried was so subtly flavored and bland that it actually seems like the opposite of the indulgent drink Schultz described, even despite watching the Baristas drop a full frozen banana into their mixer for the drink. They seemed to be struggling to make it when we ordered it; we subsequently struggled to enjoy it, and wouldn't dream of trying the only other flavor, chocolate banana.
Are these really the best choices this chain - creator of the delectable Chai, Green Tea, and Caramel Frappuccinos - could dream up to win over a thirsty, Starbucks-saturated nation? How could mango and orange flavors, typically so strong, be diluted by banana into a light paste that begs to be abandoned rather than finished?
The Verdict: This summer, if you can find a way to bring yourself out to the not-so-convenient but certainly homey single location of the Clarence Center Coffee Company and Cafe, skip the no-fruit-juice Fruista and the dead-on-arrival Vivanno in favor of a real mango smoothie. There's just no comparison between these mango flavors, two forgettable and one unforgettable, so vote with your dollars and support the real deal.
