Hot Breads

Stumbled upon this place while waiting in line for a tire change. We shared 2 mutton rolls, a chicken pastry, a veggie pastry, a fish pastry, and a spicy sambal pastry — all for $ 5. Flavours were pretty good — everything had sort of a south indian/​sri lankan vibe. The mutton rolls were my favorite, my wife really enjoyed the veggie and fish pastries. I’d try it again.

Summary: A bakery chain with world wide presence lacking world wide flair.
What’s good about it: It’s cheap
What’s bad about it: Boring food, nothing that’s remotely interesting about the food
What food/​baked goods do they have?: A strange collection of indian pastries mixed with cupcakes, pound cakes chocolate chip cookies and hamburger buns? What?
The only reason I tried this place at all was because of those dang Groupon/​WagJag/​TeamSave type sites that seem to be slowly draining my money, $ 5 at a time. Hot breads is definitely a place I would walk into, then walk out of without ordering. There’s just nothing appealing about the food there. I’m a huge fan of Indian food, but the few Indian pastries they have on display don’t look overly appealing, nor does their strange collection of cupcakes, chocolate chip cookies, coffee snacks, and pound cakes.
Any there-​in lies the crux of my problem with this place. Hot Breads comes off as boring establishment with no identity. Their signs advertise stuffed Indian pastries for lunch, but they also serve a flank steak wrap, sugar cookies and cupcakes? Identify crisis?
Anyway, with my credit, I tried a chocolate chip cake ($ 4) which was not moist and had little flavor (when I brought it into the office, even my co-​workers who usually jump over free food shunned it), pound cake ($ 4), chocolate chip cookies ($ 3 and not good at all), a few indian pastries ($ 1.50 each) and a flank steak wrap ($ 4.50).
Nothing here was worth mentioning, other than the fact that all the prices are fairly cheap. Sorry Hot Breads, give me a call when you solve your identity crisis and learn to use a bit of that world wide experience to sell interesting foods.