REVIEW: TEMPLE COFFEE & DONUTS LEEDS

I first heard of Temple Coffee & Donuts back in January when I saw someone post a photograph of a pink latte on Instagram. Given that my favourite colour is pink, immediately I told my housemate at the time that we needed to go and check it out. I was living in Hyde Park, Leeds at the time and Temple was just a 9-minute walk from my house, so it seemed like the perfect place to grab my morning coffee.

Fast forward to five months later and we still had not been to Temple Coffee & Donuts. Every time we said we would go, there was always the excuse of having too much uni work to do and before you know it exams were around the corner, (and if you are like me, you do not leave the house in exam season unless it’s for 10pm snack trips to your local Tesco Express).

1^st June soon arrived. Exams were over, the celebrations were done and it was finally time to go to Temple Coffee & Donuts. There were NO excuses.

My housemates and I dragged ourselves out of our beds and fuelled by our hangovers, we made the nine-minute walk to Temple.

We got there around 3pm and the place was PACKED. Considering the remote location, Temple is a very popular coffee shop, and after my experience there, I could see why.

Photograph taken from their Instagram @templecoffeeleeds

I can only describe Temple as instagrammable, with the pink walls, the neon signs, and of course, the extravagantly coloured coffee.

We began to queue and had a look at the donuts to see which ones we wanted to try. They had an array of flavours, all clearly marked vegan, including cookies and cream, classic vanilla, raspberry, salted caramel and even pina colada.

My friend and I decided to share a vanilla and a raspberry donut. I also got a Zeppelin coffee, which was essentially a tie-dyed latte with oat milk.

Vanilla donut (left), Raspberry donut (right), and a Zeppelin coffee

Raspberry donut

Vanilla and Raspberry donut

The staff were so friendly and welcoming and our coffees and donuts arrived within minutes, even though they were clearly very busy.

My standards are as high as a 5 pack of Co-op 60p jam filled donuts and a homemade iced latte with soy milk. I can safely say the bar has officially been raised after trying what I can only describe as the smoothest coffee and the tastiest vegan donut I have ever had in my life.

The food and drinks lived up to the homely atmosphere of Temple and I was so annoyed at myself for not visiting it sooner, seeing as I was moving away from Leeds that same week. The moral of this story is always follow your gut instinct and always make the trip to try the vegan donut.

I loved Temple so much that I decided to return the following day, (a Sunday). I arrived at around 2pm in the knowledge that it was closing at 4. When I got there, I was distraught, but not surprised, to find out that they had run out of donuts, but that didn’t stop me from ordering a coffee and stealing some of my friend’s peanut butter dairy-free ice cream.

Peanut butter dairy-free ice cream

This time I ordered an iced Sabbath coffee with oat milk. It was just as good, if not better, as my hot latte from the day before. Also photographed is my friend’s Pink Floyd, which was very sweet and did not contain any coffee, (you can add coffee if you wish, which I would highly recommend).

Iced Sabbath (front) and an Iced Pink Floyd (back)

Overall, my experience of Temple Coffee and Donuts was an extremely positive one. I still dream about drinking their iced latte and eating their vanilla donut to this day. I would highly recommend making the trip if you live in Leeds.

Until next time,

Emma xx