Dessert in Toronto need not just be a final course at dinner but a destination in its own right. This round-up includes restaurants and bakery cafes that welcome diners to stop in just a coffee (or digestif) and a slice of cake.

Here are my picks for the top new dessert places in Toronto.

Cocao 70
The haven for chocoholics is an ideal destination following a stroll through the Distillery District. The menu here offers sweet fixes like chocolate peanut butter pizza, banana splits and flaming fondues.

Dolce 21 Dessert House
The dessert house located at Pacific Mall is serving up peaks of soft serve ice cream topped with puffs of cotton candy, honeycomb and red bean mochi. Even the espresso menu gets creative with options like the cookieccino and lavendar honey lattes.

Beiruti Grand Cafe
French Mediterranean fare is the specialty of this cafe off Sheppard near Vic Park and coffees and crepes are the thing to get. Find familiar favourites like crepes dusted with cinnamon sugar or folded around Nutella and bananas plus unique offerings like a crepe with ashta (Lebanese clotted creme) decorated with berries, pistachios and honey.

Kekou Gelato
The Asian gelato shop on Queen West is open all year round (where as the outlet on Baldwin only operates seasonally). Aside from cones and cups loaded with scoops of HK milk tea and black sesame gelato, look forward to Vietnamese espresso, whoopie pies, custard brulees and a rotating selection of soft serve ice cream flavours.

Millie Patisserie & Creamery
Delicate crepe cakes in flavours like matcha, vanilla bean and tiramisu are the main attraction at this dessert house on Oxley. Other house favourites include the cream puff sandwiches featuring house gelato on choux puffs.

What did I miss? Add your favourite new dessert destinations in the comments.

Photo of Dolce 21 by irene.s2 on Instagram.