Beat the heatwave with these cool treats and eats

Don't feel like spending a lot of time in a hot kitchen standing over the stove?

Here are a few select cool meal, snack and beverage ideas from local restaurants.

Carnival treats

How do cotton candy and Middle Eastern food come together? When it'skishkal-omaraaatNaranjMiddle Eastern Cuisine on the Boardwalk. The rich Syrian dessert combines cotton candy, rose water and pistachios.

In beverage form, the "D Special" atNanazKitchen is refreshing lemon-lime soda, grenadine and ice topped with cotton candy and Maraschino cherry.

Not to be outdone, Sweet Jesus in University Plaza has a "Krustythe Cone," riffing on the Simpson's television series clown: soft-serve vanilla with cotton candy, cotton candy sauce and rainbow sprinkles.

We all scream for

There are several ice cream venues to check out, including Sweet Jesus for cones, cakes, floats and shakes and take-home kits.

There are dozens offlavoursat Ice Cream 2, along with funnel cakes, apple fritters and deep-fried chocolate.

The popular ice cream-maker, Four All, has recently re-opened their new "scoop shop" located in Uptown Waterloo. Four coreflavoursare supplemented with many rotatingflavours, including honey-chamomile and mango-ginger sorbet. There's also vegan raspberry-lemon gelato.

Sorbet is a cousin of ice cream but without milk. Usually a frozen juice or puree, which may be called an ice, granita or sherbert, the semi-solid treat is essentially frozen fruitflavour.

Ambrosia Corner Bakery has a newstrawberry-peach sorbet joining their line-up ofa half-dozen or so ice creams.

At Caf Pyrus and their Outpost store, there's vegan gelato to be found:flavoursinclude Nutella and mint chocolate chip.

Public Kitchen and Bar features a few ice cream-based shakes and floats for cool sipping, as well as a rhubarb-cream pie parfait.

Cold soup isn't nuts

The odd restaurant menu might include a variation on gazpacho, the cold and uncookedAndalusian tomato and pepper soup.

But making a cold soup at home is quick and easy. With a bit of bread grilled on the barbecue, soups can be a refreshing and light meal. Consider blending up three or four ingredients peas, cream, mint, some veg broth and chives for garnish strain and chill.

Avocado soup with cilantro and jalapeno out of the fridge can be delicious. A soup made with peaches and honey can be chilled and garnished with crme fraiche or goat cheese.

A basic technique with cold soups is adding a bit of fat and a kick offlavourvia some spices.

Sushi, bun, poke and injera

A few dishes that are cool and satisfying are sushi and Thai noodle salad, the former from Ken Sushi Houseand Taste of Seoul. The latter a bun chagiofrom Pho Tran.

Or order and build your own poke bowl at Poke Box Waterloo: there are vegetarian options and you can also get your bowl in "burrito" form.

For take-out, put together an Ethiopian vegetarian platter with a base of injera atMuyaor East African Caf. Use the cool pancake-like injera bread to scoop a series of side dishes like cabbage and potatoes and chickpea-flour dumplings. Veg platter will feed two people for under $15.

Four classic salads

Salads can make excellent light and cool meals.

JLB: Janet Lynn's Bistro serves a tunaNicoise, a classic Provencal dish with tomatoes, potatoes, black olives and hard-boiled egg.

Another classic is the Cobb salad.Kentucky Bourbon and Barbecueprepares it with chicken, bacon egg, corn and romaine.

Check out the Cape Town Caesar salad with romaine, radicchio and white anchovies from the newly re-opened Red House.

Middle Eastern restaurants often serve filling salads including thefattoush: mixed greens, vegetables, (perhaps pomegranate) and fried pita chips. You can find versions at Arabesqueand Shawerma Plus.

Chock-a-block of shops for cold coffee

We have many coffee shops in the region, both chains and indies. It's a hot drink, but cold brew is a good alternative, so you can get your caffeine fix without the 90-degrees of brewing heat.

Cold brew is a long process of preparation in which the coffee essentially "steeps" into aflavourfuland refreshing cold drink.

There's an extra charge, so to speak, when coffee shops pair up with local brewers who inject a shot of nitrogen into the coffee producing a creamy, rich texture.

DVLBeven has a cold brew coffee in a "stubbie" bottle, while sister restaurant, Smile Tiger, has a cold-brew-to-go "growler." They also serve coffee cocktails, such as the Kahlua cold brew (in-store only).

In Cambridge,Monigramwhips up a cold brew called "The Cure" and bottles it with old-school apothecary labelling. It might be the cure when the heat hits.

Matter of Taste in Kitchener and Waterloosell cold brew concentrate for home cold brewing.