Vertical poster for the 2023 Singaporean boys' love short film Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance

Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance

CompletedMovie🇸🇬

SYNOPSIS

Released on 11 November 2023, Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance is the second and longer of two Singaporean BL short films made by 250 Films under the direction of Mickey Hiah. It runs twenty-two minutes, more than double the length of the film it follows, and went out free on YouTube. Braven Yeo, Soh Deng Xun and Leon Koh all return in the roles they played the first time.

The story resumes with Gabriel and Charlie as a couple rather than as two people circling one another, and that is the single biggest change between the two films. The bakery is still the centre of the action and the working relationship still sits underneath everything, but the question is no longer whether either man will speak. It is what happens now that both of them have.

Alex supplies the pressure. Introduced in the first film as a former classmate of Charlie's who turned up for a media interview, he returns here with enough screen time to become a genuine third point rather than a device, and the triangle the earlier film could only gesture at is allowed to play out. The film works through it and arrives at a happy resolution.

For cataloguing purposes the two films are best understood as one work issued in two pieces. The first establishes a situation in nine minutes; this one spends twenty-two resolving it, and neither is complete on its own. Watched together they come to a little over half an hour, and 250 Films kept the same three actors, the same director and the same setting across both so that they play as a continuous piece. Anyone starting here will find the relationship already assumed and the earlier interruption already explained.

CONTENT DETAILS

Native Title
Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance
Original Title
Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance
Adaptation
A direct sequel to the 2023 short film Pure Vanilla, made by the same company and director. No novel, comic or other outside source work has been identified.
Genres
DramaFeel-GoodOffice/WorkplaceRomanceShort-FormSlice of Life
Themes
BL
Key Themes
Sequel FilmLove TriangleBakery SettingEstablished CoupleWorkplace RomanceHappy EndingSingapore Short FilmIndependent ProductionReturning CastTwo-Part Story
Country
Singapore
Networks
YouTube
Duration
22 min
Aired Start
Release Year
2023

RELATED CONTENT

Vertical poster for the 2023 Singaporean boys' love short film Pure Vanilla
Pure Vanilla

WATCH ON

YouTube

KEY TAKEAWAYS

  • A direct sequel: Released 11 November 2023, it continues the story begun in the nine-minute short Pure Vanilla earlier the same year.
  • More than double the length: At twenty-two minutes it runs longer than the first film and the trailer combined, and it carries the bulk of the plot.
  • Unchanged team: Mickey Hiah directs again for 250 Films, with Braven Yeo, Soh Deng Xun and Leon Koh all reprising their roles.
  • The triangle proper: Alex, a device in the first film, is given enough screen time here to work as a genuine rival.
  • A settled ending: Sources agree the film resolves happily, and no further instalment has been announced.
  • YouTube only: The sequel is recorded on YouTube alone, where the first film also carries a GagaOOLala listing.
  • Best treated as one work: Together the two films run a little over half an hour and were plainly conceived as a single story in two releases.
  • Original screenplay: No novel, comic or other outside source has been identified for either film.

EDITOR’S VERDICT

6.8/10

Reviewed by Renkaze, editor of BL & GL Flix

The second Pure Vanilla film is the better of the two, and the reason is almost entirely structural: it has the running time its predecessor lacked. Twenty-two minutes is still short, but it is long enough for the story to be a story rather than a premise.

What the extra length buys

Alex is the clearest beneficiary. In Pure Vanilla he functions as an interruption, a figure who walks in and applies pressure because the film needs pressure applied. Here he is given enough presence to be a real alternative, which is what a triangle requires if it is going to mean anything. Leon Koh is noticeably better served by the script this time.

Starting with Gabriel and Charlie already together is also the right call. It removes the will-they-won't-they holding pattern that consumed the first film and replaces it with a harder and more interesting question about what a new relationship does under strain. Braven Yeo and Soh Deng Xun have more to play, and they play it.

What still limits it

The happy resolution arrives comfortably rather than convincingly. Having spent most of its length building Alex into a genuine threat, the film settles matters with less friction than that buildup warrants, and the last stretch feels shorter than it should. A viewer who found the first film thin will find this one better proportioned but still slight.

It is also, unavoidably, a sequel that cannot be watched first. Almost nothing is re-established: the bakery, the jobs, the history with Alex are all assumed. That is efficient for anyone arriving in order and confusing for anyone who is not.

Verdict

Watch the two back to back and treat them as a single thirty-one-minute film, which is plainly how they were conceived. On that basis the pair works, and this half is where the payoff sits. As a standalone it would be unintelligible; as a conclusion it is satisfying without being surprising.

Final Score: 6.8/10

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Do I need to watch the first film?

Yes. This one opens with Gabriel and Charlie already together and assumes you know who Alex is. Start with Pure Vanilla, which runs nine minutes, and come straight here.

How long are the two films together?

Just over half an hour. Nine minutes for the first and twenty-two for this one, which is why they are usually watched in a single sitting.

Is the cast the same?

Entirely. Braven Yeo returns as Gabriel, Soh Deng Xun as Charlie and Leon Koh as Alex, with Mickey Hiah directing again for 250 Films.

Does the story finish here?

Yes. The love triangle is worked through and the film ends happily. No third instalment has been announced.

Where can it be watched?

Free on YouTube. Unlike the first film, this record holds no GagaOOLala listing for the sequel, so YouTube is the only platform recorded against it.

Why is it filed as a movie rather than an episode?

Because it was made and released as a self-contained short film with its own title and its own release date, not as a second episode of a series.

Is a trailer available?

None has been identified for this film. The first film has a separate trailer on YouTube; for the sequel the record carries only the full film, so the trailer field is left blank.

Written and verified by Renkaze · Last updated 20 September 2026

Compiled from public film listings and reviews rather than from press materials; one image accompanies it, and availability may have moved since. Corrections are handled as set out in our disclaimer.

What Pure Vanilla: Recipe for Romance is about

Thirteen extra minutes is not a large budget by any normal measure, and it is instructive how much it changes. The first film had room to place three people in a bakery and then stop. This one has room for them to act, and the difference shows most clearly in Alex, who moves from being a function of the plot to a person with a claim of his own.

That is the real argument for treating the pair as a unit. A love triangle needs all three corners to be inhabited or it is only a complication, and nine minutes cannot inhabit three people. Twenty-two can manage it, just about. The sequel is therefore not so much an expansion of the first film's idea as the first occasion on which that idea is properly attempted.

The extra length also changes what an ending can mean. A nine-minute short may stop on a gesture and call it a resolution, because nothing has been built that needs dismantling. A twenty-two-minute film that has given its third party real weight has to decide something, and this one does: it resolves, and it resolves happily. Whether the resolution is fully earned is a fair question, but at least it is a resolution rather than a fade. Taken together the two films demonstrate something small and useful about short filmmaking, which is that the distance between a sketch and a story can be a matter of minutes.

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