Brownies made by me!

Whenever possible I give people chocolate brownies in their goody bags on the chocolate tours. This week I wasn't organised in time so I didn't have any ready for today from Cocoa Loco, in Sussex, so I made my own!

Here they are in the container before I packed them into plastic bags this morning. Made with organic free range eggs, organic butter, organic flour, organic sugar and Belgian chocolate. We tried them last night and they were pretty darn good (if I may say so myself!).

Chocolate tour this Friday 28th March

There are still a few spaces! No more after this until May 31st.
Book now if you want to come along!
(The link keeps playing up, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Email me if you want to come along!)

Hope you all had a fabulous Easter! I made the cookies from the recipe on my website. Soooo good.

Cake made with Willie's chocolate

This one was cooked, not like his Cloud cake. It's very good. I'm going to putthe recipe in my Easter newsletter which I'll send out this week. You can sign up for it via the free cookie recipe form on the left of the Chocolate Ecstasy Tours homepage.

No French chocolate in the French Alps

A week in the great outdoors. Well, the great, manufactured outdoors. As we were skiing in France I didn’t take any chocolate with me, assuming that, being France, good chocolate would be easily accessible everywhere. Bizarrely, whilst all of the supermarkets had a slightly different selection, the majority of the chocolate was Swiss. Having said that, the closest airport is Geneva so I expect this is not so bizarre as I first thought. Fortunately the Lindt Caramel Creation got me through the week! This isn’t a bar I’ve seen in the UK and although it has the tell-tale ever-so-slightly overroasted taste to the chocolate, the thin caramel and mousse layers that this chocolate enshrouds more than make up for this lacking. Towards the end of the week I found a patisserie that had a selection of bon bons (small, filled chocolates) that were made in house (according to the sign, at least). My French and the assistant’s English could not get me to a point of understanding what couverture they used but the passionfruit filling in one of the chocolates was scrumptious, nonetheless. (If you go to Val Thorens it is in the little shopping centre where the pharmacy is, but, again, it's only the fillings that are good, rather than the chocolate.)



We had two days of lovely weather when we first arrived, while I slowly tried to remember what to do with these things strapped to my feet, and then the weather turned sour on Sunday night I had to wonder on Monday as I traversed the grey slopes in the biting cold, what the appeal of this skiing thing was. The miserable weather continued through until Wednesday, the nightly snowfall making the slopes too powdery to appeal to a pretty ordinary skier like me, especially as the winds revealed icy patches by the afternoons. But when the sun came out again Thursday and gave us three days of continuously cloudless sky it was easy to forget that I had vowed never to bother coming skiing again. I love it! Ah, so fickle.

So, today, I am going to bake something with Willie's chocolate whilst the washing machine churns through load after load. Part 3 airs tonight. I keep getting contacted by people who say they have seen me on TV, but I've not seen the trailer myself. I kind of forgot the cameras were there.

Cocomaya in this very chocolate-y week

I had planned to write about my chocolatey exploits of last night, where I experimented with Willie's 100% chocolate liquor, clotted cream and St Dalfour cherry jam (on ciabatta from Wholefoods, it was gooooood). So good, in fact, that I repeated it tonight with an M&S mixed berry smoothie and some honey instead of the jam. This version was also all too moreish.

OK, so I have ended up telling you about my homely chocolate feasting, but much more briefly than I might have because in my inbox this morning I fortuitously actually read the Daily Candy email that arrived and discovered that Cocomaya opened in Connaught St, W2. I heard rumours a few weeks ago that a new chocolate shop was opening in the area and, lo and behold, here it was, opened!

I was delighted to be able to get there in my lunch break, and even more thrilled that two of the three masterminds behind it were in-store to chat to. Lovely chaps indeed, as were all the others in store, too. The store is beautifully decorated in purples and greens with butterflies in frames on the wall and unique cake stands that delicately display delicious chocolatey delights. I was so enthralled in the chatting and tasting that I forgot to take any pictures. It's fortunate I have no plans for a career in photo-journalism. In Cocomaya the chocolate-making happens at the back which you can observe through a glass partition. My next tour version is launching in May but it looks like I'm going to have to add No 3 to the mix shortly afterwards!

It's always inspiring to see how each chocolatier creates their own unique chocolates, therefore making visits to all of them essential (I can see how that could be a bad thing, I suppose). What's unique here? Strawberry chilli truffles, milk pomegranate domes and sour cherry truffles. More too, I'm sure. The milk and honey ganache I tried this evening from my take-home box was a delight. In the next few weeks Jonathan (the chocolate master) will complete his range, of around 35 chocolates in total. I'm going to have to go back soon to check out what else he comes up with.

Tomorrow I'm off to France, with limited internet access. Hopefully with unlimited chocolate access. Ski slopes or hot chocolate? Hmmm... tough one.

Sir Hans Sloane Hot Chocolate

We went to the Liberty Cardholders' evening tonight. When the invitation arrived a few weeks ago I immediately spotted the chocolate tasting with Sir Hans Sloane Chocolates. I was excited to get to see the lovely Bill McCarrick again, and particularly to taste more of his chocolate. He scolded me for not having been down to see him yet. I've really wanted to!! I will get down there in April - diaries permitting - and give you all a full report of his chocolate studio.

His chocolate was even better than I remembered. We came home with a few of his bars and a tin of his hot chocolate. I tasted this just after he discovered it, when he spoke on my full day chocolate tour last October. Crunchy sugar granules that are sprayed with layers of chocolate and spun in a metal bowl until they shine, it is both pretty and delicious. As we had a pint of organic whole milk in our fridge (very rare for us) we decided to mix some up when we got home. Taking great care not to boil the milk we mixed up our nightcaps, then frothed them with the mini electric frothing gadget we got as a gift last Christmas. Yum. Well, actually, I prefer to eat it straight from the bag. As a drink it's a bit sweet for me (but then I am a fan of 100% chocolate!). The other half was thrilled with his cup, made meticulously to Bill's directions. I added some of Willie Harcourt-Cooze's (of Willy's Wonky Chocolate Factory) 100% Hacienda El Tesoro and some Valhrona cocoa powder. The kitchen is now a lovely chocolatey mess and when I went for a shower a short time ago I discovered I'd even managed a chocolate smudge on my forehead. If you saw Willy's Wonky Chocolate Factory you'll know that 100% chocolate isn't really the best thing to have at bedtime. While milk contains tryptophan that helps encourage sleep, chocolate gives you a buzz, hence this rapidly written post. Oh well. I'm tired enough I'm sure I'll get to sleep anyway. I used to be such a morning person. Somewhere in the last few years I transformed into this night owl who gets far more excited and active and productive late in the evening. I do love mornings though. I've been making more of an effort to set my alarm earlier and go for a short run. It's not much but it helps keep me awake during the day, and now that it's getting lighter earlier the sky is gorgeous when I'm out.

It's hard to discern whether it's chatting to chocolate people or eating the chocolate that gets me so excited. I think a mixture. I get excited speaking to anyone who's passionate about their work. I always get excited about chocolate too, and together it's compounded.

So, I should probably lay my weary (and buzzing) head. I have written some posts in the last few weeks that I haven't published yet. I just need to find them!

One more thing: I found out Willie's chocolate is on sale in Waitrose too! Very exciting for him. You can get Sir Hans Sloane chocolate in Liberty (obviously), Selfridges and The General Trading Co. Go and get some of his pralines. I wish I had.

Willie and the Chocolate Factory starts tonight!

Ahead of plan people! 9pm Channel 4 tonight. Watch it!!

A weekend of eating (and drinking) in Belgium

Food, glorious, food. It’s possible I actually ate less chocolate in Belgium than I would normally. But I bought more than I have in a long time, at least, in one day. I was far too easily persuaded by the much cheaper prices of the chocolates there than the same chocolate in London. That was my excuse for buying 1.5kg of Valrhona chocolate. Yes, it's French, but it was much cheaper there than it is here. 1kg of that was in a single block that I intend to use for cooking. Maybe.

On top of these fabulous deals there were a few gems that you can’t get in London. I ignored the ones you could, and I also ignored all the other “chocolate shops” with samey products. I would stick my head in (sometimes not even that) and do a quick assessment of whether it was worth my time. I don’t think it was too intolerable for my ever patient traveling partner. He shouldn’t complain, I did get all the boxes made up with two of pretty much everything.

I understand now why one of the people who came on my tour suggested I should run tours to Belgium. In some ways, it's pointless because that's what people go there for anyway, but having now seen for myself the sheer number of chocolate shops... It is quite overwhelming and quite difficult to discern what is quality and what is not. Unfortunately price, though a reliable indicator, does not always suffice.

The chocolate museum, behind the Grand Plac, was fantastic. It was really interesting and the enthusiasm of the chocolatier doing the demonstration was wonderful. I love passion in people, which is a further benefit for being part of the "chocolate world", people in the industry usually have so much passion for their vocation.

Travelling by Eurostar was brilliant. We arrived in time to leave our bags at the hotel and go wandering for supper and beer. We found went to a brasserie and ordered as tourist-Belgian as we could: moules naturale with frites, Belgian beers, followed by waffles with chocolate sauce and ice cream. Saturday we caught the train to Brugges for our extravaganza at the three-starred Michelin restaurant, De Karmeliet. We couldn’t ignore the tasting menu. Seven courses. The cheese course procuring the full cheese trolley (le chariot de fromages!). Before we chose our menu option we were given five amuse bouche each, which included a tartlette of tomato, basil and cheese, an olive friand, mackeral with salsa and a langoustine mousse. These were a great incentive to order the full degustation menu.

Our seventh dessert course turned out to be first a stand with 7 petit fours each, then a plate of three apple desserts (including sorbet, pastry, icecream, foam, mousse, crisp and rice pudding) and finally they whisked away this empty plate and returned with the chocolate construction below:



We were ridiculously and deliciously full, and we still have kilos of chocolate to work our way through. Now you might see why we bought to take home, rather than sampling too much while we were there!

Highlights:


The Chocolate Line in Brugge was inspiring. I get the feeling the main chocolatier doesn't make all of the multitude of chocolates he offers but I bet he makes these ones himself:



The one at the front is Fried Onions. Yes, fried onions. It was pretty hideous to be truthful. I wasn't a big fan of the Saffron Curry either (but that's partly because I don't love white chocolate). The Wasabi was interesting, and really well balanced. The Black Olive, Sundried Tomato and Basil was less appealing but provoking nonetheless. His better chocolates were some not featured in this image. The passionfruit, the raspberry and some of his pralines. Plaudits for his adventurousness though!

Pierre Marcolini in Brussels (on the grand sablon):


He is the only chocolatier in Brussels to make his own couveture from the bean. Fantastic chocolates. His nut-encrusted truffles were particularly moreish.

Others in Brussels worth going to (that are harder to find in the UK):
Wittamer for their square ganaches and raspberry hearts (ignore the truffles in hard shells) and Galler (though you can find them in Harrods Chocolate Hall there are a few extra treats you won't find in the UK yet).

On the way to the chocolate capital, Brussels.

Sometimes life is great. Like, right now, I’m on the train on my way to Brussels, planning moules et frites for when we arrive, staying in a nice (albeit chain) hotel and a three star Michelin restaurant booked for lunch tomorrow. I’m in the middle of Lollipop Shoes (I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to read it!) and it’s as wonderful as Chocolat. The prose used to describe the chocolate make me so glad that I have a business in chocolate. Then there’s the fact that on top of all the chocolate lying waiting for me to explore in Belgium, there’s also Belgian beer and the fact that people have been saying nice things about my tours. Hooray. I stumbled across this blog post written by a fabulous American girl who came on my tour a few months ago. I love people who love food! And I also had a call from a lady to book her gift certificates that were bought for her by her son who had loved the tour so much he had to buy it for his parents. I remember him and his lovely wife, a singer. That was a fun tour. I get to meet such great people.

If this post all sounds a bit gushy, I apologise. What can I say? It’s the start of a weekend, I’m going to another country for the weekend (I love living in London!), and people have said nice things about something I’ve put quite a lot of love and effort into. Oh yeah, and all the deliciousness to come. Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to give you all the details!

Willie and the Chocolate Factory

What are the odds of the first man to start making chocolate from the bean in the UK to have the name of Willie? Love it. Mr Dahl, I’m sure, would be very pleased.

The lovely chaps from Seventypercent invited me to a tasting for Willie Harcourt-Cooze. To be filmed as part of a four-part documentary showing in March. I’m guessing this section is demonstrating the chocolate revolution in the UK and exactly why there will be a demand for Willie’s chocolate liquor in stores. Now, I should clarify: Mr Harcourt-Cooze Is not making chocolate as we know it. He has a farm ( a “hacienda”) in Venezuela and rather than selling his beans to other manufacturers he decided to grind the beans to liquor himself. Liquor is the early stage of chocolate, you will see it as an ingredient on the back of chocolate (also seen as cocoa solids). It doesn’t yet have sugar mixed with it and hasn’t been conched with additional cocoa butter and the sugar to make it smoother and more palatable (this process destroys a lot of the flavanoids that give us antioxidants but, on the upside, remove the bitterness (one and the same in this case, unfortunately).

Only recently, two UK businesses have started to make chocolate themselves, but even these companies buy in the liquor. The making of chocolate they do is all in the blending of the liquor to their own times and temperatures and with varying amounts of sugar. Willie’s product will be completely niche in the UK. It’s not a big production but it will appeal to all of you who, like me, love the idea of stripping food right back to the raw ingredient and then messing about with it in your own kitchen. In order for us to get a taste for his product Willie made it into a tartufo (the liquor, a small amount of sugar and cream). You could tell that the quality was good. There’s a definite difference to the taste and texture because it’s pre-conching but it was miles better than cheaper chocolate in stores and a better flavour profile than some of the other pure bars we tasted on the night. Unfortunately because it was all being filmed I couldn’t really take any pictures but the documentary debuts the 2nd Thursday in March. The tasting is unlikely to be until at least the third hour but I think the whole series, beginning at the plantation in Venezuela, will be just fascinating.

The first line of the liquor goes on sale exclusively in Selfridge’s on February 18th. Sometime in the next few month’s I’m hoping to get down to Devon to see his factory, and one day I might run a chocolate tour to his plantation in Venezuela. Now that would be cool.

Happy New Year!

OK, it's a little late, but it isn't quite Christmas again yet. Though I'm sure that this year it will arrive as quickly as it seemed to last year! In the meantime, there's a lot of chocolate to eat.

Back in the UK now and I'm tempted on almost every corner by quality European brands and my chocolate consumption has returned to its sky-high levels, unfortunately this hasn't been accompanied by resuming regular exercise. Oops. Though I have been doing quite a bit of wandering around London in my research for the 2nd Chocolate Tour, which will launch in the next few months (hooray!).

I hope you all had a fabulous start to 2008. We did, celebrating at home with great friends and great food (well, the ingredients were good, I shouldn't shout too loud as I made most of it). We did have lovely homebaked bread (not made by me) and our friends brought taramasalata from Fishworks (soooo good, if you haven't tried it and you are anywhere near a Fishworks restaurant, go now!) and they also bought chocolate cakes. So we had two chocolate desserts, the one I prepared (to be more specific, this is one I had only got as far as getting the ingredients out for but decided to make even after hearing they had brought another chocolate dessert) and the Christmas Logs from La Maison du Chocolat. The home-made dessert was a peach and chocolate pudding. What can I say? it's Winter here, and hot chocolate pudding was required. I feel I should perhaps clarify that we also had a main course of baked salmon, kale and hazelnut and parsley mash potatoes. I'm getting hungry writing this...

Three days later I was treated to dinner in Claridge's. We discovered they do a fabulous deal on a three course meal. Delicious food, and they use Valhrona Manjari in their chocolate dessert (though the raspberry was actually the tastier dessert, I think).

If you have found this site through Red Magazine, welcome! I hope to see you on a tour sometime!

Now it's really time for dinner. Wishing you all good food and good chocolate and good health for 2008!

Back soon...

homeward bound

Well, there was more baking, more chocolate and there was more proper activity. A few more farm walks, I pedalled a few laps of some of the paddocks while the boys played with the motorbikes, and we had a few hits of tennis (I’m so bad at it!) and on the gorgeously sunny boxing day we did make it to the beach AND managed to make this spectacular sand castle.





We packed so much into every day, yet felt completely relaxed the whole time, it was more in retrospect that we realised in one day we’d baked (twice), played tennis, gone to the beach (twice) and spent a fair bit of time just hanging around. Other days were similarly busy and it passed all too quickly before we had to pile our luggage into my mum’s toy car and drive back to Melbourne for our flight home. Not before catching up with a few more friends at a pub, riverside. Melbourne is more gorgeous now than it was when I was a student there, though I am very happy living in London. I was sorry not to have spent more time with my Australian friends, it was all too short, sorrier still I didn’t see some at all, though this always happens, and glad that this time I got to see some I’d missed the last time. It’s amazing how quickly the years pass and how when you return after not seeing people for so long it all feels so easy still.

What will I miss? My dad’s breadmaker bread, made from flour he mills himself, the sunshine, trying more of the restaurants and discovering all the food changes that occur in my absence, being able to go to the farm and relax and eat my mother’s famous chips. I’ll miss walking along the beach. Mostly I’ll miss the people, especially my delightful niece and nephew who made Christmas so special.

Back to Old Blighty. Does anyone know why it’s called that? I could Google it I suppose… Except I’m writing this on the plane and there’s no search engine up here… In fact there’s not much of anything on this plane, no personal TVs, not even a personal air conditioning vent! Good on the way out with back to back night flights we slept, with no distractions to watch films, I’ve managed to fill almost the entire twelve hour flight to Shanghai with a thick and very addictive novel bought for me by my Holly for Christmas. Perhaps I’ll nap on tomorrow’s flight.

Ain't no sunshine while we're here...

We keep getting scolded for bringing the weather with us. But it’s not true! Most of the days we have had here have been sunny and nice! Well, maybe slightly more than have been raining. Today it is cool. Time for scrabble and films. Might as well have stayed in the UK! Though I would rather this than the high thirties they are predicting for the week after we leave. Especially this is suitable weather for a sweet-toothed frenzy. Mind you, all of the desserts I’ve made so far are cold ones: chocolate ripple cake, the biscuits soaked in cherry juice; a chocolate-cherry cake; and a loganberry marscapone trifle. The chocolate-cherry cake was pretty ordinary. I was glad I didn’t use all of the good chocolate in it. If I’d had cocoa (forgot to buy cocoa, silly) I would have swapped it for some of the flour and I should have left out the lemon rind as my gut instinct was telling me. It was a confusion of being a fruit cake and a chocolate cake, and not in a good way. I love the combination of chocolate and cherries though (the chocolate ripple cake was divine) so I might have another go at the recipe. There’s still more baking to do before I leave, to use up more of the ingredients I bought. We might have to get up to something more active than one gorgeous walk along the bush tracks though!

the best meal ever (so far...)

Wow. What a meal. That is the best meal I have had so far in my life. True, I have a lot more restaurants to try but previously I would have struggled to pick a favourite meal. Not so anymore.

In the six non-consecutive nights we had in Melbourne we managed to fit in meals at Taxi, Vue de Monde, Koko and Jacques Raymond. There are so many incredible restaurants in Melbourne and not enough time to go to all, but these seemed like a good selection. We were gluttons at all of them, accepting the full menu at two of the four. At Vue de Monde this was the ten course Gourmande menu. Gourmande, meaning someone who eats a lot, very appropriate. Of the ten courses, plus amuse bouche, palette cleansers and petits fours, only two were just ok, and the rest were outstanding. There was a lot of food theatre at the table, but a meal is partly about entertaining and the smoking bowls, the dry ice drinks and the bouillabaisse made at the table in a 1970s coffee machine were all delicious as well as entertaining to watch. I hate going out for a meal and receiving a dish I feel I could have made better myself. Only the chocolate dishes here were in that category (and maybe the cheese course). All of the other dishes were far beyond my culinary abilities, the creativity was inspiring and the ingredients both difficult to obtain and luxurious (too expensive for an amateur like me to experiment with!). Flavours were perfectly matched to be interesting, complementary and without overwhelming each other. Challenging the palette without distracting from the quality of the ingredients. Our first dish of salmon, with smoked, fresh, mousse, foam and jerky set the standards for intensity of flavour and variety of texture. The crayfish mousse wrapped in courgette (zuchinni here) and topped with a buerre noisette sat in a shallow Provençal vegetable soup with crayfish pieces was a favourite of all of us. Just divine. The first dessert course matched our first savoury in strength of flavour and texture variety, this time the central ingredient was raspberry: a raspberry mousse on crisp rice flavoured with raspberry and dotted with snap-frozen raspberries. On the side of the bowl was a raspberry cannelloni (striped raspberry sugar shell) filled with raspberry rice pudding and drizzled with a raspberry coulis. Yum, yum, yum and yum. The service was friendly and knowledgeable though I was surprised that after one of the servers knocked my brother’s glass of red wine over me (the poor waitress) they didn’t refill his glass and though the manager came with his card and offered to pay the dry cleaning, they didn’t offer any discount on the meal. Strange.

Of the five courses at Jacques Raymond only two were really good. The others seemed, to me, to be an attempt to be too clever, pairing strange ingredients that didn’t quite gel. Steamed spinach and dehydrated strawberries is an interesting idea but not particularly compelling and especially not next to vegetables I can't remember decorated with rubbery slivers of black truffle, a special “extra” we were persuaded to have. A piece of pumpkin laquered with palm sugar and miso, served on a vanilla puree with coriander, fennel and a soy and sake glaze was suberb, however. It was obvious when the ingredients weren’t as high quality, and too many of them weren’t. It isn’t like me to be too critical and I guess I just had too high expectations after hearing it was given best restaurant for 2008. Perhaps they were foreseeing better things for the coming year than they were able to produce for mid-December 2007? Though it’s considerably less expensive than Vue de Monde I’d still rather pay more and eat there.

Taxi was fabulous. Great quality food, beautifully plated. Slow service but pleasant enough. I was taunted by a cherry mousse with a Valhrona centre that had one tiny square of Manjari in the middle of cherry-hinted warm air. It had me (and my brother) digging into the chocolate stashes at home. With the views of the Yarra and the relaxed and comfortable atmosphere, and obviously the great food overall, I would definitely go there again.

Koko reminded me of an episode of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares where the chef was scolded for cooking everything on the grill and Gordon told him it was making all the food taste the same. We had teppanyaki. Our first course of sushi and sashimi was fantastic and the quality of the seafood and meat cooked to follow could not be argued with, but I kind of missed the impressive plating and accompanying sauces that normally happens in these restaurants. Even though we were given three bowls of sauces each to dip into as we pleased, somehow sloshing a bit of soy over the sizzling steak and a dab of butter and squeeze of lemon on the toothfish made it just seem less magical. But I guess everything just pales now in comparison to Vue du Monde... But I'm happy to face up to the challenge of trying to beat the best meal title in 2008!

All-Australian Experience

I hadn’t expected this to be as much of a holiday as it is so far turning out to be. We’ve spent the most of the last few days in planes and cars, baptising the man to true Aussie experiences. On the first day we made it to the beach (albeit only the sand, the water wasn't too inviting), on the second a barbie with my friends, on the third we flew to Sydney and climbed the Sydney Harbour Bridge. An All-Australian experience for our first few days. At this point it finally rained, leaving him questioning the insults he receives about the weather in the UK, but it made the walk up the steel pylons all the more adventurous!

We’ve been treated to gorgeous seafood spreads and this morning a tropical fruit spread with fresh croissants before heading to the airport to fly back to Melbourne. We also saw Australian animals (and more) at the Taronga Zoo and swam in the beach at Noosa. We were completely spoiled in Brisbane with seafood followed by sparkling wine in the hot tub and a swim in the outdoor pool in the morning.



A giraffe with Sydney in the background (!). We went for lunch in the viewing tower you might be able to make out in the distance. Don't bother unless you are just going for the seafood. It's ok but I'm not a huge fan of buffets at the best of times, I like the choice but hate that the lack of focus that usually means most things aren't great, or that they have been sitting in the warmer for hours. The view is lovely though. I did get to introduce the man to some Aussie desserts though: Lamingtons, Cherry Ripe Slice, Caramel Slice. Unfortunately not the greatest examples of these, I might have to make some with the kids over Christmas.

The only blip in our fabulous Northern side trip was this:


He was actually ON the toilet roll when I started to pull it. Needless to say, I screamed. I don't mind spiders, unless they surprise me in a small room at such close quarters. I was just grateful I had only just closed the door and could escape quickly!! (And that there was another toilet in the house.)

Back in Melbourne, we've got a few fancy meals planned while we're here. Taking advantage of the fact that nice restaurants are slightly cheaper here than restaurants of a similar quality in London. Tomorrow night we're off to Vue de Monde, given the Best Restaurant in Melbourne for 2007 title. As we can't try them all we might as well try the best!

Lazy last weekend in London (with Chocolate Wine)

I love lazy weekends. I have needed one. These last six weeks have been hectic and living the last four months in just one room of what was a one-bed flat has made weekends at home pretty unappealing. We finally got the carpet laid last week and moved all the furniture last weekend (ok, he mostly moved the furniture, I ate chocolate, but it was my birthday, so that's ok right?).

Last Friday evening was magical. We went to Somerset House to go iceskating, and I managed to stop thinking that I might fall and have my fingers sliced off by blades, and just relaxed into skating and gazing at the gorgeous building that surrounded this sparkly circle reflecting the coloured lights all around. Mulled wine, music and a brisk pre-Christmas evening.

So despite it being a "lazy" weekend I have done quite a lot of my backlog of filing and emails and feeling reasonable proud of myself. I also managed to find time to make a scrumptious chocolate and berry pudding and to have Sunday lunch at a friend's house. Where we drank this wine:

How cool is this? It concerned me that they'd named it so because it was quite high in tannins and therefore slightly bitter but it was delicious with dinner.

Chocolate as Fuel

And not just for humans! I know I can definitely run further and faster on chocolate, but now it appears cars can too!

This provided interesting canape conversation last night so I thought it was about time I wrote about it in my blog:

Two chaps from the UK, Andy Pag and John Grimshaw, have converted a truck and two 4WD vehicles to run on the misshapes of chocolates and are travelling to Timbuktu. Brilliant! I'm so excited about the use of this "chocolate" (I don't think they're using top notch stuff here) for fuel. This trip is not just carbon neutral, it's carbon negative. Though this calculation includes the fuel that will be offset in the coming year if the citizens of Mali use the biofuel conversion machine they are delivering. But it's also because if they weren't using the chocolate rejects for fuel they would only be taking up space in a dump somewhere.

It also works out at about 15p/litre. (That's about US $1.16/gallon.) Isn't it great when things are good for the environment and good for your wallet?

Nice work, gentlemen!

Check out more about biodiesel from chocolate at their site.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today I was thankful for the happy music that made me bounce along in the car on the way to work, for the road that took me there smoothly and the sunrise that lit the way after the lights were snuffed out along the journey. I was grateful for the gym at the end of my ride that allowed me to feel good about eating three courses at dinner last night.

Pacific Bar and Grill is such a friendly local restaurant. We stepped into the warmth from the rain and this pub made shiny was almost full with smiling diners. The two waiters looking after the whole floor were attentive though a little scattered! But I haven't had such friendly service in a long time. The food was fresh, simply prepared with good ingredients, and a delicious combination of flavours that didn't try too hard - it didn't need to. Both the tuna and the salmon we had were cooked perfectly and served with bright green leaves (mine Cos, his rocket) and light dressings. The high point was still to come: The Chocolate Brownie, broken up, warmed and topped with ice cream and hot chocolate sauce, it was just divine. Crisp on the edges and chewy and fudge-like when you got towards the middle pieces. A delicious dessert that couldn't seem to decide whether it was cake or cookie or something in between, made in-house apparently. I had to use my fork to fight away the persistent attempts to steal it. At this point the head waiter told us he would bring us something to go with the brownie, and promptly brought us two glasses of frangelico on ice. Now that is the way to bring warmth to the heart of your customers and get them to return.

food-full weekend (chocolates too)

I only started feeling hungry again at noon today. I've been too busy eating this weekend to write in my blog. Which now leaves me with a backlog of things to post about.

On Friday night I went to the BBC Good Food Show. I got there quite late so it was a bit of mad dash around as many stalls as I could get to. So many chocolate stores! Including a new one, Vanini:




New to me, at least. They have apparently been making chocolate for decades in Italy but only just been brought over to the UK. I tried all the ganache bon bons and their dark bar too. Delicious! And no nasties in their ingredients either. I look forward to them coming into the shops. By the time I got back from doing the loop of the other stalls they had closed so I didn't get to buy any this time.

After the food stalls closed we went to explore the drinks vendors and then the dining experience. It wasn't quite the choice, or the quality, of the Taste London festival. Theo Randall did have a soft chocolate cake made with Valrhona. The menu said it was made with Lindt but the host told me that Lindt offered them the chocolate and they accepted and then tasted it and decided to use Valrhona instead. It was delicious. I really don't think it's as obvious what quality the chocolate is in cakes as much as in tarts and mousses though...

On Saturday I was chocolate touring all day then went to a friend's hens' party for dinner and karaoke and finally yesterday went to another friend's house for more eating. I feel like I didn't stop eating all weekend. Here are some of the "raw" chocolate desserts we made:

blueberry and orange mousse cake


chocolate fudge!


chocolate and apple cake

a chocolate brownie gift!

I received a note this week that I had a parcel delivery attempt. I ran to the post office this morning to get it. When I returned home I ripped open the discreet cardboard box to find...
BROWNIES!



Sent to me by the lovely Jane of Coco a Moi. Seemed like a great way to start a Friday so I ripped open the box and tucked in. They had pecans in them so surely a good way to start the day? They come in brownie bites so it's easy to just have one or two (or three...).



They are completely different to the brownies I sell on my website. Not just because of the nuts. They are slightly more cakey and it's a very different chocolate flavour, a completely different texture. Yummy. Both so yummy. Mmm...