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well. since we’re talking zumbo…

the plump raspberry heralds its lineage. this saucy daughter of the envie (remember? chocolate ganache and squishy raspberries in a fine pate sucree shell) goes by the name, envious. but take your cue from the bite-sized yellow macaron: yes, a passionfruit-chocolate tart. how can it be, you wonder.

as did i.

i’d take a bite, and the fleeting tang of passionfruit would be almost imperceptible. the next bite would be an intense burst of sunshine, and then the ganache would melt away, fast and chocolate, and i’d be left wondering… did i just –? and on it went.

i hear they make this by straining passionfruit pulp and stirring it through the ganache. while there are no hidden surprises in the crisp pastry shell, no squishy bits of fruit to tease your tongue, i love that the passionfruit component is not quite homogenised; you get a different passionfruit-chocolate experience with each mouthful.

today i saw a big tart, for sharing or sheer spectacle. it was festooned with many a small yellow macaron, and spears of vegetation, truly a tiny garden of eden.

next down the runway, barbados: a moulded wall of palm sugar mousse, and then sticky rice pudding, a thin layer of coconut jelly, and one of mango with bits of pineapple, all on a biscuit base.

the first time i saw this, it was a lopsided construction. i seem to remember it did not have the rice pudding (any counterboys reading today? please set me straight!), and it looked like a soft, pastry version of a soviet era factory building. i was intrigued.

the first time i ate it — a couple of months ago — i was leaning up against the counter at adriano zumbo patissier, eating spoonfuls of the velvety mousse from the cake that had just been slid across to me. the rice pudding had, by then, been incorporated into the structure, and — fine, i have come to terms with the fact that the pastrychef likes a little bite in his grains of rice, fine — and that aside, it shot right up to one of my very favourite things from the zumbo kitchen. i think it was the mousse that done it, the faint caramel flavour, the way it felt full and fat — yet light — on my tongue before it swiftly dissipated. or maybe it was the summery thrill of tropical fruit. or hell, it was the sticky rice. oh how i love it, al dente and all.

this one here, that i finally brought home with me last week, seems different again. the rice pudding tastes more complex than i remember, with shades of lime and… basil? is it possible? it’s almost savoury, certainly, and plays off the medley of sweet things in a most satisfying manner. the pastry base is a little sodden; perhaps i have left it too long before eating it, but i don’t expect it was ever meant to be the star of the show. barbados is at least two desserts in one, maybe even four! it is possible that you may feel like you’ve had an island holiday after you’ve eaten it. and like a holiday, it will make you feel like you need another one.

it is fun, is it not, being able to follow the evolution of these beautiful cakes? to see them through gawky adolescence to their final splendour? a few weeks ago, there was a row of nascent religieuses behind glass. they were somewhat garish, a little clunky, but not without charm. this afternoon i caught a glimpse of the elegant poufs they had become, all dainty, detailed piping, and a promise of roses and lychees. this religieuse exerience, i think, will be the one i have next.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 3 November 2007 at 10:12 pm

permalink | filed under cake, chocolate

halloween! halloween? in australia?

last saturday, the kid, my mum and i were just walking up the street to lunch, when we suddenly decided to get on the bus into the city. the spontaneous plan was to partake of the sydney food and wine fair in hyde park, but as we approached, we realised that the enormous crowd of people we saw across elizabeth street was just the queue to buy food vouchers. ghastly!

it did not take much for us to turn left up elizabeth, and head for the lindt cafe instead. how’s that for spontaneous, eh?

before too long, we were ensconced in plush white seating, surrounded by cool marble and glidey waiters, with a selection of well-crafted, modestly-sized (but satisfyingly filling) sandwiches before us. spicy sausage panini with yoghurt and grilled peppers; roast beef schiaciatta with mustard, vintage cheddar, marinated tomatoes and bitey cress; club sandwich with smoked salmon and goat curd with dill. we were so satisfied we couldn’t even order dessert! well, ok, so i did have one of those only slightly over-the-top $6 iced dark chocolates. but still.

instead, i made do with a couple of special edition halloween lindor balls to go. the jack-o-lantern is a regular milk chocolate ball, and the spooky ghost one is a milk chocolate shell with a white chocolate filling (it also appears to use the font, template gothic, for smallprint — my favourite font from the 90s and boy does it take me back to that special place — although really, i think it’s just the effects of the limitations of printing small on plastic)… neither of which were extraordinary. i’m not even demanding an exotic pumpkin pie filling; just an orange-infused chocolate would have sufficed, and a dark chocolate shell for the ghosties. is all.

a day later, the crazy hot weather had rendered the filling a perfect liquid consistency, though by that same token it also sent the milk chocolate the wrong side of cloying.

i did get a raspberry lindor ball too, because, well, you know me and raspberry chocolate, and also, it’s wrapped in pink foil.

(and did you know you can now get bars of chilli dark chocolate? like, the regular 100g dark bar with a gentle burn in the back of your throat? for $4? bafflingly, the lindt shop is the most expensive place to buy lindt chocolate, but if you eat at the cafe, and present your cafe receipt at the shop counter, they take 15% off. so we did, and they did.)

but look! here’s the tricky raspberry-chocolate treat for you: adriano zumbo‘s raspberry-chocolate macaron. i got it monday afternoon, a lone specimen perched atop a case of plain chocolate ones. its speckled biscuit like a jewel in the raw, its fruity ganache mysterious and coy. but see, if only there had been more filling, i would totally be saying “voluptuous and jolly”.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 31 October 2007 at 7:22 am

permalink | filed under around town, chocolate, lunch, packaging

this past week, the kid has made heartening advances in the hand-eye coordination department. taking arky joe‘s lead, i handed her a blunt knife and half a banana at breakfast time, and by the third day, she was slicing perfectly uniform slices, and arranging them just so on her honey toast. but, oh, that glint in her eye when she took the knife from me that first morning!

so thursday morning, we delved into handling hot water. well, i poured it, and then she emptied the packet of jelly crystals, and stirred, and added cold water, and then filled a cluster of little gelato cups — without spilling a thing.

by the time we got back from library storytime, the jelly was ready! she poked her finger into it, and it sprang back, and her eyes were big at the magic! “but where is the other jelly?” she asked, bemused.

good children, today’s lesson in the state of matter: liquid, solid, gaseous and jelly!

me, i’ve been eating little food too (distinct, and very different from “a little food”). just look at these adorable ritter sport minis i got when i was last in singapore.

yes, i’m aware that was a good seven months ago, and i’d much rather think of this as “saving for a special occasion”, rather than “pathological hoarding”. and anyway, who says a special occasion can’t be, um, reading in bed?

i love ritter sport. it is so not sporty! pretty good chocolate with a huge variety of fillings like cornflakes or yoghurt or marzipan (or, yes, fruit and nut, if you’re that way inclined). the regular slabs are 16 squares; the minis, four, and you get an assortment in each pack.

of course, i liked the one with the whole sweet biscuit hidden within — just look at the cute wrapper, argh! — but even the old-skool hazelnut bar was very agreeable. here is the copy from the website, written with characteristically german precision and attention to detail:

…there are more nuts in ‘Ritter Sport Milk chocolate with Whole Hazelnuts’ than in other chocolates — and what is more, only the best hazelnuts will do: hand-picked and freshly roasted whole Turkish hazelnuts with precisely defined ideal dimensions — between 1.1 and 1.3 cm in diameter.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 23 September 2007 at 8:57 pm

permalink | filed under chocolate, kid

last friday, international opec day, i looked out the window and it was raining. ten minutes later, the sun was out… until the rain kicked in again. and so it continued through the morning, until it was time to go meet deborah. we packed our picnic rug just in case, and small forks, a flask of hot tea, and some pretty teacups, because we had a spring picnic in mind.

it’s good to have a plan, isn’t it? we already knew that one of the things we’d be eating was adriano zumbo’s chorizo and olive baguette. the other, as-yet-unkown entity was to be any lovely thing (or things — we had not planned to be restrained if the situation allowed) on the new season’s menu.

we met across the road from zumbo, and hurtled across darling street to the happiest place on earth. but, where o where were the delicate morsels of pink and green and yellow? everything in the cake display was chocolate!

(i know i say it like it’s a bad thing, and it’s not. just, the plan in our heads was in colours other than brown.)

so we pressed up against the wall as other people came and went, and eventually we worked out a suitably diverse collection of cakery for our morning tea. it had stopped raining by the time we emerged from the shop, and emboldened, we strode with purpose to the park. amidst other optimistic picnickers, we spread out our blanket. it had barely touched the ground when we felt the drizzle on our heads. after deborah pointed out a low ceiling of blackness blowing in from down the hill, we folded up the blanket and raced the raindrops home.

the kid, for whom the picnic torch burns bright, spread our faux burberry across the balcony floor, and then the parade of baked goods, and the pouring of tea. deborah unpacked a tidy box of cucumber sandwiches and a brand-spankin’-new ikea catalog. i was immensely pleased with both: the sandwiches had been made with soft white bread, and butter that the clever girl had salted herself, with pink flakes from the murray river; the ikea catalog holds the promise of things to come. we tried the chicken, mushroom and almond sausage roll, which tasted salty and peppery above all else, and, alas, doesn’t quite hit the heights of the lamb and harissa at bourke street bakery. and you already know the chorizo and olive baguette: lovely, chewy bread filled with a choice selection of salty things.

but we could hardly wait for the sweet things: deborah’s maxiadz was a great brown wheel on a stick — two bits of chocolatey dacquoise sandwiching luscious chocolate mousse and divine raspberry brulee. the whole contraption was coated in chocolate and then sprinkled with cocoa and rolled in chopped hazelnuts, and even between the three of us, chocolate freaks all, we could not quite finish it. (ok, i finished that last crumb of dacquoise later that night.)

and this, the one i’d been hanging out to try for aaaaaages. sugar lips: a brioche donut filled with lemon creme. look how it sparkles with sugar and cinnamon! see how pillowy soft it is when you slice it! just watch that glorious pale yellow ooze forth! if the man would just bottle his lemon creme, i would buy it and grow fat on it alone.

we poured the last cup of muji spicy orange and pepper tea, and then brewed a new pot of T2 monk pear. a splendid time was had by all.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 11 September 2007 at 3:51 pm

permalink | filed under cake, chocolate, lunch

i really never order a croissant. it’s just, you hear these french people talk about how nothing french outside of france tastes like it’s supposed to. and i know, the people who are not french roll their eyes and maybe make a rude gesture with their loosely-clasped fists. and i haven’t effectively been to france and eaten a real, live french croissant, so i have nothing with which to make a comparison. but i have eaten the odd croissant or two outside of france, and all they did was make me hope that the french ones were nothing like them.

outside of france i’ve had: pale, flaccid croissants; overly-browned croissants with a sugary glaze; flaky-mouthfuls-of-air croissants that leave your lips covered in bits; soggy almond croissants that taste of flour; and once, in a health ‘n’ golf spa resort high in the hills of east malaysia, a basket of mini croissants that weren’t flaky or buttery or puffy or whatever it is you think of when you think of croissants, plus they tasted strongly of freezer. which is a bit of a minus, really.

so i surprised myself at zumbo when i pointed out the chocolate croissant. i figured, if the pastry was lacking, at least i knew the chocolate would be good. but of course, the pastry wasn’t lacking at all. it was bold and crunchy on the outside, and just chewy enough on the inside. and the little slabs of dark chocolate tucked into its folds? just the right number. it made for a most enjoyable lull in springcleaning, with a cup of vanilla tea.

i don’t want to play favourites or anything, but i will eat this over and over again.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 5 September 2007 at 11:37 am

permalink | filed under cake, chocolate, snacks

“californication” eh? somehow i made it past the advertising blitz, the suntanned duchovny busstop posters, the pneumatic breasts of the first episode, the last-minute “mum, i want you to read me a story”… to watch episode two with a chocolate treat and a pot of mint tea by my side.

is hank moody the new carrie bradshaw? is this just sex in the other city? i much prefer new york, but i do like david duchovny. on tv. remember when he was on “the larry sanders show”? or when he did that episode of “dr katz“? a pan could not be deader. i’m pleased he’s not doing stoopid alien movies anymore.

at zumbo yesterday morning, i admitted my unease at the delicious way the cakes just melted away on my tongue. “you know why that is, don’t you?” asked counterboy.

“because they’re the fattest things on the planet?”

“yep.”

alas.

behold the chocadz. the salted butter caramel ganache melts away to nothing; so quickly, it is just a memory of a ribbon of salty-sweet. sitting on its crunchy hazelnut meringue biscuit base, it is draped in a thin coat of milk chocolate, and a dense sprinkle of rough-hewn hazelnuts. the first time i had this, i was on a plane, too early in the morning, up in the air somewhere between sydney and melbourne. i liked it then, hence the reprise, however it was much funner eating it in bed.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 4 September 2007 at 9:08 am

permalink | filed under chocolate, tv

from across the counter, before counterboy popped the lid onto the paper cup, i caught a glimpse of glossy dark brown and knew that this was a hot chocolate to be reckoned with. minutes earlier, the answer to the question, “do you make it with melted chocolate?” was a pause, and then, “it’s half cream and half chocolate.” i sipped it at the counter. it’s like drinking luxury.

but luxury which, a short time later, made me feel like my face was detaching from my head. i fear that my tolerance to good dark chocolate is decreasing; i would like to be able to eat more of it in one go before i start feeling strange. and this is really good dark chocolate: a rich… well, i can’t even say “liquid”, because it is on the verge of that next step up into… well, i can’t say “solid”, or even “goop” — like those cornstarchy concoctions that get sold as thick, european-style hot chocolate — because it glides so smoothly down my throat. what i did say, out loud, was that it was better than the lindt cafe hot chocolate, and those are big words, i know.

i kept up the steady sipping all the way home, and when i got there, with my loaf of soy linseed, and removed the lid, i was astounded to find that i hadn’t even made it halfway through the cup. i prepared myself a slice of buttered toast, and put the hot chocolate in the fridge for later.

which turned out to be much later, after dinner, when — because i am a wuss — i thinned it out on the stove with a dash of milk, and — because i am a wuss capable of diabolical and twisted reasoning — fashioned a sort of affogato with three kinds of ice cream. and look, one of them was even chocolate!

posted by ragingyoghurt on 2 September 2007 at 9:27 pm

permalink | filed under chocolate

i’d been watching it take shape over the last month or so, this shell of a shop next to gleebooks, on glebe point road. i’d been watching it specifically because once when i went past, there was a sign taped to the dusty window, which said, “chocolateria san churro coming soon”.

and then, last friday, there it was. pretty much open for business as i walked by after dropping the kid off at playschool, except for a ladder right in the middle of the dining room and two freshly jigsawed holes in the plywood shelf in the window.

monday afternoon, because this is the way we are, deborah met me and the kid out front. the holes had been plugged with miniature chocolate fountains, and the ladder had been removed, but when we stepped inside, the first inhalation was all paint fumes rather than sweet chocolate. we sought to remedy that in a hurry.

this was supposed to be lunch; we had debated the issue for a couple of days, and decided that to do justice to the chocolate, we should make it the main course rather than just dessert (but it’s never just dessert anyway, is it? is it?). so instead of just chocolate shakes, we had the chocolate shakes with whipped cream, and the alfajore, and the fried chocolate truffles.

the classic chocolate shake, made with premium 60% cocoa ice cream, comes to the table one foot high, topped with another couple inches of whipped cream and a good scattering of chocolate shavings. it is wonderful. the alfajore is two light, crunchy biscuits with a rich chocolate flavour, sandwiching smooth-as dulce de leche, whipped cream, and a drizzle of chocolate. it may not be an authentic rendition of the south american confection, but it is nonetheless, um, wonderful. the fried chocolate i had to get, because it sounded just crazy — loco, really — and it was! crazy good! you bite into the freshly fried nuggets, all thin crunchy shell, and then suddenly, molten dark chocolate is running down your chin. it comes three to a serve, on a bed of milk chocolate flakes, and it was lucky there were three of us to share it, or someone would have died. (me.) if the batter hadn’t tasted so slightly of oil, meh, these would have been wonderful too.

we had only just begun, and then the kid started speaking very, very fast. you could not even make out the words she was saying; they were sounds involving the rolling of her tongue. perhaps she was speaking spanish? funnily, i started speaking very, very slowly. “oh, you are speaking quickly, ” said deborah, “it’s just that time is moving very quickly too.”

and then something, and something, and something. and there was giggling, that i remember, and some slumping. and at some point we had to stop the waitress from clearing the plates with the chocolate flakes and the caramel-smeared cookie pieces. well, i thought i had to stop the waitress; everyone else had stopped eating by then.

so, yeah. it was great. i had only managed to walk past the one on brunswick street the last time i was in melbourne, but the time before that, i had come out of there with a spicy hot chocolate in one hand and a tray of fat, crunchy churros and chocolate dipping sauce in the other, a fine balancing act all the way to the playground by the museum. and now, i will no longer have to fly south to OD on chocolate: it is only a busride away.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 28 August 2007 at 11:28 pm

permalink | filed under around town, chocolate

ah! what is this thing? with its topping of dark crumbs?

after a fun 20 minutes at kinko’s, i cut across oncoming (pedestrian) traffic along the footpath, to peer into the window of the bourke street bakery’s broadway satellite, just to see. and here was something new! because the labels were all a-hither, i had to step inside to ask what it was. and then because i was already inside, i had to buy it.

behold: the chocolate mousse and raspberry tart. the gritty innercity cousin (with the milky soft heart) of the zumbo and lumiere chocolate-raspberry tarts, previously documented.

raspberry chocolate and me go way back. it was the summer of nellicent’s graduation from northwestern, and we spent the days with the backs of our knees slick with sweat, hanging around downtown chicago. the tourist brochure from our hotel had a coupon in it for a welcome gift from marshall field’s, the historic chicago department store, and we took advantage, really we did. day after day we would show up at the visitors’ center, coupons in hand, and be like, “oh! what a lovely surprise, to be getting this giftbag with a little box of chocolates inside.”

the chocolates were frangos, and commonly mint, but one day, there was a red box which held a raspberry variety. these were small blocks of chocolate that just melted away on our tongues. the raspberry flavour was bewitching.

and of course, it is “flavour”. a distinctively un-raspberry taste that you know to be “raspberry” because the package is red, and says r-a-s-p-b-e-r-r-y. and you crave it anyway, and years later, you discover that the raspberry syrup they use in starbucks is a pretty good approximation of a raspberry frango, when squirted into a hot chocolate.

this is not like a frango. beneath the dark chocolate crumbs is a lush chocolate mousse. beneath the mousse is a layer of squishy, tart raspberries. the pastry shell is flaky, rather than biscuity, and the whole thing — this tiny bouquet of contrasting textures — is so extremely delicious that i keep nudging it with my fork, eating it one small piece at a time, until it is all gone. it certainly makes a night of saving print-ready PDFs infinitely more pleasant. those crumbs… ingenious.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 19 August 2007 at 4:09 pm

permalink | filed under around town, cake, chocolate

my desk is a mess again, and i haven’t even arrived at the busy time. i am circling the periphery, looking in, pacing myself. just pacing.

at my elbow i have sheets of paper, covered in scribbled lists: lists of amendments to layouts; lists of drawings to make; lists of invoices to send; lists of where to go in queensland.

i have passes to a film on the weekend: “an epic tale of mothers and sons, mothers and daughters, unrequited love, betrayal and secrets… the true story of a glamorous shanghai nightclub singer, who struggles to survive in seventies australia with two young children“. phew!

i have tea: muji jasmin tea ball in a muji glass teapot, good gifts from my good mother.

i have chocolate: a monsieur truffe bar with cocoa solids of 64%. there is some guff on the back of the package about fresh fruity notes and bouquets of dried fruits, but i am simply impressed by how a dark chocolate bar — french, no less (by way of melbourne) — can be so goshdarned creamy.

i have an urgent calling to watch that hideous show, “age of love“.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 16 August 2007 at 10:30 pm

permalink | filed under chocolate, misc, tv, werk

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