Paris, je t'aime!! Having spent 3 weeks just eating my way through Paris, it was sad to return, because now I have to look harder and walk farther to find a good croissant, luscious almond chocolate croissant (if they exist in Sydney), fresh baguette that is just so tasty on its own, pastries and desserts and cheeses and wonderful fresh produce than I could dream to indulge.
But we must pay the bill and that means the holiday must end at some stage... the consolation was, we would be returning to Sydney for the October Good Food Month!!
Being our favourite month of the year (yes, better than Christmas and new years holidays!) October Good Food Month is simply a culinary delight for gluttons such as us. Long before October, and far far away from Sydney, the CEO and Secretary munched French baguettes and indulged on €2 Camembert cheeses, €5 bottles of wine, while cherry-picking five of the SugarHits from this year's Sydney International Food Festival.
I love creme brulees. Second only to macarons, it would be my favourite dessert. Unfortunately I have had poor creme brulees in Sydney - curdled at Santa Cruz (Mexican restaurant in Cremorne), runny (too many places to mention), or solid creme brulees at Paradoxe (Crows Nest, which WAS a paradox because they are run by a French chef!!!). But I could not resist the orange and grand marnier infused creme brulee at Harbour Bar, Park Hyatt, The Rocks. Verdict? Two thumbs up. It was luscious but not overly rich, and I easily polished off 1 and 2/3 portions thanks to fellow dessertee who has a much smaller dessert stomach ;-) Citrusy fruity Brown Brothers dessert wine totally complemented.
Big welcome to Flora and hubby to their first DDT!!
Next stop, desserts with a heavy Asian influence at Monkey Magic, Surry Hills, for black sesame creme caramel with red wine-poached pear, coconut ice cream and pink peppercorn, served with a choice of cognac, or Brown Brothers dessert wine, or Choya plum wine. What also intrigued many of us were their attractive a la carte dessert menu, so we managed to have a variety of desserts on this night - with caramel semifreddo, silken tofu cake with lemon sorbet, banana white chocolate and shiso spring rolls.
Tofu cake was very light, but I could not taste the soy flavour. Quite unlike the tofu cheese cake from Ella's at Hurstville. To me it was a tad bland. Lemon sorbet was lovely, very smooth, literally disappears as soon as you lick it. Very nice. The spring roll was interesting - Not sure I personally enjoyed the flavour, but that's unfair to this unusual and flavoursome dessert. Salted caramel semifreddo was gorgeous and creamy. The black sesame creme caramel was the SugarHit of the night. LOVE. Rich sesame flavour; coconut ice cream light and fresh, but I'm not sure about the pink peppercorns - which I scraped to the side, but others enjoyed the spicy and slightly numbing flavour. And we agreed that the plum wine went best with this dessert - maybe it's got something to do with the Oriental flavour - Asian sweets seem to go better with green tea, for example. One criticism I could come up with was that it wasn't exactly creme caramel, but more a creme brulee without the burnt sugar on top. Not a flaw in my mind.
Tofu cake was very light, but I could not taste the soy flavour. Quite unlike the tofu cheese cake from Ella's at Hurstville. To me it was a tad bland. Lemon sorbet was lovely, very smooth, literally disappears as soon as you lick it. Very nice. The spring roll was interesting - Not sure I personally enjoyed the flavour, but that's unfair to this unusual and flavoursome dessert. Salted caramel semifreddo was gorgeous and creamy. The black sesame creme caramel was the SugarHit of the night. LOVE. Rich sesame flavour; coconut ice cream light and fresh, but I'm not sure about the pink peppercorns - which I scraped to the side, but others enjoyed the spicy and slightly numbing flavour. And we agreed that the plum wine went best with this dessert - maybe it's got something to do with the Oriental flavour - Asian sweets seem to go better with green tea, for example. One criticism I could come up with was that it wasn't exactly creme caramel, but more a creme brulee without the burnt sugar on top. Not a flaw in my mind.
Tofu cake, black sesame creme caramel, banana white chocolate shiso spring rolls ... sorry but i didn't get a photo of the caramel semifreddo because I forgot to bring my camera!!! :-p
Big welcome to Lisa and Cathy :D What a place to start your dessert experience!
The one chocolatey dessert we chose from SugarHit was the white and dark chocolate mousse in a tuille, with cointreau orange segments, woven caramel nest, and honeycomb pieces on chocolate grenache. It was probably the most average dessert we had on our dessert tour this year, chocolate mousse was not light and airy, there was not enough dark compared to white chocolate mousse, and the tuille which encased it was a little stiff after refrigeration. We couldn't taste the cointreau, the 'woven caramel nest' was simply caramelised sugar. My favourite part was actually the honeycombe - melt in your mouth (except the outside crust) and lovely and bitter-sweet.
Welcome Amy and John!!
The next dessert echoed the Asian theme - Black sesame blancmange served with sparkling muscato at Ocean Room. It was slightly disappointing in terms of the serving size, after being spoiled by Monkey Magic and Holiday Inn, this little cup of blancmange was looking very pathetic. But it was so delicious! Blancmange is like a panna cotta, it's cooked cream set with gelatin, and quite unlike Monkey Magic, this one was very light. Give me 5 - because I can have 5 in one sitting.
Because our CEO missed out on Holiday Inn and Ocean Room, the finale was the Bel Mondo's poached pear and medjool date with hazelnut praline ice cream, spiced french toast and butterscotch sauce. We had last minute cancellations so it was just the two of us, eating 3 desserts - not that we are complaining because it was very delicious (and the head bartender was flirting heavily with us) - the spiced french toast was soaked with eggy goodness, very moist and full of flavour. Ice cream was just lovely - who doesn't like praline ice cream (apart from ppl with nut allergies)?! It took us a while to figure out what was the dark, what looked like the caked-on paste on the bottom of the plate - it was a paste made of dates! Very delicious.
Another month of culinary over-indulgence is over. I wonder what other creations the pastry chefs in Sydney will come up with next? But before they do, November DDT is the half-yearly home bake again!! Get your creative juices flowing and come up with something no one else had had before!! (KT: test it on others first please :P)
CS
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