As with every other year, we started at La Renaissance: A perfect strawberry macaron, an old favourite palmier, and a chocolate and pistachio roulade. Plus an individual Le Roi Soleil, a gorgeous dome of mango & mandarin mousse with coconut cremeux, almond nougatine & almond sponge. How fitting!
Then we started strolling - by 11am The Rocks was abuzz with people and they are all caffeinated/caffeinating. Because of the recent rise in popularity in specialty roasters, for the first time in many years the Aroma Festival went back to how it all started in 1998 - it has a big focus on coffee, the stuff of aromas. There are a range of coffee preparations too, no longer just the creamy espresso, there were the 'artisan' coffees such as pour over, cold drip and traditional Kenyan brew. These gave different characters to the flavours of the coffee and, as much as we all love a good espresso, Australia is way overdue for these preparations.
I had a lovely cold brew from Delano Specialty Coffee. The Kenyan traditional coffee by Djebena was also stellar - strong, but not bitter. I didn't mind the pour over coffee from Zest Coffee too, although dimmed in comparison to Delano.
Having loaded up in coffee, we left the beautiful atmosphere of The Rocks for Koko Black, where we had spectacular chocolates a few months before. Koko Black has a basement cafe, serving chocolatey desserts and drinks, which filled our table: Iced chocolate/coffee, chocolate affogato (chocolate sauce over ice cream), an apple crumble with panna cotta, a salted caramel delice, and a chocolate spoils plate with chocolate ice cream and crumble, chocolate alchemy cake, chocolate mousse, chocolate pralines and chocolate cherry royale. 
Let's start with the way it should be tasted - light to heavy. The apple crumble with panna cotta was quite fresh but that panna cotta lacked the wobble-effect. Salted caramel is a flavour that has been done to death, but boy this was a good delice - gooey sticky sauce over a mousse that encased a chewy caramel centre. Now that chocolate spoils plate - every item rich and chocolatey and best shared. Really good chocolate mousse - light texture, rich flavour, and that little pot is the perfect amount as any more than that will send anyone into a sugar high. Chocolate alchemy - rich chocolate ganache, moist layers of cake and chocolate creme, again perfectly petite. Chocolate ice cream was silky and again, rich. 
The desserts are on par with Lindt, or Guylian's, and of course their chocolates were brilliant. Though for a cutting edge boutique chocolatier the desserts could be more creative.
Post chocolate high that accompanied the caffeine high, I took a stroll on this stunning afternoon across the harbour bridge. Calories consumed - 2000. Calories burnt - 200. I feel so much better now .....
CS
