Hotel Chocolat Easter 2013 Review: Beau Bunny Choc Egg

Time for Easter already?  Well it's time to start thinking about it.  Hotel Chocolat kindly sent me a Beau Bunny to sample or give away....I chose to sample it.  They don't seem to sell this from their website in the same format - you can have either the egg or the mini eggs, but their shop may have a more diverse range.  They seem to have turned MR BB into a bit of a 'product' but he is quite cute and the chocolate was OK so I don't really mind.

 I'd like to point out there was nothing wrong with their P and P.  The white scratch on the top of the egg was made by me in my eagerness with some scissors to rip off the ribbon and cellophane.

 So it was a nice transfer of a rabbit plus 6 mini eggs.  We all preferred the 3 caramel filled ones, the other three were 'praline' and we are not that mad on nuts.

The large itself I didn't have a problem with,nice and thick with a good flavour, but my partner said it tasted a bit of coconut which is not necessarily good for a premium chocolate.

Overall 8/10 - enough for three of us to share as a dessert, or for one person at Easter
They are suitable for vegetarians and all of their chocolate is ethically sourced.

Review: Hotel Chocolat: Your Eggscellency Extra Thick Easter Egg

Hotel Chocolat kindly sent me a Your Eggscellency™ Extra Thick Easter Egg.  

The packaging was beautiful, almost a mini hat box, with a luxury black ribbon tied around it.  I have previously criticised HC for their excessive packaging, but this time I was won over. Not as much plastic as there was last year. A couple of months ago I was seriously underwhelmed by the HC Advent Calendar, but this li'l baby ticked all the boxes.  Exciting packaging, thick chocolate in two colours and inside, 12 liqueur chocs: Champagne truffle was my fave, followed by the Mojito and then the Bison Grass Vodka. 

One side of the shell was half milk and the other half plain chocolate.  I really liked that - I am a fan of both and it was nice to take a bite of each.  It was indeed very thick chocolate that I rather liked.  You could really bite into it and hear it snap - you don't get that with a Cadburys Egg.  

This sizeable egg costs a sizeable £26

Review: Hotel Chocolat Advent Calendar 'Truffles to Share'

This advent calendar was gratefully received courtesy of Hotel Chocolat and it felt really naughty to eat the whole thing by 14 November!  However, I had a review to do, so I had the perfect excuse.    I'm guessing this is aimed at Double Income No Kids Yet couples (can anyone else afford £24 for an advent calendar?) who want to share a high end product. The (rather seductive) gimmick is that there are two chocolates behind each window.   I do have children and they were very excited about it, but they only liked one or two of the truffle flavours.  In fact rather than bickering over who would have the chocolates we were all saying 'No, go on, you have the mulled wine truffle.'

 I loved the Salted Soft Caramel and quite liked the gingerbread truffle, the plain and milk truffles, but the mulled wine flavour was rejected by all of us and only one of us, my 10 year old son, liked the cinnamon praline. All the chocs were the same nipple shape.  It would have been more fun with some variation e.g. Stars, trees, snowmen etc

On the plus side, two chocs per advent window is a great idea.  Right sized chocolates, three quarter sized = a nice mouthful.  

Negatives: high price and dubious flavours. The packaging design was half right: I liked the sparkly icicle and tree pattern but there was an ugly strip of white cardboard down the middle on the hinge of the calendar. 

It would have been nice if the website had listed the truffle flavours contained within this calendar.  There are some very tiny icon symbols to show they contain e.g. alcohol, nuts, milk etc ( hey, hotel choc, can you make those symbols a bit larger?  They're very difficult to interpret in such a small size) but no list of flavours.

Overall our verdict was that it is a good concept, a little overpriced with not particularly yummy chocolate.

There are four other advent calendars in the range.  I think the others have festive shaped chocs inside and are priced at £12-17

 Rather interesting that their website is also advertising a 'Cheese and Chocolate Tasting Experience.'  As a youngster I discovered the taste sensation of pairing mature cheddar cheese with Kit Kats, a guilty pleasure, but I've always been a fan of sweet-savoury combos.  They even use chocolate as a 'cracker' for cheese and serve sweet relishes instead of Branston.  Whooh.  Brave, but I'm liking it.

Penge Punch, First of the Month

It's true: I rarely leave Devon and Cornwall.  But for the hottest day of the year, with everyone heading for a bonus day on the beach, I ended up travelling to South London. Craziness.  What a good time I had .  A superb party held to celebrate my dear friends, J and L's 40ths.  J had invented two new cocktails, Penge Punch (in honour of the venue) which was lethal - a stronger version of Long Island Iced Tea (including laminated instruction sheets for novices on how to concoct the tipple - he is so anal organised).

There was also a totally delicious Southern Sangria (Spanish red, lemonade, a healthy dash of fresh lemon and lime juice and tons of ice and fruit).

Needless to say, a good time was had by all.  Hawaiian shirts, fairy lights, paper flowers, cocktail dresses, posh kebab canapes.  I spent a manic hour in the kitchen assisting these two strapping lads and generally dropping things on the floor.

A really great idea.  Wraps containing pre-bbqed meat, veges and condiments had been prepped the day before and our job was to bake them for 15 minutes and then slice them into 2cm slices and serve on trays as kebab canapes.  They were hungrily snapped up.

Later we moved on to genuine live opera singing (M and L were astonishing), a put-together-at-last-minute-band and then dancing, Shisha pipes with apple tobacco and fire baskets in the garden.

And after just a couple of hours sleep (there were about eight kids in the house) we were up and at 'em again.  I'd bought long some fab bacon from Borough Market (my first time at BM - WOW, what a change from Devon farmers' markets) from Sillfield Farm and we cooked up bagels,bacon and more pitchers of Southern Sangria in the sun.  

Finished off with some perfect hangover food made by the resident starlet, H, chocolate dipped peppermint creams.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Penge Punch Yeehah

Like a cross between long island iced tea and mojito.  Kicks a fair punch

Quanitity makes a large pitcher

300 ml  cointreau

300ml vodka, 
300ml tequila
300ml dark rum and 
300ml white rum

125ml sugar syrup infused with mint

1 litre of Coca Cola

125ml freshly squeezed lemon and lime juice

Loads of ice

TASTE AND ADJUST TIL YUMMY!

Two 11 Year Olds Play with the Hummingbird Cafe Cookbook

My 11 year old daughter and her friend wanted to make something from the Hummingbird Cafe Cookbook.  We had all the ingredients for the raspberry cheesecake brownies.  Including wonderful local, Devon raspberries from our local farm, Shute Fruit.  I was getting our house ready for some guests who were coming to stay, so just let them get on with it in the kitchen.  I was rather impressed when two hours later (including a bit of refrigeration time), they presented me with the finished product:

The recipe is fairly simple, but does involve three layers so I was impressed.  The chocolate brownie and vanilla cheesecake layers are baked together in the oven and then when cool, smothered with pink creamy muck muck.

I made it again today as a treat for my daughter as she started Secondary School today.  It's simple and very fattening, but delicious.  I recommend halving the quantities if you just want to feed 4-6 people.  The original version is enormous and serves 12.  Also, where the recipe says to beat the cream, sugar and raspberries together for the wonderful pink shaving foam topping, it's best to whip the cream lightly, then add the sugar and raspberries, otherwise the mixture won't thicken.

I've never been lucky enough to visit the actual Hummingbird Cafe in London, but we've made a couple of things from the cookbook - other notable favourites are: the vanilla cupcakes, and the double chocolate chip cookies

Bagel and Beans - Great Budget Food in Central Amsterdam

I'm just back from a gloriously sunny and wine-sodden five days in Holland staying with our dear friends A, D and A.

We needed a bite to eat away from the touristy centre of Amsterdam where we'd enjoyed a visual feast of Vermeers and Franz Hals at the rijksmuseum, where incidentally, The Milkmaid was my favourite picture:

..... and we happened upon Bagels and Beans.  This is a small chain of Dutch cafes specialising in breakfasts and lunches.  We heartily enjoyed the 'Everything' juice that included pineapple, orange, strawberry and apple:

The bagels were fresh, packed full of fairly healthy ingredients with some good combos, and not just the average 'cheese and ham' that features heavily on Dutch menus.  I chose the smoked chicken, avocado, pesto and pinenut, with plenty of greenery too (particularly enjoyed the large helping of killer cucumbers):

The free pot of coffee bean shaped and flavoured chocolate beans were a great added bonus - they were on every table.

The juice was 3 Euros -  a tad high, but considering that's the same price as a Coke in a European pavement cafe, not too bad.  The bagel was 6 Euros which I thought was fair enough.  The waiter was so friendly and disarmingly asked me if I was 'well-known in Holland.'  I think he was asking whether I knew Holland well.  Free chocolate, smiley waiters, good food and free postcards from a stand for the children to take as souvenirs - a great respite from a frenetic European city centre and great for people on a budget.

Chocolate Hedgehog Cake for Son's 10th Birthday Party

I have a book full of inspiring cake designs.  Each year I hand it to my two children just before their birthday.   One day I hope they'll ask for the Sandcastle cake that's coated in realistic looking crushed Digestive biscuits.   They look through every single one and then ask for the Chocolate Hedgehog Cake.   Again.

I suppose I should be flattered, but I don't get any better at them and each time they come out looking highly comical and COATED in chocolate buttercream and Cadbury's Flakes.  I baked the sponges in two sizes of pudding basins - they took ages to cook, but were actually pretty good sponges.  OK, so hedgehog, porcupine, possum?  What is he?  Funny looking critter.  And a blurred picture.

Recently found a hilarious Jane Asher cake book with some truly weird cakes - a cake that looks exactly like a cabbage.

One that has been intricately carved to look like a bowl of Cornflakes with milk. (No one has been stupid enough to make that so I can't steal a picture of that one - but just try imagining a bowl of cornflakes.  As a cake.) I'm simply not trying hard enough.  As I'm sure Jane would say, 'Hedgehog, Shmedghog'

And this is what he should have looked like:

Can you spot the difference?

Hotel Chocolat - Putting Myself First for a Moment...

Food PR, and fellow food blogger, Beth, from Jam and Cream PR sent me this (initally) very attractive parcel of chocolate from Hotel Chocolat to review.  It's called the Essential Easter Collection and it retails for £35.  Initial impressions were favourable although I immediately felt unhappy with the amount of packaging: the Tiddly Chicks were in a packet with in a box within a bag within a box?  A tad excessive, even for mail order protection.

I decided to hold a tasting review panel with my husband and two children, aged 9 and 11.  The kids were, of course, rather enthusiastic to have an early Easter treat.  My children totally buy into the Hotel Chocolat thing.  When we visit Exeter, it's somewhere they nag us to take them.  They claim it's their favourite chocolate and love all the cutesy shapes and packaging.  They feel they're being spoilt if they get a bar of  this stuff.  My husband is of a rather more cynical persuasion (understatement of the year) and hates the shop and product.  'It's not a hotel, and chocolate has an 'e' on the end of it' is his response to their nagging.  'Overpriced' and 'style over substance' may also have passed his lips.

We gave each item a mark out of 10 for Presentation, Taste and Easter Factor. Overall winner was the Doodle Chick bar - slab of caramely chocolate with a chick moulded on the front.  The children adored the taste of this but both adults thought it was horrible - a caramely coconut taste that was too sickly.  In last place was the Easter Expose Half Egg - the most 'traditional' of the products.  We really marked this egg down for its cheeky claim on the side, something about 'we were advised to make thin eggs to save money but look how thick we've made it' - and it was thick at the visible edges and was really thin towards the back.

The Tiddly Chicks scored badly for their packaging but were cute and lovely if you like plain choc shaped little chicks (I do).

The Egglets (caramel eggs in a cardboard basket) were probably my favourite although they had been bashed around a bit in the post and weren't in perfect condition. 9 year old son really hated these and actually spat it out.

The Tiddly Pot - an Easter decorated cardboard cup filled with rabbit and chick shaped chocolates was a hit with the children but husband declared it looked like a cheap cup of carry-out tea.  He's harsh.

We enjoyed them, but didn't love them.  Huge divisions between which things the children liked compared to the adults.  Not an all round hit, but we all liked something.

Unfortunately I'm going to have to mention the wording on the packaging.  It's becoming a bit of a geeky pet hate of mine that I have to read all the packaging and I get quite wound up when it's spelt wrongly (my current bottle of Original Source Shower Gel has two spelling mistakes) and Innocent Smoothie cartons (yes, I found them refreshingly cute a few years ago, now I wish they'd bland themselves out a bit and just provide basic info).  So the offending words from Hotel Choc?

 'And with the absolute minimum of recyclable packaging, putting yourself first for a moment won't cost the earth.'

Firstly, there's a double meaning there - 'the minimum of recyclable packaging'  - so they've used as little recyclable packaging as possible?  Great, chuck it all in landfill then.  They need to lose the word 'recyclable' rather than putting it in as a soundbite.

Secondly, the idea of 'putting yourself first for a moment' - i.e. being selfish, having your little chocolatey moment and buying stuff with lots of packaging isn't that endearing to me.

Also the bag says British Cocoa Growers and Chocolatier.  Presumably this is trying to position themselves in a niche that Cadbury has vacated.  I've looked at their website and they explain their rationale for not being Fairtrade, as they have their own plantations in Ghana and St Lucia and work / trade ethically there.  OK, I was going to ask where they grow cocoa in UK as I would think that's impossible.  So is that moniker also a tad misleading?  They grow cocoa abroad.

Aha!  I've found it!  There actually is a Hotel Chocolat - it's in St Lucia and opened at the end of Feb 2011 and it's all part and parcel of their brand.  I'm off to tell husband that actually they ARE a hotel.  And I would really like to go there if my eco-conscience and money would allow.

Graze - A New Concept in 'Healthy Snacks'

I have noticed this company, Graze, primarily as it is so close to my own moniker, Grazing Kate.  The concept is that they deliver 'healthy' snacks through the post to your home or workplace, twice a week and you hand over your credit card details and end up paying £ 3.49/ box, including delivery.  I think this is aimed at people with office jobs who know they snack unhealthily whilst at their desk.  The aim is to replace the old crisps / kitkat / another kitkat routine with healthier alternatives in snack-size portions.

 The first two attempts at entering my details on their website failed, but third time lucky.  The package arrived as promised, on a Wednesday.  Next one due on Friday.  I had heard from fellow blogger, Mme Guillotine, that they had paid no attention to her personal taste preferences that she had edited on their website.  Like Madame G, I can't eat seeds or whole nuts (and a lot of their products are very nut and seed based), so I I unticked all those boxes, and I was happy to receive this selection with no nuts or seeds whatsover.

My first pack contained Korean Chilli Rice Crackers (a guilty pleasure), Sticky Choccy Pudding (chocolate buttons and two types of raisin), Pitted Kalamata Olives with Herbs and Milkshake Mix (white chocolate discs, dried strawberries and bananas).  My daughter and I ate the Milkshake Mix straight after school today - they were delicious, and we kidded ourselves that they were healthy.  

Value for money?  I guess if I were a City Slicker (oh, yes, I once was, hard to believe, but that's another story) these would be convenient, a bit trendy and not too expensive compared with other products within the Square Mile.  

However..... I'm an unslick, unhip Devon food blogger who minds her pennies, so after the first pack (free of charge) and second pack (half price), I shall cancel my regular order.

They claim their packaging is as eco and recycled as they can be, although anything in such small packets (within a packet, within a packet) like this is going to involved an excess of packaging.  But at least they've tried.  And I really like the little bamboo cocktail stick for picking up olives.  And I liked it arriving through the letterbox with the rest of the post.  And I liked kidding myself that eating chocolate buttons with raisins is healthy.

This is the 'personalised' nutritional info sheet they include.  I'm really off some of the 'matey chit chat' packaging companies use at the moment e.g. Innocent smoothies springs to mind 'contains 100% absolutely no squirrels', but I quite liked being addressed by name: 

'so Katy, how healthy is this box....?'

'Er....not very.  But thanks anyway.'

A Child's Food Blog from Giggling Wombat

A food blog from a child's perspective.  What a great idea.

Giggling Wombat promises to provide honest opinions on food, drink and cafes and this week she provides details of her 'top five fave foods':

 http://gigglingwombat.blogspot.com/2011/01/my-top-five-fave-foods.html

I am slightly worried as I think someone's about to get their own back and start reviewing the food I serve for dinner....Quick, I'd better start thinking about wiping clean those sauce-splattered plates, adding garnishes, getting in some forgiving light sources, and making my food look a little less rustic-homemade i.e. thrown-on-the-plate than usual!

Exeter Cafe Review: SW Food Bloggers at Boston Tea Party

We had a get together of some South West UK food bloggers at the Boston Tea Party cafe in Exeter at the weekend.  It was the first time in the cafe for Choclette (choclogblog), Liz (feastsandfestivals) and Matthew (matthewsfoodblog), but I think they were impressed by the place - for its sheer size and great place for meeting up with people.

The downstairs looks like this - rather small and always hectic, but in a buzzy way:

And everyone gets a BIG surprise when they get up to the top of the staircase (tray, teapot, cake all in one piece - phew).  The upstairs room is vast and has a huge array of mismatched furniture, some enormous long refectory tables, sofas, original artwork on the walls and posters advertising everything cultural that's on in the Exeter area.

I suspect that some of the student frequentees actually live here.  They know which seats have access to the sockets for when their laptop batteries fade. They can make that drink and muffin last for many an hour.  I have on occasion spent a lovely afternoon here with a cuppa, a piece of rhubarb and custard cake and a favourite novel.  Simple decadence.

OK, so that's the ambience sorted.  They have loads of types of tea on offer - all served as leaves in clever tea pots with built-in strainers.  The cakes are great - my faves are the Portuguese custard tarts pictured above, but also good are the Devon apple cake, chocolate brownie, chocolate fridge cake - a fellow blogger reported that the coffee and walnut cake was average rather than mind-blowing.

Thanks to Choclette and Liz for coming up from Cornwall to have coffee and cake with Matthew and myself - really enjoyed having an inspiring chat about food and our blogs.

Chocolate, Rosemary and Olive Oil Cake - The Jury's Out

I cribbed this recipe from this lovely blog:

http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/rosemary-olive-oil-cake-recipe.html

The full recipe is on her site, and I won't repeat it here.  It's adapted from a recipe from Good to the Grain by Kim Boyce.

This cake has no butter (or marg), just olive oil and has plenty of chopped nuggets of dark chocolate and a good smattering of finely chopped rosemary.  The top is crisp, crunchy and sugared like a muffin.  I cooked it for a friend who came for lunch and we both loved it, it's unusual but good.  There is a savoury note to the cake (rather like focaccia) but in a good way.

Then I sliced some for my family.  My son refused point blank to have anything to do with a herby cake.  My daughter tried a few tastes and left the rest (it had chocolate in it, for goodness sake, she must have hated it) and my husband's comment was classic.  "It's an anti-cake.  You take a bite of it and it makes you never want to eat any more cake again.  Ever.  It puts you off cake."  Charming!

So, I saved a few slices for myself and gave the rest to my friend and her family - all three of them love it (or are being very polite!).  The jury's out 4 people love it, 3 people loathe it.  What do you think?

Chocolate Profiteroles - So Easy a Child Could Make Them...?

My children surprised me the other day by announcing they were going to make profiteroles.  I've never made them before and have always regarded choux pastry as 'too tricky'.  Plus, I was busying myself with other things, so I agreed, but told them that I wouldn't be able to help.

Surprisingly rapidly, they had summoned up these with the help of the River Cottage Family Cookbook:

They weren't prepared for how much they expand during cooking and the little lumps of pastry mostly merged into one big choux bun.  The pasty doesn't have that much sugar in and when we tasted it, a bit warm from the oven, we all agreed it tasted (and looked) like Yorkshire Pudding - obviously, as the recipe is very similar.  The four profiteroles around the edges of the tin were perfect.

The children still weren't convinced.  

"We've just made Yorkshire Pudding and it's rubbish," they sighed, ready to chuck them away.

After dinner,  I convinced them to make a chocolate sauce regardless and that we could fill the profiteroles and the big blobby one with vanilla ice cream instead of whipped cream.  The results were delicious.  Yorkshire Pud with chocolate sauce and ice cream perhaps, but delicious nevertheless.