Let's Do Desserts aka Sugar Hit 2013: The Gallery Tea Lounge, Sheraton on the Park, Sydney CBD

It's that time of the year when I end up gaining a few extra kilos thanks to Good Food Month Sydney (formerly know as Crave Sydney and also Sydney International Food Festival). There are heaps of events happening around this time including Night Noodle Markets, Hats Off Dinners and Let's Do Lunch. It's a foodie's dream come true! One of the most popular events is Let's Do Desserts (also known as Sugar Hit previously) where restaurants, tea lounges and hotels create their signature dessert for only $20 including a glass of Brown Brothers dessert wine. There is so many to choose from though this time I decided to check out the dessert at the Gallery Tea Lounge located inside Sheraton on the Park. This hotel is also conveniently located across the street from Hype Park where Night Noodle Markets is happening. Perfect!

The setting was quiet, chilled, formal and relaxing compared to many other restaurants in Sydney CBD. The overall service was not as interacive but it was reasonably attentive. The room was almost empty but then I was there randomly at an earlier time at 7:30pm so it will probably get bus after 9pm when most of the Sugar Hit restaurants start serving their desserts.

The Gallery Tea Lounge's dessert offering is the Guanaja 70% Chocolate Millefeuille served with a Hazelnut Praline and Chilled Chocolate Orange Sauce. The dish itself was fairly cluttered to accompany as many elements on the plate as possible. I enjoyed the Millefeuille (reminded me of the biscuit layers of an ice cream sandwich) as well as the pistachio biscotti and the dried chocolate and honeycomb pieces for that added crunch while the smooth chocolate mousse melts in your mouth. The strawberries on the side as well as the hazlenut praline were very handy in to balancing out the overall flavour of the chocolate. Incredibly rich and filling for one person alone. Perfect for those who love their chocolate especially dark chocolate with its intense and bitter flavour. If you can't handle too much chocolate then this is not really the best option. This is coming from someone who really loves dark chocolate.

Guanaja 70% Chocolate Millefeuille served with a Hazelnut Praline and Chilled Chocolate Orange Sauce ($20.00)

All Sugar Hit desserts are accompanied by a matching Brown Brothers dessert wine for no extra cost. Fruity and sweet just like the dessert.

Brown Brothers Orange Muscat and Flora Dessert Wine

Let's Do Dessert is available every night until 31st October. Bookings are recommended. For more info on which venues are offering 'Let's Do Dessert' for Good Food Month: 
http://sydney.goodfoodmonth.com/letsdodessert

The Gallery Tea Lounge
Sheraton on the Park
161 Elizabeth Street, Sydney NSW 2000
(02) 9286 6650
When: 5:30pm - 10:30pm (Oct 1st-29th, 31st October 2013)
http://www.sheratonontheparksydney.com/goodfoodmonth

Freckle Shapes - The Sweet Swap

Originally, I didn't plan on getting involved in The Sweet Swap. Mainly because my cooking skills aren't too great and I don't have much time for cooking these days. After hearing everyone raving about this event and checking up a few recipes, I eventually gave in just for the curiosity. And I definitely do not regret this at all! Seeing the talents of everybody getting their hands dirty into making beautiful desserts was a sight to see. 

What is The Sweet Swap? It is an Australian food blogger initiative organised by the talented Amanda from Chewtown and Sara from Bellyrumbles where you register and receive your 3 matches. With that, you make and mail three equal batches of handmade sweets to those three bloggers while you wait to receive three more batches for three other food bloggers. You do not find out who you receive the sweets from until it gets delivered to you. And it's all done for charity with proceeds going towards Childfund Australia.

I wasn't sure what to make at all before signing up. Cannot think of my own recipe so read through as many recipe websites and cookbooks as possible before deciding on the sweet to make. I initially planned to make apricot balls but the final taste was a downer (I kept coughing every time I tried a piece) so it was back to the drawing board. Mum really praised it though. Maybe I'm just too harsh on myself...

Original plan: Apricot balls

Thanks to one of my fave mags, Frankie Magazine, I found a recipe for Freckle Hearts in their Sweet Treats recipe book. I will definitely recommend this book as it has lots of decent sweet options based on your cooking skill. The one that stood out for me was the Freckles because of the limited number of ingredients and its seemingly easy (yet incredibly messy!) process. While the original Frankie recipe was called 'Freckle Hearts', I decided to give it more variety by making the chocolate freckles into various shapes - mainly to save time and also for the sake of curiosity. The following recipe was also inspired by a similar recipe that I found on Best Recipes except with double the portion of the ingredients. It was tiring when balancing the sweets together especially when some of the shapes didn't turn out right. Despite that, it was all made with love...and on a Saturday night! Thanks Rage TV for keeping me sane...

Chocolate porn ;)

What did I end up getting?

Sweet Swap 1: Chocolate honeycomb snaps by Muppys

I freaking love these treats! Soo addictive! I'm also a massive fan of honeycomb so I gladly ate as much as I could before mum came back from North America finds this lot in the fridge...and ate the rest! Looking forward to reading the recipe for this ;).
 

Sweet Swap 2: Copycat Green Tea Kit Kats by Julie from I Dream in Chocolate

A cute, quirky and slightly healthier choice compared to lots of sweets. Great to share with mates (my mate loves anything with green tea!). The melty kiss is so adorable and I really enjoyed eating the green tea kit kats - both the rich and scrumptious handmade "copycat" ones and the real one.

Sweet Swap 3: ???

Sadly at the time of writing this post, I still have not received my third Sweet Swap package :(. I have a feeling that maybe there was a post slip to collect the parcel but it got lost somewhere. Hopefully it shows up eventually. If not, hopefully you see this post and let me know one way or another. I am very curious to see what it was especially since I really enjoyed what I've got so far.

My lucky (or unlucky) recipients of my handmade sweets were Chanel from Cats Love Cooking, Eileen from Soft and Stiff Peaks and Julie from I Dream in Chocolate (LOL we got matched up both times! :P). Hope you all enjoy these treats as much as I had fun making them.

After a few minor alterations to original recipes, I present to you The Random Foodie's first recipe post everrrrr! From what I've heard, these are amazing treats for kids, parties, picnics and even for brekkie! (thanks Julie! :P)


Freckle shapes 

Great for vegetarians! Not so great for those on a diet :-p.

Total prep time: 30 minutes (including 10 mins cooking time)

Makes: 25-30 freckles (NB: this depends on the size of your cookie cutter, I used small cookie cutters)

Ingredients:

250g good quality chocolate - I used 70% cocoa dark chocolate
20g Copha, chopped
1/2 cup of 100s and 1000s

Instructions:

1. Line trays with baking paper
2. Lightly grease your cutters with butter or oil and place it on the baking paper
3. Melt the chocolate and copha into a small pan/saucepan
4. Remove the small pan once you start to see tiny bubbles otherwise the chocolate will burn
5. Place about a tablespoon of chocolate mix into each cutter (this may need more or less depending on the cutter size. I learnt it the hard way when making the first batch)
6. Cover with hundreds and thousands and refrigerate for about 30 minutes or until set.
7. Remove the chocolate freckles from the cookie cutters and store them in an airtight container in the fridge.


Storage: This can be kept refrigerated in an airtight container for up to six weeks.

Variations: You can also use milk chocolate or white chocolate as the chocolate mixture.

Melting the chocolate

Pouring the chocolate into the cutters

The finished product

What I love about The Sweet Swap was finding out what sweets I've gotten as well as seeing what everyone has received. If there is anything that I would change for the next Sweet Swap it would definitely be my packaging. Mine was quite rushed with plain takeaway boxes and cards so it didn't look as pretty compared to everyone else's. Seeing the package delivered to my house and opening them up was the best moment ever. It feels like opening your Xmas pressie! Will put more thought into how it should look next time. Will also spend more time making a variety of sweets. It's actually loads of fun.
A final thanks to Amanda and Sara for doing an amazing job in organising The Sweet Swap and bearing with my impatience as I continue to wait for my final package. 

For more info and checking out what everyone else made on The Sweet Swap:
http://www.thesweetswap.com/