Birthday trip to London

Kate and I were born 3 days apart, so every November we have much to celebrate! This year we both went to London (with our gentlemen friends) and this is a little snapshot of what I got up to this time.

So we started off in Spitalfields market as my friend Camilla was doing a stall there, I forgot to take a picture of her stall so check out her blog http://butterscotchandbeesting.blogspot.com/
But I did take this flamingo which I love

I accidently found Carnaby Street and really liked this window

Then treated myself to this crazy cakes

This is John (my boyfriend) back at the hotel

After much wandering around Bethnal Green I finally found one of my favourite places, Columbia road. Every Sunday there is a flower market along the road and the place is crammed full of people, live music and flowers! It's a real buzz and I love the indivual shops down there. This shop sold wall stickers, this one reminds me of the Cocoa lounge wall- but all the pictures of a lot darker!

Some flowers for you...

This shop had tiny cakes for a doll's house, how cute.

This shop is called Suck & Chew, it's an old fashioned sweet shop.

I had to take this picture of a fox at the window

Then I found my favourite shop, run by two friends it's called J&B check out their website
www.jandbtheshop.com

Finally a trip to Harrods and of course I started with the Chocolate department. Here I found some gorgeous boxes that looked like they would fit in Cocoa..

And Holdsworth's truffles from Bakewell were there, I was very proud as we sell their truffles in our shop.

Ohhh!! ...the horror of it all

An Unwanted Visitor

We regret to inform you that the enchanted sweetie wonderland you know as Cocoa is coming to terms with a very unfortunate event; this is a plea for help!

Anne & Kate love entertaining and enjoy having Cocoa's doors open everyday for visitors to come and relax in Cocoa's comfortable surroundings, like a home from home! Sometimes Cocoa visitors find Cocoa so cosy they stay a while, that's fine we don't mind! However, one day last week a terrible thing happened... An unusually horrid visitor came and never left....

A cruel dark spell has been cast upon us! Cocoa has been transformed into what can only described as a witches Lair. Since our unwelcome guest moved in, the sun has disappeared and the days are short, dark and cold. The worst thing is that some of Cocoa's special treats have been transformed into the ugliest most grotesque sweets imaginable! Some terrible atrocities have occurred. The lovely lady birds are now hideous spiders (we are convinced they have fangs) , the cute gummy bears are now eerie skeletons, the teddy bear lollipops are bats, the list goes on.

The only way the curse can be lifted is if we rid Cocoa of these terrifying dare I say it 'treats'?! We have until 31st October to set Cocoa free or we will in this gut wrenching state until the end of time. Don't despair just hurry on over to the Witches Lair (AKA Cocoa) and purchase some of these gruesome sweets.

Wedding favours; tried and tested!

Kate and I spend a long time making up wedding favours but rarely get to eat them! This year a few of our friends got hitched, which gave us a chance to see these little boxes in action.
First up this year was Roisin and Tom's wedding. Unfortunately we didn't make it to this one (due to another wedding) but they were kind enough to send a pic of what we were missing.


So they had Fresh milk & Pink Champagne truffles in a pink box with blue ribbon. They have also added a tag which looks great!

Next up was Tim and Emma's wedding over in Bridlington. Their theme was red, so we put together a selection of truffles in small white boxes with red ribbon. This matched everything on the table, as you can see.




This is Kate and I (Anne) enjoying our chocs!


...And Becky having fun with the ribbon!




And finally we went to Jen and Mark's wedding in Wetherby. Their theme was blue, so we got stripey bags and inside was Scottish Tablet. They added tags which look great, especially with the names written up on a typewritter.



Here is Kate enjoying hers.



They also wanted a Sweeie bar, so they borrowed our jars with a variety of sweets.



Here they used the typewritter and blue card for the sweetie tags, keeping to the theme.



Ellen is enjoying the sweets!



...As is Julia!


That's it for our invites this year but next year I am getting married so I'll be deciding what to do myself soon! Here are a few ideas I could use....

Roses are red, Violets are blue.....Rose & Violet creams in a box for £1.50 each


These beautiful Rococo floral bee bars are also £1.50 each



I love these boxes of Italian sweets for £1.99 each.




These Amaretti biscuits are only 50p each, but look beautiful.



For something retro I could have the classic love heart sweets, at only 20p they are a bargain!




And if I'm feeling traditional, I could have sugared almonds in a organza bag for £1.50 each.

Cocoa Girls take a trip to China!- A day at the Tea Plantaion

So it's been a few months since Kate and I got back from China and I wanted to share some pictures of a special day we had in Yangshuo. We went to China to visit our friend Jamie (his sister Emily also works in Cocoa) and he had managed to find this amazing tea plantation.


Yangshuo is a beautiful part of China, full of karst mountains, rice fields and tea. You can't really see from this picture but it was really hot!

This is called the Treasure Bowl, it's where the tea shrubs grow.

This is me (Anne) picking the tea leaves.



And Kate picking tea leaves.



You only pick the young leaves; the upper lead bud and the next two leaves.



Sometimes they call these leaves 'Green Feathers' and you can see why.



Here is a close up on the tea leaves.




To the tea factory...Here the leaves are withered and rolled.



Then they will be fermented, dryed & sorted.



Here is the rolling machine.




Next up...Tea tasting! Kate and I are very excited.



Our wonderful host Annie shows us how to hold our teacups (like a lady).



Kate and I smell all the different kinds of tea Annie sells in her shop.



The fresh green tea leaves are washed first, then they use the cups to brew the tea. We didn't actually see a teapot in sight!


Once the leaves are brewed Annie strains the tea.



And pours it into tiny tasting cups.



This is Annie's Tea shop.




And this is the Chinese symbol for tea.



We say goodbye to Annie and China....



But not before one last brew, look how amazing this table is!


If you are interested in going to China, check out Jamie's website :www.internchina.org
for a great time.