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.

A Chocolate Dinner Party... round Kate's house!

Being huge fans of the popular television show 'Come Dine With Me', my dear friend Colette came up with the idea of hosting our own version of the programme. So, she gathered three of her friends together (me being one of them) and we all agreed to host a dinner party each. I know it's a cliché but I couldn't resist having a go at a chocolate themed evening. I kept this a secret so they had no idea until they actually started eating what the secret ingredient was!

A week before the party I concocted my own 'Chocolate Rum' recipe ready to add to my cocktails at the start of the evening. I basically infused a bottle of Rum with toasted cocoa nibs and some grated 100% (both available from Cocoa, Ecclesall Road by the way!).

Chocolate Rum Recipe:

Bottle of Rum (I used Morgan Spiced)
50g Cocoa nibs
2 squares Rococo 100%

A funnel, frying pan, grater, sieve, jug, empty bottle

Prep
1. Gently dry fry the cocoa nibs on on the hob for a couple of minutes
2. Add to the Rum (you may need to pour a bit out)
3. Grate in the the chocolate
4. Give it a good shake
5. Shake 2-3 times a day for 5 days minimum (depends how chocolaty you want it though!)
6. When you're ready to drink, strain into a jug and transfer into a clean bottle
7. Enjoy! It tastes good with Coke (a Cocoa Cola!), neat with ice or...

.... how about a Chocolate Mojito?

To accompany the Mojitos I made some nibbles....

Goats Cheese with Cocoa nibs... a truly magical combo

Ingredients

4 Tbls Cocoa nibs
11 oz goats cheese
½ clove minced garlic
1 Tbls honey
1 Tbls ginger syrup
Black pepper
Cocoa powder for sprinkling

1. You basically just mix all the ingredients together.

I then rolled the mixture into small bite size balls but you could roll into a log and slice it's up to you!
2. Sprinkle with Cocoa powder and serve!

I also made an Egyptian Chocolate Beetroot Dip... interesting

Ingredients

A pack of 4 cooked Beetroot grated (buy them from the Sharrow Marrow, Sharrowvale Road)
3 Tbls greek yoghurt
1 garlic clove, crushed
lemon juice (to taste)
1 Tbls extra virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon paprika
1 square 100% choc grated
pepper to taste

1. Mix all ingredients together!
2. Serve warm or cold with pitta or some sort of bread (i was going to make chocolate bread but ran out of time!)

The lovely ladies looking beautiful and trying to guess what that secret ingredient is....

For starters I attempted a White Chocolate Avocado (Savoury?!) Cheesecake. Sounds random I know! If you haven't tried cooked avocado before you should. The flavour is much less subtle and quite bitter so the addition of sweet white chocolate balances out this bitterness.

White Chocolate Avocado Cheesecake Recipe

Ingredients
200g cream cheese
1 egg, beaten
25ml double cream
1 large avocado mashed
50g white chocolate chopped/grated
1tsp salt
Black pepper to taste

x6 10cm baked (and cooled) pastry shells (I cheated and used ready made puff pastry)
- I tried making a breadcrumb base instead of pastry but found pastry worked better.

Prep
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees
2. Mix all ingredients together
3. Spoon into pastry shells
4. Bake until lightly browned and when toothpick comes out clean (approx 35 minutes).
5. Remove cakes from oven and cool.

I topped the cakes with roasted red pepper and drizzled with sticky Chocolate Balsamic Vinegar...

Recipe
Ingredients (approximate measures I just shoved it all in a pan!)
4 parts Balsamic Vinegar
1 part Valrhona Abinao 85%

Prep
1. Gently heat vinegar in a pan stirring constantly until thick and syrupy
2. Take off heat and add chocolate, stir until melted

Cheers to Chocolate!
After the starter I served frozen grapes as a palate cleanser, thought this was important after all that rich food and a preparation for more...

Excuse the rubbish photo (doesn't really do the dish justice) as it was dark by the main course and I didn't have chance to fiddle around with camera settings (I had sipped a few glasses of wine at this point ooops!).

I decided to opt away from the predictable Mexican Mole sauce.... so served a Mushroom Ragu with a white chocolate sweet potato cake and a green salad with a citrus and cocoa nib vinaigrette.

Chocolate and mushrooms so go rather well together! Plus the addition of the 100% thickens the sauce and leaves a lovely velvety finish. I thought a slightly sweet Potato Cake would complement the rich smokiness of the Ragu and the tangy crunchy salad would refresh the palate.

Mushroom & Chocolate Ragu Recipe

Ingredients
450g mixed mushrooms (I used button, shitake, oyster, portobella, enoki)
50g Butter
2 Garlic Cloves minced
150ml Red Wine
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cardamon
salt & pepper
50ml water
1 Tbsp grated Rococo 100% chocolate

Prep
1. Slice mushrooms to about ¼ inch thick
2.Heat a large frying pan over medium-high heat and add some butter
3. Once butter is foaming. Add one type of mushroom and sauté, stirring frequently until browned. Repeat this with each mushroom added more of the butter each time
and emptying all mushrooms into the same bowl.
4. When all mushrooms are cooked. Heat a splash of oil in the same pan and sauté the minced garlic until translucent, but not brown.
5. Return the mushrooms to the pan, add the the wine, spices, salt and simmer to let the wine evaporate.
6. Add the water, cover and simmer for 10 minutes or until to the mushrooms are cooked, they should get all lovely and juicy.
7. Uncover and cook until the sauce is reduced and slightly syrupy. Stir in the chocolate until it melts.

Sweet Potato Quinoa Cakes with white chocolate Recipe

Ingredients
170g quinoa, rinsed and cooked according to package directions
450g sweet potatoes (2 medium sized), peeled and cut into 1 inch chunks
4 spring onions chopped
1 tablespoon dried sage
50g white chocolate grat
salt and pepper to taste

Prep

1. Preheat oven to 200 C
   
2. Boil sweet potato chunks until soft. Mash.
   
3. Combine mashed sweet potatoes, cooked quinoa, spring onions, white chocolate, sage, salt & pepper.
4. Form into cakes and place onto a baking sheet covered in parchment (I pressed mine through a biscuit cutter to shape as the mixture was quite sloppy)
   
5. Bake for 15-20 minutes until they’re lightly brown and crisp on the outside

Salad Dressing: Citrus & Cocoa Nib Vinaigrette Recipe

Ingredients
2 lemons
1 small orange
1 shallot
300ml olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 pepper
Cocoa Nibs

Prep Juice the lemons, orange, and shallot in a juice extractor. Put the juices in a bowl and whisk in the olive oil in a slow stream to form an emulsion. Add nibs. Season with the salt and pepper. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

Time for Dessert! There was a savoury twist to the chocolate dessert, thought I'd confuse their palates even more!

I made A basil infused white chocolate cream with sticky balsamic strawberries (found on BBC Goodfood) accompanied by a salted caramel tart.

The Salted caramel tart was dead easy (I cheated quite a bit!).

I basically just....
1. Bought some puff pastry and Dulche d'leche (caramel).
2. Rolled out the pastry, cut out circles, popped into a heart shaped mould and blind baked until golden.
3.Once cooled, I then filled the pastry hearts with the caramel and topped with some Gianduja (a posh version Italian version of praline, available from Cocoa)
3. Sprinkled with flakes of sea salt & popping candy (also available form Cocoa).

I decorated the white choc cream with a miniature sparkler and an edible flower from my garden!

I thought it'd be nice to give the ladies some chocolates to take home with them but thought it would be even more delightful if they could make their own! We made our chocolates whilst sipping on Cocoa's famous Blackforest Gateau Tea.

So I made some little bowls of ganache the night before and filled a Bento box with assorted sprinkles (included crushed ginger biscuits, vermicelli, cocoa, icing sugar, caramelised hazelnuts) to roll the chocolates in.


The chocolate ladies proud of their chocolate making skills!


To add a personal touch, I made some stickers for everyone to stick on the boxes.

When our sticky fingers were all clean we smoked Chocolate Shisha and blew smoke rings like the caterpillar!