The Chocolate Festival

I'm in chocolate heaven! 3

2010-07-13T06:31:00.001-07:00

All in all we loved every dish, but I have to say my favourite was the Sea Salt Caramel Tart and surprisingly the non-chocolaty Pomme Granita. ChocMums, however, favoured the Moelleux Au Chocolate.

The menu and the whole visit was a special and memorable experience, and at only £15 it is extremely well priced (especially considering the amount of work and detail that goes into the dishes).

So if you are a chocoholic (I’m sure you are if you’ve read this far) I would definitely recommend a visit to William Curley to indulge in this ultimate chocolate feast.

The dessert bar is available from 1pm onwards. The shop is located in 198 Ebury Street, Belgravia, London, SW1W 8UN. Nearest rail station is Sloane Square (5 mins walk). It is open on Monday to Saturday 9:30 - 18:30 and Sunday 10:30 - 18:30. Tel: 020 7730 5522

I'm in chocolate heaven! 2

2010-07-13T06:28:00.001-07:00

We started our culinary adventure with a Sea Salt Caramel Tart – Lucie skilfully filled hazelnut pastry with sea salt caramel and raspberry compote then topped it up with hazelnuts and ganache. Next we had a Moelleux Au Chocolate – chocolate fondant with Kinako bean ice cream and crystallised pistachios.

This is the place to mention that all the ice creams used in the dessert bar are made in house and are churned to order. By using a special machine it is possible to churn small amounts so it is always fresh and the ice cream is extremely smooth. Apparently it’s one of their best sellers and we now know why!

We then followed with a palette cleanser - Pomme Granita. (Basically this is a freshly tasting ‘sorbet’ type dish that enables you to continue with the chocolate explosion). It consisted of apple spaghetti soaked in lime syrup (to stop it from oxidising – or going black for you and me), apple jelly (made with agar agar instead of jelly which gives it a melt-in-the-mouth texture as well as making it vegetarian), topped with crème fraiche and apple granite (frozen apple juice crystals). We all agreed this dish was deliciously refreshing and stands on its own.

We were now ready to continue to the ‘main course’ – Foret Noire – a dark chocolate casket filled with a dark chocolate mousse and a kirsch cream, pistachio ice-cream and a cherry compote. And finally we finished with one of the house Coupe Sundaes – Madagascar vanilla ice cream, chocolate sorbet with fresh orange compote and roasted piedmont hazelnuts served with chocolate sauce.

A Japanese tea completed the ‘meal’ and was definitely needed by the time we completed all of the ‘courses’.

Continued in next post - titled 'I'm in chocolate heaven! 3'

I'm in chocolate heaven!

2010-07-12T12:29:00.000-07:00

I have been meaning to visit William Curley’s new Belgravia shop ever since I read about his A La Carte chocolate menu. So naturally I couldn't turn down an invitation to go the day after the official press launch. Like everything William and Suzue produce, the new shop is elegant and stylish. The staff is very welcoming and you can just sense they love what they do. It is chocolate heaven!

We were welcomed by Lucie Bennett, a pastry chef that has been working with William Curley for over 3 years. She created the stunning desserts right in front of our eyes (that’s me and my girlfriends – aka ‘ChocMums’) which really elated the whole experience.

Continued in next post - titled 'I'm in chocolate heaven! 2'

Why blog? - introduction

2010-07-12T06:44:00.000-07:00

Every time people ask me what I do and I answer 'I organise a chocolate festival', the reaction is always the same: 'oh wow, what a great job!'.

The assumption being that the job title comes with lots of free chocolates! Unfortunately that isn't the case. I probably spend more time at my home office in front of my computer and on the phone then anyone else I know... not very glamorous!

So... I decided to put the sparkle back into my job I am going to try and visit chocolatiers and chocolate companies / events etc. much more often. So this blog will include, as well as updates related to the festival (which is brilliant by the way!), some reviews and pics of places I've visited and chocolates I ate.