High Tea at Sydney's Royal Botanic Garden


Last year November I went to a conference in Sydney, Australia. As you might know, the seasons there are quite different. It was already pretty sunny there, they were close to their summer season, which was awesome! I used one of my free days to visit the Royal Botanic Garden. It is not just a very nice place to wander around and spend your afternoon, it's also free :) Inspired by the Afternoon Tea at the Butchart Gardens in Victoria (Canada) a few years back, I treated myself to the "High Tea" here at Sydney's Royal Botanical Garden.

I have to admit that I did not have such a nice view of the gardens during the tea ceremony as in Canada, but it was a really nice experience anyways. The snacks and sweets were really fresh and delicious and everything looked so bright and nice. The tea on the other hand was a little mediocre. They used tea bags and the selection was quite limited to English Breakfast, Earl Grey, Green Sencha, Camomile, and Lemon-Ginger. However, I am a big fan of Earl Grey and Green Tea, so I was all good :)

The savory Snacks consisted of the following:

  • Egg-pea sprouts-celery sandwich (white bread) --- can't go wrong with that one!
  • Smoked salmon-capers-dill sandwich (dark bread)
  • Roast turkey-cranberry-brie brioche slider
  • Sausage roll (pork-fennel sausage with tomato relish) --- not a big sausage fan, but this was amazing! And sausage rolls are supposed to be classic Australian food :)
  • Tartlet (capsicum-fetta-smoked paprika)   ---- super fresh and crispy!
  • Arancini (sundried tomato-basil-morzarella) --- an arancini is a stuffed rice ball, breaded and fried

The Sweets and Scones were fresh and delicious as well!

  • Scone with Devonshire cream, lemon curd, and preserve    --- delicious creams!
  • Lemon meringue tart      --- real delicate!
  • Vanillla cupcake
  • Chocolate, cranberry, coconut brownie
  • French macaron         --- this was a delight!












Chocolate-Pear Mini Bundt Cake


I just love these little cute mini bundt cake forms. In Seattle, there was this little coffee shop where I always got a orange-poppyseed mini bundt cake. I had to try to recreate them. What better way then to start with some chocolate cakes ;) They are actually really easy to make. I used silicone molds and had no problems removing the cooled down cakes from the molds. They just look amazing!

I got the recipe from a very good German website with lots of different bundt cake recipes called "Gugel-Glück" ("Gugelhupf" is German for bundt cake). They even have some recipes for savory bundt cakes.

I also tried out delicious raspberry-joghurt and apple-almond mini bundt cake recipes from the recipe book that came with the molds. I will post those at a later time :)

Ingredients (16 cakes):

  • 100g bittersweet chocolate
  • 100g butter (+ some more to butter molds)
  • 200g sugar
  • 200g cream cheese (softened)
  • 2 eggs
  • 200g flour (+ some more for molds)
  • 1 1/2 tablespoon baking powder
  • 1 tablespoon cinnamon
  • 1 tablespoon vanialla sugar
  • 1 pinch salt
  • 400g pears (canned)
  • 100g chocolate drops
Topping:
  • 200g bittersweet chocolate 
  • Hazelnut pieces

Preparation:

  1. Preheat oven to  380 degree Fahrenheit (190 degree Celsius). Grease mini bundt cake molds with some butter and dust with some flour.
  2. Add chocolate and butter to a small pot and melt, stir. Whisk sugar and cream cheese till creamy, fold the butter-chocolate mix under. Add one egg and whisk, add the other egg and whisk. 
  3. In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder, cinnamon, vanilla and salt. Sift it in small portions onto the chocolate-cream cheese mix and whisk everthing together. 
  4. Drain the pears, cut into cubes. With a wooden spoon or rubber spatula, stir the pear pieces and the chocolate drops into the dough. Scrape the batter into the molds, filling about 3/4 full. They will raise.
  5. Bake for 20-30 minutes (middle bar) until a wooden toothpick inserted in the middle of the cakes comes out clean. Take cakes out of the oven and let cool down within the molds. 
  6. Now, melt the chocolate for the topping. Remove cakes from the mold form. Pour the melted chocolate over the cakes. Scatter the hazelnut pieces on top of the cakes. Let cool down till the chocolate gets hard. 







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