They set the bar high – this is yum cha fine dining style!  The usual pram jam and rampant children running dangerously around steaming hot trolleys might not be featured here – instead it’s likely to form a suit crowd. Verified by the waiter who said that it was packed out during the week. Well the proof is is in the dumpling – the prawn dumpling in fact. The yardstick by which all yum chas are measured!  The pricing here seems to be at a small premium for the upmarket experience, most are extra large at $9.50 a pop. but you do get 4 of each, unlike some cheeky yum chas who now give 3!    I loved the prawn dumpling.  The skin was correctly translucently but al dente. Not soggy at all, and the prawn filling had the appropriate texture and also this delicious seasoning that is usually simply pepper in other restaurants. Thumbs up!

The fancy sister of har gau is the scallop dumpling.  They look like little “cheeks” if you know what I mean! hehehe.  They were plump and nice.  But my only gripe is that a bit of cheap seafood extender is also in the filling.

Next, the other staple for comparison – the siu mai – or pork dim sum. Dotted with some roe on top.  The meat had some texture but my one didn’t have much prawn.

The lotus leaf wrapped sticky rice was good too. Also at the extra large price though.  The rice was gooey and perfect, but personally a bit more sauce would be excellent!

The scallop wontons were hot and crispy – served with mayo. I was a bit miffed that it too was $9.50 and also, had a bit of seafood extender in there.

This was my fave though – the vegetable dumpling. Vegos around the world cheer – because usually they have hardly any offerings at yum cha.  Chinese stick prawns inside vego things as that is perceived as being generous and more hearty.  But this triangular dumpling needed nothing of the sort. Finely chopped mushrooms, bamboo, water chestnut and carrot were taken to a new level with coriander and sesame oil.

And for dessert – some baked taro buns. Usually these sticky brown buns are filled with char siu.

So we ordered a steamed char siu bun to make up for it

And finally, some deep fried sesame balls filled with lotus seed paste.  I have to commend the really friendly staff. They were not pushy at all like some other yum chas. The lady really acted like a friend, saying “Try this, it’s only priced as a small, it’s really nice!”.  It was indeed a serious change from the frantic (but fun!) pace of other yum chas where they try to churn you out.  It’s absolutely worth paying a small premium for this service!  What else would you expect from this regal dim sum house in such a beautiful building as QVB!

Looks like the CBD yum cha scene is hotting up more – with Sky Phoenix having opened a few months ago in the Westfield Sydney, and the closure of beloved Regal Restaurant.  

First up, make half a recipe of plain vanilla sponge cake.  The recipe I use is half of the following:  1/3 cup each of plain, SR and cornflour, sifted.  Beat 4 eggs until tripled in volume along with 2/3 cup of sugar.  Gently fold in the flours and bake at 180 degrees for 20 minutes.  So basically, half of the recipe will fill 12 muffin tins, just 1/3 of the way, you don’t want the sponges to be too high or else they’ll be huge towers when you fill them with jam and cream.  Flours, eggs and sugar – pantry? Check.  I also wanted to test my mini madelines tin.  It was filled with less than half a recipe of the chocolate fondant recipe from masterchef, which involves butter, cocoa, chocolate, sugar and flour, again, all in the pantry/fridge.  I steeped some mint leaves in there for a mint flavour, but it didn’t work that well

Mini madelines – need to be eaten ASAP, and they were also a bit gooey in the centres because it was a fondant recipe – yum! Dust with icing sugar.

I filled the cooled sponges with raspberry jam, some whipped cream (purchased ingredient number 1), and sliced strawberries (purchased ingredient number 2).  Aren’t they sooo sweet and cute looking!!

And how can it be tea without cucumber sandwiches!  I lightly spread with margarine (or avocado if you have some), as butter is too difficult to spread on the fresh bread without mangling it.  I also used a vege peeler to slice slivers of cucumber, discarding the seeds which would make them soggy.   Arrange neatly and evenly on the bread, and stack your sandwiches in a tower to slice off the crusts and into thirds in a uniform way.

And finally, just before guests arrive and after you’ve set the table, bake the scones so that they are fresh and warm – flour, cream, milk, sugar, an egg. I used the recipe from masterchef again too. And once again, all pantry ingredients  For a couple of hours work, your friends will really appreciate your dainty treats almost as much as you’ll have enjoyed baking them!

Beneath the stained glass arched entrance is a clear glass display of beautiful pieces of fine cake art.  It is soooo hard to choose from – tiramisus, mousse cake slices, gigantic macarons sandwiched with ganache, and their signature three texture chocolate mousse cake to name but a few..

They also have a good selection of family sized cakes, all too delicious to eat – topped with gorgeous strawberries, macarons and other jewels of adornment.   The style is less crazy, definitely not plain classic, each one a beautiful work of art that seems too good to ruin by eating.

What paticceria in Sydney would dare not offer a macaron. These chubby cuties sandwiched generously in ganache and irresstible in their pastel beauty.

I’d say that once word of this places gets around, there certainly won’t be many cakes for FoodieChat to photograph!  And the lady behind the counter was so nice, urging me to take piccies – unlike an unnamed new bakery in the Strand which haughtily said “we will be having professional photographers do our publicity”. Obviously unaware of the power of you guys, my readers!

If you can’t eat cake all the time, and let’s face it, breakfast is definitely offlimits, they also offer a selection of danishes, croissants and banana bread. OK, so still cake like, but everyone eats these

If you have time to eat in, definitely definitely try their cafe menu.  The paninis and sandwiches are gorgeous, true to their Italian style, and very good value at $14 each.  Oh, and there’s also the amazing antipasti too.  I can definitely see this place becoming one of my regulars.  But maybe i shall have to force myself to take the stairs each time, just to make myself deserve that last bite of cake  Marie Antoinette would certainly feel at home here!

Just in time for the Sydney International Food Festival, Bacco is also offering high tea for $45 per person.

www.bacco.com.au

Also unlike other stuffy high teas in Sydney, Bathers does NOT put everyone’s food onto the one tea stand in an attempt to make it not look stingy! Bathers puts two persons food on the one stand, no need to make it look good value because it already is!

Many people eat savoury sweet sweet, but for me, I start with hot then move to savoury then to sweet.  First up, scones!  One each, still warm, and of a good size, served with whipped cream and strawberry jam.  High tea purists might argue that clotted cream or double cream should be served.  But I prefer my cream with as little saturated fat as possible, it makes it much less heavy.

The sweets of the day were a bread and butter pudding slice, a hazelnut chocolate mousse layered slice, and a passionfruit meringue.  These were all lovely, but probably not up to 5 star hotel standards.  The bread and butter pudding could have been warm for my liking; and the chocolate on the layered slice wasn’t quite tempered, but the gold leaf was a very elegant touch.  The mousse could also be a bit firmer to make the chocolate thing easier to eat, as it squished when you used your fork to eat it.  I liked the taste of the mousse though, as well as the passionfruit tart.  But I was a bit sad that I think the meringue wasn’t evenly torched, and I don’t think it was done the cooked way (ie to add hot sugar syrup into the egg white).

The savouries were a delightful change on traditional crust off sandwiches! We each got a shitake mushroom bun (chinese style), a mushroom tart and a smoked salmon finger sandwich.  The shitake mushroom bun wasn’t quite up to chinese standard, especially since it was cold, as the bun was a bit gluggy, when it should be fluffy and warm.  The filling had a delicious earthy flavour though.  The tarts were absolutely perfect, bite sized and full of flavour.  And finally, the smoked salmon finger sandwich on rye with creme fraiche was as good as the best I’ve had.

Your $25 also includes any coffee including cappucinos, mochas etc, and also a pot of tea. All in all, amazing value.  All so good that in fact I forgot to take pictures of the view! hehe. Oh well.  If you can get here, do try it.  It’s something different from other high teas.  The only problem though is that there are no bookings, and it’s only on Mondays to Fridays.  Don’t let that stop you though!

The tea is taken in the Promenade lounge in the hotel.  As we went during the week of the Chelsea Flower show, the tea cost £50 per person plus 12.5% service charge, instead of the usual £35.  Effectively A$100.  So expensive   Well if they say that that’s where it is, better try it.  I actually don’t know what the extra £15 gets you and it seemed quite like a standard high tea.  If you took the special flower high tea for another £11, you got to take home a small pot plant of flowers as well as a more expensive type of champagne.  Standard high tea for me! 

I’m not a drinker, so I contemplated substituting the champagne for a softie. But looking at the menu, the champers itself was £15!  It was actually very fruity and sweet and bubbly still, unlike some other venues that have pre-opened bottles without the fizz.   

I was so ecstatic when the waiters asked if we had any allergies or dislikes.  I actually don’t eat mayonnaise, and the evil white sauce is found in sandwiches the world round, as if there wasn’t such a thing as a sandwich (or sushi in fact!) that could survive without it!  The chefs obliged without any complaint and made them without the sauce for me! And made them vegan for my friend too.  The bread was made fresh and was obviously made in house.  There was a standard cucumber sandwich on caraway seed scented bread, caponata/roast veg on pumpkin bread.  My favourite was the chicken on basil bread, and there was also smoked salmon.  Something I wasn’t accustomed to was the fact that we were asked if we wanted seconds!  Free refills – awesome!  We had both fasted in order to come so we relished another serve of each.

We were served a pre-dessert then, a white peach jelly with jasmine tea foam.  Wow, the peach was the perfect mix of sweetness with a hint of tartness, and it complemented the jasmine tea foam perfectly.  The foam’s tea flavour was so intense without being overpowering, and the texture – so silky!

I haven’t actually had clotted cream before, in Australia we often just get double cream or whipped cream.  On the table I actually thought it was butter – wow, now I know why they call it clotted cream – artery clogging perhaps??  We also had some really runny not set strawberry jam (more akin to syrup) and some blueberry jam which was better.

A sultana scone and a plain scone each.  They weren’t as fluffy as I would have liked, quite flat in fact   But they had a good crumb.

Getting full now.  Which is why it was sort of acceptable that we only got one plate of sweets to SHARE.  I think it was extremely stingy. For $100, we should at least have our own cakes, instead of having to cut these dainty morsels with our knives and making them looked hacked and unappetising   We had a total of five cakes to share.  A key lime and basil macaroon (a  bit weird, but luckily the basil is very faint), a rose flavoured mousse on top of a strawberry sponge, a peanut and caramel mille feuille and another friand type cake.  And I forgot what the other one was!  The mille feuille was my favourite, but it looked like a disaster after we cut it.  I wasn’t much of fan of the dense friand cake. For $100 I would have also thought that they could serve it on a plate that had been cleaned of crumbs as well.

Stinginess aside, the waiter was wonderful.  This is a posh place to go without having to be snooty, and you can tell by the fact that it’s regularly booked out.  I can’t help but conclude that high tea is a bit of a rip off, as I didn’t feel like what we had was worth $100. Especially since I can have a three course meal at three-Michelin starred Gordon Ramsay at Hospital Road for that same price (Blog post to come).  Maybe if we hadn’t gone on the Chelsea Flower Show week it would have seemed a bit more worth it.  High tea everywhere is expensive, but at least other hotels give you a sweet each.   I have to say they did look beautiful though. And they were great sandwiches.

A brilliant way to use excess carrots, these mini bit sized cupcakes will be a perfect addition to a high tea party or to surprise supper guests or even as part of a petit four! Good for the cholesterol conscious as it uses oil not butter.

To make the icing just mix sugar, margarine and milk until almost sti ff but still mixable. Then pipe stars on top.

Here’s the recipe:  http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/carrot-cake-mini-cupcakes?autonomy_kw=carrot%20cupcake&rsc=header_9

http://www.jilldupleix.com/recipes/rec001.php

Char Siu Bau (or BBQ pork buns) are well known to the general population as fluffly steaming white dough buns filled with sweet pork. But have you tried the baked and glazed version – with a brown top, rounded and smooth?  Another favourite bun of mine is the polo or pineapple buns, filled with custard and topped with a sweet, crispy topping.

Essential but unhealthy – the mandatory spring rolls are crispy, deep fried asian sausage rolls – filled with mince of pork, mushrooms, and prawns if you’re lucky, as well as wood ear mushroom shreds and bamboo.  For the more health conscious, the steamed dumplings are a solid offering.  Prawn dumplings (har gau) are often chased by enthusiastic impatient diners (oh no, I would never do such a thing! ) and are often the first to go; and the most asked for.  Like a steam prawn wonton, wrapped in rice paper and steamed.

I’d say dim sims come a close second, going hand in hand with its prawn friend.  Balls of minced pork, prawn (and some pork fat shreds) are encased in a wonton wrapper, steamed and dotted with a yellow spot on top (dont’ ask me what it’s for!).  Another version is the snow pea shoot dumpling. Don’t be deceived though, it’s not vegetarian as it does have prawns in it too.  The sticky, see through rice wrapping is deliciously chewy.  Other favourites include calamari, steamed lotus seed buns, and steamed rice noodles.  Another day!  The best thing about Marigold is the parking station downstairs. $2.80 for one hour for diners! But beware, it’s $50 an hour for non-diners. D’oh!

www.marigold.com.au Level 4 and 5, 683-689 George Street, Sydney

I thought I could let my birthday pass without anyone from work knowing or at least making a fuss about it, but the girls at work managed to surprise me and made my birthday even more special! They managed to sneak in some cupcakes from a bakery until I walked to the fridge for some milk and saw these cupcakes, and… surprise! I was so touched!  Who can resist pink iced cupcakes, perfectly smooth drizzled with white chocolate over the buttery dense base; or these devilishly delicious chocolate chip and nut cupcakes with dark chocolate ganache,

Or these deceptively healthy looking (I assure you, they are not!) blackberry baked cheesecakes…. and finally, tangy lemon baked cheesecakes!! As if I hadn’t indulged enough already (other birthday blogs to come)…. but cupcakes really are so extra special Thanks for the sweet surprise girls!