Tiramisu - Daring Baker's February Challenge

Another month, another challenge!

The February 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Aparna of My Diverse Kitchen and Deeba of Passionate About Baking. They chose Tiramisu as the challenge for the month. Their challenge recipe is based on recipes from The Washington Post, Cordon Bleu at Home and Baking Obsession.

I can't say I was overly thrilled by this month's challenge. I'm not a major fan of tiramisu (or Italian food in general. Shock Horror.) and the baking element was rather minimal. I did enjoy making the pastry cream though.

First up, the ladyfinger biscuits. This step was pretty straightforward, although my batter didn't make as many biscuits as the recipe said it would. I was really impressed with how professional the biscuits looked (if you squinted a bit and ignored the wonky bits). So impressed, I forgot to take any pictures.

Next I made the mascarpone cheese. This was an absolute nightmare. I heated cream in a double boiler, trying to get it to 88C. It got to about 70C and stopped. Long slow heating of cream makes clotted cream, and I could see the yellowy crust forming on my cream. I love clotted cream, but this was not the right occasion! The recipe said I would see small bubbles forming as the cream reached just below simmering point. Instead, the cream suddenly thickened and went very very stiff. I added the lemon juice just in case the process was still salvageable. There was no curdling, and I couldn't see any whey in the mixture. I strained the cream in cheesecloth. After leaving it overnight, there were two drops of whey underneath the cloth, and the cream was as solid as butter. It tasted like mascarpone, but the texture was too firm. I left it out to soften at room temperature.

Tiramisu

The zabaglione was next on the list of components. This thickened up nicely, although the lemon zest made it look lumpy even when it wasn't. I would have added the lemon at the end to give flavour but without making the texture so lumpy.

Moving on, it was time for the pastry cream. I'd made this once before for chocolate eclairs, and it had been a bit of a disaster. I was determined to get it right this time, and kept the heat so low that it took ages to thicken up and cook. It came out really well and I finally felt like something in this recipe challenge had gone right!

Finally, I made up the sweetened whipped cream, and assembled the tiramisu. The recipe said you needed a pint of coffee. I used about a quarter of that to soak the ladyfingers. I have absolutely no idea who is getting half a litre of coffee in to 25 sponge biscuits. The recipe said to use an 8inch square dish. Mine was 8.5 inches, so I thought it would be fine. After putting a few of the biscuits down in the first layer, I realised I'd be lucky to fill half the dish.

Finished Tiramisu

It tasted pretty good, and it was so rich that even though I'd only made a half size portion, I still got 6 platefuls out of it. I served it up to T's parents, who were in raptures over it, and were ridiculously impressed when T told them I made the ladyfingers and the mascarpone.

(As a side note, the next morning I was ill, and the sight of that tiramisu in the fridge turned my stomach so much I hid it in the freezer. Even typing this now is given me memories of nausea, so I think that it will sit in the freezer until I give in and throw it away. It's not bad, it just has negative connotations now.)

I didn't rate the recipe at all. Every stage seemed inaccurate or poorly explained, and the quantities were either too large or too small. So for that reason, I'm not going to link to it or write it out here. Hopefully next month's challenge will be a bit more inspiring!

On the plus side, I now have a bottle of marsala to swig every time the ironing gets too much.

Cappuccino Cupcakes

I decided that making the millionaire shortbread from "Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache" was not a good test of the book, as it is about the only recipe in there that doesn't use some kind of vegetable in place of butter. The anthropomorphic descriptions in the book are not particularly useful, so it took me a while to decide on the cappuccino cupcakes with sweet potato.

Cappuccino Cupcakes (with Sweet Potato)

After creaming eggs and sugar, finely grated sweet potato is mixed in. The other main difference between this recipe and a standard cake is that the flour is replaced by rice flour and ground almonds, making this gluten free as well as fat free (I know there are fats in nuts, eggs and sugar, but there isn't the massive hunk of butter that starts off most cake recipes).

Before baking, the batter tasted more like carrot cake than coffee cake. Even though I'd added more coffee essence than the recipe suggested, the flavour was quite weak. After baking, I tried one of the cakes without any icing. Although the coffee flavour was still weak, the cake was moist and fluffy, and the sweet potato had melted away. I was quite impressed that such a healthy set of ingredients could produce such a good example of cake.

The suggested icing was a modified buttercream - 1 part butter, 1 part mascarpone and 4 parts icing sugar. Again I put in a bit more coffee essence than recommended to ensure that the icing made up for the lack of coffee flavour in the cake. While I like the creamier texture that mascarpone adds, I find that it produces quite a loose icing, which doesn't pipe as well as plain buttercream. I tried to practice icing roses on the top of these cakes, but as the mixture wasn't stiff enough they collapsed a little. I think my technique is improving though.

Cappuccino Cupcake with "Rose" Icing Pattern

I am generally not a fan of "fun-free" food, but these were quite impressive. I don't think I'd make them regularly for myself, but as I know a few people who are watching their weight or gluten intolerant, it's good to have a recipe to suit them too.

Cappuccino Cupcakes (Harry Eastwood - Red Velvet & Chocolate Heartache)
Makes 12

2 eggs
160g caster sugar
200g peeled and grated sweet potato
100g rice flour
100g ground almonds
2tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3tbsp coffee essence

Icing
50g unsalted butter
200g icing sugar
50g mascarpone
2tsp coffee essence

1) Preheat the oven to 180C, and line the muffin tray with paper cases.
2) Whisk the eggs and sugar until pale and fluffy. Whisk in the sweet potato, followed by the rice flour, grated almonds, baking powder and salt. Finally stir through the coffee essence.
3) Fill the cases and bake for 20 minutes. The cakes may look a bit like muffins at this point but don't worry.
4) While the cakes cool, whisk the butter for the icing until it is smooth. Then add 100g of the icing sugar and beat in to the butter to form a thick paste. Whisk for longer than you think you need as it is vital the butter and sugar are properly combined.
5) Add the mascarpone, coffee essence and remaining 100g of icing sugar. Mix with a spoon until you get a smooth icing (don't use the electric whisk here, it'll destroy the texture of the mascarpone.) Keep the icing in the fridge until you are ready to use it.
6) Once the cakes are cool, top them with the icing.

I'm keeping my cakes in the fridge, as the mascarpone won't survive at room temperature very long. However, if you plan to eat these within a day or so, they should be fine to store in a normal cake box.

Peter's Yard. The Quartermile

Reading through some of the previous review posts on here, I seem to always be very positive. Though this may indicate that I only eat in the most fabulous places (or that I have a thoroughly undiscerning palate), it's actually because I don't want to bother reviewing places that have rubbish food! Especially as they are usually places that you know will be rubbish, but you have to go ahead with it anyway because it's your friend's birthday and they wanted to go there (I'm talking to you, Wetherspoons). Although if I do eat somewhere that is hilariously bad, I probably will blog about it for comedy value.

Somewhere I have mentioned on here a couple of times, and I have been meaning to review for ages, is Peter's Yard. It's in the new Quartermile development, although to me, it'll always be on Middle Meadow Walk. A few weeks after it opened, a Starbucks sprung up 2 doors down. I did not hold out much hope. Well over a year later, and Peter's Yard is still thriving.

I love this sign - it tells the truth.

Peter's Yard isn't a typical Edinburgh cafe. For starters, it's not in a pokey converted tenement front room. It's industrial, with exposed pipes, concrete, lots of glass and half the space taking up by a very imposing looking bakery area. The menu is written on brown paper rolls that hang from walls, with no option of a frappucino with soy whipped cream and extra sprinkles.. In fact, you can't even choose to supersize your coffee, it comes in standard only. The furniture is stylish but utilitarian. This is not the third place.

Instead there are the usual coffees, including an honesty station, where you can pour your own filter coffee to take away, leaving your money in the jar next to the flask. The coffee is very good indeed, and often comes with some very impressive examples of latte art.

Latte Art at Peter's Yard

However, the thing that hooked me in, and drew me to Peter's Yard when I knew I should be in the library studying, or saving money by eating at home, was the food. All the baking is done on the premises, and they produce some of the best bread in the city. The cakes are also particularly good, with the parsnip cake and the Valrhona muffins being among my favourites. Often after a miserable day at uni, I would attempt to cheer myself up with a bowl of their soup, and a big hunk of fresh bread. They also sell quite a lot of grocery food too, such as packets of Swedish cookies, the teas and coffee blends they serve, and some seriously good chocolate, including Valrhona, Amedei and Michel Cluizel.

After a fun afternoon spent queuing at the council office to pay for a parking permit, I stopped once more at Peter's Yard. Deciding it was too hot for soup, and I wasn't hungry enough to justify a massive open sandwich, I went for a cappuccino and a slice of pecan pie.

Pecan Pie and Coffee at Peter's Yard

The coffee was delicious as usual, although I think that today's barista was still in training given the slightly poor attempt at latte art! (Some kind of musical notation? Or just a random swirl?) I love the way the top is really bitter, but the main coffee drunk through the milk is almost naturally sweet.

The pecan pie was rammed with nuts, and had an intriguing construction. Bordering the pastry was an almost cake-like layer, which I guess was probably made from ground nuts. On top of that was a hefty layer of whole pecans, and then the top was glazed with apricot jelly. This tasted quite strong when eaten alone, but when eaten with the pecans gave the pie a satisfyingly fruity aftertaste.

Peter's Yard is more expensive than a lot of other places nearby, especially given that it is a stones throw from the George Square campus. However, the quality of the food and drink is such that I think it justifies a slightly higher charge. If lunch at Starbucks is going to cost £5, then I'm totally ready to pay £6 and have something much much better. Given that Peter's Yard is often packed while the neighbouring Starbucks is almost empty, it seems many Edinburghers agree with me.

The Graduation Bake-a-thon.

As it was graduation week, we have had various friends, relatives and randomers drifting in and out of the flat all week. In an attempt to be hospitable, we all chipped in to an ingredients pot and I went on a baking binge.

• Delia's Lemon Roulade
• Jamie Oliver's Carrot Cake
• Cupcake Bakeshop's Chocolate Fudge Cupcakes
• Dorie Greenspan's Korova Cookies
• Red Mangetout Salted Caramel Mochas

The lemon roulade was amazing, and the left over lemon curd is in the fridge. I haven't told my flatmates this yet as once I do it will not be around for long. The only trouble I had with this recipe was that the sponge broke up when I tried to roll it. Luckily I had enough lemon curd and mascarpone to stick it back together, but it looked a bit messy from the side.

Broken lemon roulade - tastes better than it looks

The carrot cake is one of my favourite ones, as it is so dense and moist. However, I made it in mini loaf tins as I wanted to freeze a cake for later in the week in case the first batch went stale/got eaten. As the mixture is so dense, it is prone to burning on top but still being undercooked in the middle. Luckily I managed to get away with it this time, but the cake was a little moister than I would have liked, and a little crispy on top. I also swapped out the walnuts for hazelnuts as I had them in the cupboard already.

Carrot cake with vanilla mascarpone topping

I have altered the Cupcake Bakeshop recipe, and never use the strawberries in the filling, partly because they don't add that much and partly because even in season they are so expensive! The buttercream icing on top is perfect. It's creamy and sweet but without being overpowering. The texture of the cake itself is nothing special, but when it has the ganache filling it is AMAZING. I have yet to give anyone this cupcake and for them not to fall in love with it.

I'd made the Korova cookies before, but this time I used white chocolate chips instead of dark, just because I'd messed up the shopping list and not bought enough plain chocolate to make these and the chocolate cupcakes. I also think I sliced them a bit thin as they were too crispy and a little tough. Still delicious though!

Roulade and Carrot Cake, boxes of cookies

Once again, me and caramel failed to get on. I burned the mixture and had to strain it through a sieve in to a fresh pan. I also didn't cook it enough for it to stay in the biscuits, so some of them leaked as the caramel was too runny. I also got the quantities completely wrong, so now we have a massive tub of caramel in the fridge alongside the lemon curd!

Overall, I think I need to plan baking binges better. I ran out of muffin cases and baking powder, but had way too many eggs. I tried to make things in an order to best maximise things like oven capacity and cooling racks, but if I'd thought it through better I would have made things like cookie dough in advance. I also need some more attractive display containers. The cake caddy is pretty awesome, but kind of utilitarian looking. Any ideas?

Rachel Allen's Mocha Cake

The funniest thing about running a blog is Google Analytics. The initial excitement that somebody other than me had read it, then finding out in map view that person is from Argentina! Apart from trying to collect a reader in every country (gotta catch 'em all) I love reading the search results. The most common search is for Press Coffee, although I get some very strange ones too. Try "I don't like eating with other people" and "Tania Tang". I have no idea who she is although she sounds dubious to me.

This post is dedicated to the person who searched for "Rachel Allen mocha cake review".

As someone with a rather large baking store-cupboard, the only ingredients I had to buy for this cake were fresh eggs and some butter. Usually I have some of them in the house but this time they had run out. Luckily, as E was craving cake (he was finishing uni that morning) he offered to pick them up on the way home from his exam.

The cake batter was simple to pull together, and "Bake" is rapidly becoming my book of choice for sweet treats. I couldn't be bothered baking a layered cake, as my sandwich pans are teeny, so to get a decent size cake I usually use the springform pan and wash it out between layers. However, the recipe gave alternate timings for cupcakes, so I went with this.

Mocha cupcake

The cakes cooked well, although I had to turn the pan to combat a cool spot in the front of the oven. The icing is a simple coffee buttercream. Usually, I pipe in a spiral inwards, but I'd seen online that piping in a spiral outwards from the centre created a rose petal effect. Seeing as E was going to snaffle these down with whisky and beer, I was sure he wouldn't mind if I experimented with the decor a little.

My roses were pretty poor, although for a first attempt I was impressed. I think with a little practice I might be able to produce something quite pretty. I also made a few traditional ones to take pictures of.

More Mocha Cupcake-ary

The cakes were generally light and moist, and kept well until the next day. The buttercream was very sweet, but went well with the cake. I've noticed buttercream gets a lot of "haterz" online, either as it is too sweet or too fatty tasting. I think if it's well whipped and spread sparingly it tastes great. (Plus, we're talking cake here, if you want something non sugary and fatty I suggest a salad.)

I think next time I will make this cake as a proper cake rather than cupcakes. As is the way with cupcakes, the icing to cake ratio was a bit off. Actually, the ratio wasn't too bad, it was the distribution. I like layer cakes as the icing is spread evenly, whereas the combination the cupcake shape and a small mouth means I invariably get icing up my nose, and one bite of icing followed by another solely of cake.

Salted Caramel Mocha Cookies

In Delicious. this month there is a was an advert for a coffee machine which came with an recipe for cappuccino thumbprint cookies. This got me thinking, and I suddenly became obsessed with adapting the recipe to make salted caramel mochas.

I followed the dough recipe pretty closely, only making a couple of changes to the method. It was the filling that really took time and experimentation. I wanted to make a creamy caramel, much like you get inside a Twix or a Mars bar. Using Leiths, and various online recipes, I made four batches of caramel. All of them were rubbish. The first couple burned, even though I was using a sugar thermometer. The second two I was much more careful with, and took them off the heat well before they were anywhere near burning point. I tried stopping one with cream, but instead it just turned in to a giant lump of hard sugar and some slightly dubious looking brown cream. The next batch I used a combination of milk and butter. This had a better consistency, but was a very dark brown and instead of being smooth and creamy, had a weirdly grainy mouthfeel.

4 attempts at caramel meant that I had run out of sugar, clean saucepans and dairy products. My fingers were covered in tiny burns from boiling, spitting sugar, and I was getting frustrated. Why was boiling some sugar so difficult? I was being attentive, monitoring the temperature, and not stirring too much. The part of me that thinks I am a good cook suggested that it was a combination of a dodgy electric hob and a cheap, thin saucepan. The part of me that wants to be a good cook thought I was probably stirring too early, heating too quickly, and getting distracted too easily.

While searching online, I found a recipe for millionaire's shortbread. Looking at the picture, it seemed that was exactly the type of caramel I was looking for. A baking community I posted on also suggested a similar recipe. I noted down the ingredients, and went to bed. That night I dreamt of caramel. All of my dreams featured it in some way. I dreamt of bubbling sugar, liquid in the pan but solid on the counter. I was surrounded by vast containers of dark, burnt toffee, with curdled cream and butter floating on top. Finally, I dreamt of the millionaire's shortbread, and the promise of a perfect, mellow, soft caramel, interspersed with the crunch of vanilla sea-salt.

The next morning, I couldn't wait to get out of bed. This is a very rare feeling for me! I went off to the supermarket, stocked up on sugar, butter and condensed milk. I was going to crack this today.

I mixed up the ingredients in a pan, playing slightly with the quantities. I stirred as the butter melted, then stirred as I added the sugar and the golden syrup. I kept stirring as I added the condensed milk. And stirred, and stirred. Slowly the texture began to thicken, and the taste became more caramelised. Then some brown lumps appeared. The baking community had warned that it would catch easily. NOOOOOOOOOO!

I whipped it off the heat, and strained it in to a new pan. Luckily, there were only one or two burnt specks, which got caught in the sieve. I turned the hob down to the lowest heat and stirred some more. I stirred for a full 30 minutes. I wasn't even convinced the mixture was thickening properly, and the colour didn't appear to be changing either. Still stirring, I reached over to the sink to get the sieve and the used pan. Only then did I realise how brown my mixture was! The old saucepan was a eggy yellow, but the one I was currently stirring was the colour of tanned skin after a good day at the beach (not my skin though, then it would have been a violent red).

Doing a little victory dance (but still stirring) I poured the caramel in to a bowl. While warm, it was fairly liquid, when cooled it was almost solid, but still pliable. Perfect.

Maybe when I have a kitchen with natural light I will be able to take good photos.

Salted Caramel Mocha Cookies.
Makes 40

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Mix 285g plain flour, 100g cocoa powder, and 2tsp of sea salt in bowl, with 2tbsp ground coffee.

In another bowl, cream 225g unsalted butter with 285g caster sugar. Mix in 2 egg yolks and 2 tbsp cream. Once combined, add in the flour cocoa mixture. Stir gently until combined, then turn out on to a work surface and knead until you have a smooth dough.

Divide the mixture in to 4, and then make 10 small balls from each of your quarters. If you don't want to make the 40 cookies, you can keep the dough in the fridge for a week, or the freezer for a month. Put the balls in the fridge for 2 hours to harden up. If you try to bake them straight away they will spread too much and break up.

Form each of the balls into a shape like a pie shell. You want the edges to be fairly thin, but not so thin that they will crack in the oven. About 5mm is ok.

Bake in the oven for 10 mins, and then cool on a rack. If any of the holes for the filling have risen, then push them down while still soft. While the shells are cooling, make the caramel.

Melt 180g unsalted butter in a saucepan over a low heat. When melted, add 75g caster sugar and stir until dissolved. Then add 2 tbsp golden syrup, and stir until combined. Finally, add in a can (397g) condensed milk, and stir continuously. When the mixture is golden and thick (and tastes caramelly) remove from the heat into a clean bowl. Stir in sea salt to taste. I used about 30g of vanilla sea salt, but I like my caramel SALTY.

Filling the shells

Once the caramel has cooled slightly (but is still liquid enough to pour easily) and the biscuit shells have hardened, fill the shells with caramel. Mine took about a tablespoon of caramel per biscuit.

Lots of filled shells

Finally, melt 200g white chocolate and spoon this over the caramel, smoothing out the edges so the caramel is hidden. Make it pretty with a dusting of cocoa powder.

Press Coffee, Edinburgh

Press Coffee, Buccleuch Street

Press Coffee is in what used to be a second hand bookshop, with a rather dubious hippy cafe underneath. Given that their nachos comprised of some doritos with ketchup on top, I wasn't surprised when it shut down.

I was initially a bit suspicious the first few times I walked past. There was no decor to speak of, with plain white walls and a rather forlorn looking chiller counter in the middle of the floor. For several weeks nothing seemed to happen, and I wondered if it was one of those places that shut down before it even got going.

A week or so later, while eating lunch in Kilimanjaro (a rather nice coffee shop near to uni), I saw on their news bulletin sheet that Press Coffee was essentially a second branch of Kilimanjaro. Having been reassured that it wasn't some dubious ketchup nacho affair, I decided to give it a try.

I ordered Moroccan chicken soup and a cappuccino. I was instantly impressed that I was asked whether I wanted my coffee with the meal or after. I still find it a bit strange drinking coffee with a meal, but as I was pushed for time I opted to have both together. Just as I sat down, the guy at the counter came over to tell me that they'd run out of chicken soup, but had some Thai vegetable instead. I was fine with the switch, although I little disappointed as I do love a bit of Moroccan chicken!

The cappuccino arrived and had an attempt at latte art on it. My flatmate E usually works as a barista during the holidays, and reckons that latte art is always a good sign. Apparently you need several variables to right before you can do it properly, and it indicates that a certain level of care goes in to the coffee.


Although Peter's Yard does the best latte art I've seen in Edinburgh, this was a pretty decent attempt, and the coffee underneath was pretty tasty too. Also, I really liked the spoon. A minor thing, but well designed cutlery always scores bonus points.

The soup came with a massive section of baguette, and a pot of butter. It was generally tasty, although not that memorable. I have visited subsequently and had the paninis, which again, while good, aren't so great that they are worth the visit alone. I think Press Coffee's real strength is that they are very close to uni, and the only places that are cheaper than them serve really bad food and drink. I've already been several times, just because they are easy to get to, good value and I know I'll get a decent meal, unlike the union-run cafes!

I think the biggest disadvantages Press Coffee has are the location and the decor. (I know I just said they had a good location but hear me out.) The coffee is better than most places nearby, and the food is good value, but not so great as to make it worth a special trip for. While they are close to uni, I suspect they could struggle during the summer when that part of town isn't so busy. However, if their business plan revolves around making money during term time to tide over the quieter holiday periods, then they could do ok.

While the decor is not offensive, it isn't exciting either. The white walls, plain seating and strangely placed chiller cabinet make it seem a bit clinical, and it needs to be full to get any kind of atmosphere going. Given that it used to be a book shop, I would have perhaps played on this and made the interior slightly more cosy. The big windows will be spectacular in summer, but seeing as Edinburgh is grey and dull most of the year, I'm not convinced that people want to feel that exposed. Certainly, when I'm looking for somewhere to eat in winter (and most of autumn and spring too), my key factor is warmth. They'll have to really have the radiators on full blast to counteract the "coldness" of the decor when the two days of summer are over!

I'll be interested to see how Press Coffee fairs over the next few months, and it's currently slightly ahead of Kilimanjaro in my opinion, mainly as Kilimanjaro is often too busy to be comfortable. I'd also keep it in mind if you are planning to visit for the festival, as it's close enough to the action (Gilded Balloon and Pleasance Dome are 5 minutes away) to be convenient, but hidden enough that you might actually get a seat.

Raw Food

We went for a walk to Stockbridge, which we had heard was a bit fancy, to check out the area. I've got a graduate job in Edinburgh in September, so I wanted to see where normal people lived as I've always stuck to the student end of town.

While we were there, we stopped in Red Sugar for a coffee. It's a raw food cafe, run by a pair of nutritionists. The premise is that cooking food destroys the nutrients within it, and it is better to eat food that is only warmed to about 40C. Luckily the coffee was an exception and was made with boiling water.

The other gimmick was that there were no additives, and everything was vegan. We got soy milk in our lattes, and sweetener instead of sugar. I forgot to ask what the sweetener was, I suspect it was fructose rather than Splenda or some other chemical substitute, but I found this a little strange. Sugar is made from sugar cane, and although white sugar has been processed intensively, brown sugar is fairly simple product, with minimal processing. I've had raw sugar cane before, and it was pretty tasty, and I can't see how it can be worse for you than any other naturally occuring sugar. I don't understand why extracting sugar from cane is bad, but extracting it from fruit is ok. I guess there might be some nutritional differences, but I would expect these to be minimal. Google reveals that turbinado sugar has roughy the same amount of calories as fructose, so I don't really know what they were aiming for here.

I don't think I've ever had a soy latte before, and I was pleasantly surprised. I really couldn't taste any difference between this coffee and a standard one. Although I found the logic behind the sweetener iffy, it did the same job as sugar in this case.

I really wanted to try one of the cakes, which looked delicious. I'm not sure exactly how they were made, but it was quite interesting trying to figure out how they could make cakes without heating the food. I read on their List review that they use a dehydrator to make flatbread, so I guess they could use this to make pastry too, and then have fillings that can set through chilling.

In the end, we got two Booja Booja raspberry truffles. These were also vegan friendly, and used cocoa beans that hadn't been roasted (and ths counted as "raw"). They were pretty tasty, and if I was a vegan I'm sure I'd love them. However, as an omnivore, it was too obvious that they'd used coconut oil in an attempt to recreate the natural creaminess of properly roasted beans. The chocolate had quite a strong coconut taste, although this might have been in the raspberry centre rather than just the chocolate. The raspberry centre was really good, the flavour of raspberry was strong, and the texture was creamy. I pulled a bit of chocolate off the raspberry to taste it on its own, and wasn't overly impressed. It was dry tasting, and although it was dark, it was still quite sweet. I think if you had food allergies, or were vegan, then this is a really decent substitute, but I think the flavour and texture compromises needed to make this "raw" weren't worth it. I can cope with eating raw vegetables for better nutrition, but I doubt very much that anyone eats chocolate for its nutritional value!

I would be interested to go back to eat a meal, rather than just having coffee. The decor was quite modern and smart, which makes a change from other vegan places I've been, which tend to look a bit rundown and messy. This isn't a bad thing, and sometimes it is nice to eat somewhere that feels like your hippy mate's living room, but sometimes it takes away from the "treat" element of eating out. I think the only other vegan/vegetarian place I have been that made a similar effort with decor is David Bann. I'm trying to eat less meat, partly for health reasons and partly because I am poor and vegetables and tofu are cheap. I might head back to Red Sugar for lunch in a few weeks when the dissertation is done and I have more time to investigate the whole raw food thing.