Clandestine Cake Club Perth
Posted by | Categories: Desserts, Featured, Perth, Recipes
Via my fellow bloggers on Twitter I recently became aware of a brilliant phenomenon called the Clandestine Cake Club. The CCC was created two years ago by cake lover Lynn Hill in Leeds, UK with the aim to be able to get people together in a relaxed social environment so they could “Bake, Eat and Talk about Cake”.
The concept was to strictly only include cakes; no cupcakes, brownies, pies or tarts are allowed and since its inception it has grown to over 133 groups around the world including Switzerland, Spain, France and Finland.
There is currently only one group in Australia and luckily for us it’s here in Perth! The Perth branch is coordinated by Carolanne from Carolanne’s Kitchen and Jackie from Where the wind blows me. Recent awareness of this group has surged thanks to some awesome publicity in Scoop magazine, on Great about Perth and Agenda City.
I was so excited to hear that the theme for the July meet was to be gluten free and signed up to come along. As I am by no means a talented baker by anyones stretch of the imagination I began madly flipping through a number of my food stained cookbooks. I eventually decided to make a Coffee Bundt cake adapted from one of Sue Shepherd’s books.
For those who don’t know who Dr Sue Shepherd is; she is one of Australia’s leading clinical nutritionists specialising in patients with gluten intolerance and fructose malabsorption. Being a sufferer of both these conditions myself, I have all her cookbooks on my shelf every single one is worn and well used. (For the recipe for my Coffee cake please click here.)
Knowing what a sweet tooth my bestie is, I wasn’t surprised when she agreed to join me as my guest and off we headed to our first Cake Club meet! We were greeted with a warm welcome and were both blown away by the wonderful collection of cakes that had been made for the occasion. Everyone had experimented with a wide range different types of flours and ingredients to create a decadent selection that would make any gluten eater jealous.
Carolanne made a scrumptious coconut and berry cake using coconut flour. She taught me something new; apparently coconut flour has such a high fibre content that it expands dramatically once you add your wet ingredients meaning you only need to use a third of what you would use with normal flours. I have a bag of coconut flour sitting unused in my pantry, I am best to remember this expansion effect when I first use it!
My favourite cake of the day was Red Hot Spatula’s Kuihs – little Asian style cakes made from rice flour, green bean flour and tapioca flour. It was interesting to find out that traditionally in Asian cultures they do not usually bake large cakes like what we are accustomed in Western society. Instead they tend to make small single serve cute little cakes. These cakes were steamed not baked and I loved them so much that I ordered some more from her to be delivered to my work the following fortnight! She was kind enough to share the recipe with us all as a guest post on Where the Wind Blow Me.
My bestie’s favourite cake for the day was the white chocolate, macadamia nut and honeycomb cake. This cake was subtle flavoured with all three elements and had a very moist, almost syrupy texture without being too gooey.
As well as being the welcoming hostess, Liv from Col Panna baked the “Best Cake full stop”; which was a hazelnut cake with Frangelico ganache. This deliciousness was nothing sort of incredible and was made even more spectacular in that the outer layer of the cake was the best part, not the centre like many standard cakes. My bride diet went completely out the window with this one. She was also kind enough to share her recipe for us all to try for ourselves.
A final cake of note was the raw chocolate avocado cake made by Bri from East Meets West. Unfortunately I didn’t try this one as it contained dates which are chock full of fructose. I figured after the sugar and dairy overload, I didn’t need to add a fructose blow out to deal with as well. It looked almost succulent and I watched enviously as the rest of the group devoured it.
One of the great things about these cake meets is that once we are all finished at the end, we all get to fill our own plates with slices of everyone else cakes to take home to share and enjoy. As much as I dreamed of eating cake for breakfast, the Boy tucked into the container as soon as I got home and there were only slim pickings by the following morning! I guess this is a good sign on how good the cakes were as he isn’t really a sweet tooth.
The next meet’s theme is Scandinavian style cakes and is on the 4th of August from 3-5 pm. If you are interested in joining this brilliant phenomenon click the link for details how to register.
Perth Clandestine Cake Club: http://clandestinecakeclub.co.uk/groups/perth-australia/
Keep up with the latest and Like Me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter!
Chapels on Whatley, Maylands
Posted by | Categories: Breakfast/Brunch, Desserts, Perth, Restaurants
In recent years Maylands has become a definite stand out location to visit if you want a decent breakfast. There are so many options to choose from including Piccos Kitchen, Mrs S, Milkd, Sherbet Bake Shop and as I recently discovered; Chapels on Whatley.
The café is actually contained inside a shop selling a variety of imported Asian antique furniture, art and bits and pieces for around your home that they source from a number of countries including Tibet, Mongolia, Japan, China and Vietnam. They have a wide range of over sixty different types of beautiful loose teas to purchase and you can book a tea tasting to try them all if you wish.
The café is located toward the back of the store and opens out onto a quaint and relaxing little courtyard. Sounds of the neighbours pet bird’s song echo gently giving a wonderful sense of serenity and peace. My dear friend and colleague Chris had the luxury of a few days break from her second job of being super mum to her two adorable children. Her daughter was having a couple of days sleepover at her Nanna’s and so she only had her youngest little baby boy to watch. This made the prospects of outing much easier and relaxing for the both of us. She loves the Maylands area and visits it more regularly than I do so convincing her to meet at Chapels was easy work.
Short Macchiato
I rose quite early that morning and felt buzzing with energy so I burst out the front door for a quick pre-breakfast run. We are so lucky to live in such a beautiful city and no matter how many times I run along the foreshore I always revel in its beauty. Normally upon my return from a morning run I am literally starving and will immediately commence devouring breakfast of some form; ideally something that includes eggs and strong coffee. However in order to meet Chris on time I had to jump straight in the shower, dress and into my car to head off to Maylands with an empty stomach. As I was waiting for Chris to arrive, I was so hungry it felt like my stomach had started to digest itself in protest. Thankfully she arrived shortly after with her gorgeous little boy in tow and as we waited for our orders to arrive she opened up a little container of puffed corn for him to nibble on. Figuring his food was fair game, I helped the little guy work his way through his breakfast snack as he looked back at me with a slightly astonished and bemused expression.
Smoked salmon and poached eggs on gluten free bread with spinach
Our meals were super quick to come out of the kitchen and I had to conscientiously stop myself from greedily eating it in two seconds flat. My eggs were poached just a few seconds beyond perfection maintaining most of their gooey centres which burst out like lava over my salmon and toast. The gluten-free bread didn’t have that crumbly cake texture I loathe in some but was fairly standard in taste.
Smoked salmon and scrambled eggs on rye with spinach
Chris also ordered the smoked salmon but had her’s with scrambled eggs and on rye toast. Her eggs were airy and fluffy and although her little boy had already had his breakfast, he was totally fine with the idea of helping her finish her large serve. Very cute.
Mixed berry minicake with cream
One of the many things I love about eating out with Chris is her healthy appetite, especially when it comes to breakfast. A lot of people cannot handle a large amount of food first thing in the morning. Neither Chris nor I are one of these people. She was the person who introduced to me the concept of a “second breakfast”, an idea that has great merit to someone like me who is often a very early riser. In addition to this we are also big fans of a two-course breakfast.
Green tea macarons
The dessert menu left me spoilt for choice with a multitude of gluten-free options. We ordered the mixed berry tea cake and a couple of green tea macarons. The cake was fluffy and light with a great tang of tart berries and a dollop of decadent thick cream. The macarons were a little disappointing. They lacked a crisp outer shell and were mostly a chewy consistency. Texture really is key to macaron success. The green tea flavour was too subtle for me and it was also a little too sugary.
Chapels on Whatley are another gluten-free friendly breakfast venue to add to your bucket list in Perth, especially if you love a good cup of tea. Their menu is small but varied and I am interested to return and try their lunch menu.
Like Me on Facebook!
Chapels on Whatley 196 Whatley Crescent, Maylands, 6051 | (08) 9272 7738 | www.chapelsonwhatley.com.au Price: $$ ($8-25 breakfast/brunch, gluten-free options available) Food: 2.5/5 (fluffy scrambled eggs but poor quality macaron) Service: 3.5/5 (very prompt service, friendly) Ambience: 4/5 (love the courtyard with accompanying birdies) Drinks: 4/5 (would return just for the tea) Total: 14/20
