Around the square and into Parklane

Parklane Espresso. Seriously, I must have been the last person in Hobart to find out about this place, which is odd given how many cafes I seek out and tips that people pass on. Anyway, after I was met with a chorus of ‘oh, have you not been there?’, and ‘they must make the best coffee in Hobart’ for a few weeks, I decided it was high time to try it out and suss out the hot chocolate. Given it is an espresso café, I was dubious. But firstly I had to find the place! I knew it was in Salamanca Square but for the life of me, I could not see it. Just as I was about to leave, a sign jumped out indicating where it was. Crisis averted.

A small little pocket tucked away in an arcade near Smolt (to save anyone else getting confused), is the home of Parklane Espresso. The tiny space seems to attract a constant stream of coffee aficionados who are served with speedy precision, allowing even more people to cram in to get their fix. So, from the masses, it would appear the coffee is good, but what about the hot chocolate? Well, let me tell you, Parklane Espresso make damn fine hot chocolate! My first visit was for a takeaway, and let’s face it, those paper cups never photograph well. I resisted buying a Parklane Espresso glass KeepCup (yep, they have their own and they are super stylin!), as I had plans to get my very own KeepCup in colours to match this blog (matchy matchy? Me? Never!). On the arrival of said KeepCup, I toddled back to Parklane to fill ‘er up! So now I had not only an amazing hot chocolate, but one that looked super hot in my new cup 🙂 And a shameless grab of their card makes my pictures look all the better, don’t you think? Happy days indeed. The hot chocolate at Parklane is quite rich with a slightly bitter tang and a sweetness that makes it just right.

Check out Parklane Espresso

100th blog post – toot toot!

It seems to have taken no time at all to reach 100 posts – but it does make me feel queasy thinking back to all of the éclairs and hot chocolates I have sampled 😦 Thanks everyone who has provided café tips, been patient while I took photos of my drinks (and trying not to be one of those ‘annoying food picture people’!), and

Here’s to another 100 posts with more chocolately, frothy goodness 🙂

*yes, that is cocoa in the picture, and yes, I was supposed to be doing other things…!

It’s a ginger thing…

Continuing on with my quest to find ‘different’ hot chocolates during my trip to New Zealand, I visited Patagonia in Wanaka (after my failed attempt in Queenstown) to try their ginger hot chocolate. Feeling a little peckish after a walk along the lake edge and working up (what I thought was) an appetite, I ordered the ginger hot chocolate and a serve of churros. The problem was the churros. Or maybe it was the fact I had a sweet, chocolate drink and sweet (huge) churros. Or the dark chocolate sauce I ordered with the churros. Sugar and chocolate overload 🙂

Ginger is often associated with not only it’s fantastic flavour but it’s medicinal properties (in this case adding even more health benefits to hot chocolate as my study continues). Ailments ginger can assist with include colds, headaches (so a powerhouse when combined with the headache killer that is hot chocolate), and aids digestion – so maybe I was smart to have this with my large serving of churros? I was very curious to find out what ginger would be like with chocolate – and I am now a massive a fan. There were finely grated pieces of ginger mixed through the hot chocolate giving a subtle hint of ginger flavour with the occasional piece of ginger in the mix. I am definitely going to try making this one at home. If it works out, I will post the recipe. I may not make churros to accompany it though – not sure I could survive that experience twice!

A teasingly good brew

This post is a slight departure from my normal café reviews of hot chocolate. But it is about hot chocolate nonetheless. Earlier this week it was time for my 6-weekly visit to Tease Hair and Spa to see the lovely Ben (Ben: that’s another $5 on my next hair cut). I had stopped by Next Door on my way, but it was closed. I was a bit disappointed (I caught up with them the next day), so Ben offered to make me a hot chocolate. It was billed initially as the ‘best hot chocolate you will ever have’, and was slowly downgraded to ‘probably not the best, but quite good’. This was a rare crisis of confidence for Ben.

After snipping away my hair for a while, and us both forgetting the promised hot chocolate, Ben remembered, downed tools and went to make my drink. I am not sure what I was expecting really, but when he bought it out, it looked quite professional and good. I said as much to which Ben, who seemingly regaining his confidence, rattled off all the places he has worked where making good drinks was a requirement. OK. So he cuts hair very well, breeds great lamb (I have a freezer full), is knowledgeable about food, and it turns out, can make good hot chocolate. Some people.

I am not quite sure that you can walk in off the street for one of these hot chocolates, but hey, it can’t hurt to ask. Tell Ben I sent you – it will likely cost you more.

Tease Hair & Spa

Lo lo lo lo Lola

(Go on, play the song…you know you want to! Lo lo lo lo Lola)

I possibly have a new favourite café in Hobart – Café Lola. I first noticed Lola a few weeks ago, tucked back from the Hobart waterfront, and for whatever reason it looked like a place that would have good hot chocolate (I do live in a permanent state of hope).

So earlier this week I met a friend for lunch at Lola. Given it is only quite new, I expected it to be quite busy, so I arrived for lunch at midday and 45 minutes later it was full. It is easy to see why this has become a popular spot. The clean and whole food menu options are limited, but offer some tasty lunch selections which are all reasonably guilt free 🙂

So if the food looked guilt free (which is never really a major consideration for me anyway), then surely the hot chocolate must be following the same healthy path? I will guess that the hot chocolate is made from cacao powder given it was reminiscent of Pollen’s hot chocolate mix, but a little sweeter. It was instantly a new favourite of mine, possibly just sneaking in behind Pollen (time to update the leader board!).

I will be heading back for both the hot chocolate and the food – see you at Lola!

Café Lola

The badgering continues

After my first visit to Honey Badger and the discovery that there was more than one hot chocolate on offer, last Friday I went back. It was a very late afternoon tea plan that turned into dessert before dinner (what an awesome idea!), mainly because Honey Badger do not open until 5pm and because sometimes you have to turn things upside down and shake them a bit.

So dessert before dinner it was.

Tegan, Ben, Nicole and I converged on Honey Badger and we were not the only people with reverse dinner plans. After scoping out desserts from other tables, we ordered. An interesting thing happened between the time we left work and the time we arrived at Honey Badger. Tegan (the ringleader), who had requested we leave work earlier than planned to get some sugary treats, ordered what looked like breakfast and far too healthy. Coupled with a cup of tea, she had the mostly healthy ‘dessert’ of us all. Ben, Nicole and I stuck to the plan and ordered treats with varying degrees of sickliness. I also ordered the dark (Mork) hot chocolate (it turns out the milk hot chocolate is Cadbury chocolate).

The dark hot chocolate was great. The foamy top was a thick mousse-like texture and taste and the drink itself was yummy and rich. I would definitely recommend it over the milk. Combined with the Queen B hotcakes, it was a winner.

The dinner side of the evening saw us lose a team member (due to the onset of a chocolate coma), but the three of us marched on to consume two pizzas (the girls) and a rather large hot dog (which belonged to Ben who seems to be a bottomless pit!).

Chocolate & More…the ‘more’ is code for hot chocolate

A half consumed hot chocolate is not the normal sort of picture I share on this blog, but it was the best I could do given a) the hot chocolate was a take away, b) I had a long way to walk with it and c) it was a cold day. But I think the picture actually helps me illustrate a particular feature of this hot chocolate – its goopy thickness.

This hot chocolate was sourced from a place which should have seemed obvious to me, but at the same time was quite a surprise. I bought it at Chocolate & More in the Bank Arcade (near Habitat/Wellington Walk/behind the mall/near the great Thai veggie place – that should paint a picture for general directions!). I had been ‘referred’ to this shop by Indi, and while a chocolate shop should seem a likely source of all things chocolate, how many times have you ever seen hot chocolate (ready to go, not flakes) in a chocolate store? Never, I bet (in Hobart anyway).

I spotted the hot chocolate machine/swirly/mixing device thingymybob on the counter. This was the right place! I ordered a $6 cup (pricey but it looked good) and had a good chat to the lovely lady about the hot chocolate. It is made from Italian chocolate (slightly weird I thought – were Switzerland or Belgium out?) and she adds corn starch to thicken it. So pretty much what this results in, is a very thick, gooey hot chocolate that feels and tastes like hot custard (but better than Yogo). It was another case of ‘do I drink this or chew it’, which has become a key indicator of a good hot chocolate. Or maybe I have chewing and drinking issues. Even so, good hot chocolate has this effect on me, where I cannot understand my own body and what it wants to do. The picture shows the thickness of this hot chocolate…and being thick it holds heat very well (I have a burnt tongue to prove this).

Hello, Honey Badger

Hobart has a great new dessert café tucked in Salamanca Square, Honey Badger, and it’s exciting! After dinner on Friday night, rather than sticking around the restaurant we were at for dessert, clever Kathleen had made a booking at Honey Badger for dessert. Such a great idea – have dinner then walk to dessert (if only our restaurant had not been just around the corner this would have been just the exercise we needed to ‘make room’!). Although we were about 45 minutes early for our booking, we were able to get our table early and warm up inside (must have been a balmy 3 or 4 degrees outside, so it was not like we were freezing or anything).

The dessert list sounded pretty decadent, so realising our limits (there is a first for everything!), my sister and I shared a tea infused pannacotta (which was hardly sweet at all, so a good choice when we really did not need dessert, let alone one with deadly amounts of sugar). The rest of the table had desserts (which were honestly all works of art) that looked so sweet my teeth ached. And hot chocolate. They have hot chocolate! And it is Mork. I love Mork. And it looked so pretty too. It was very good, but I suspect some sugar has been added, and I loved the presentation in the Bodum double wall glasses. Classy. Then I noticed someone else at our table had a different looking hot chocolate to mine (I may have got slightly huffy at this point and accused my sister of ordering the wrong one – she didn’t know she had options). They have different types available and the one I spotted was dark.

So next week I can be found at Honey Badger…where I will be finding out how many different types they have and trying them all (not all at once of course!).

I could not help but share a link to the ‘other’ Honey Badger – this makes me laugh every time!

History repeating itself

It is officially winter and time to get out and get amongst the hot chocolate so I went to an old friend with friends – Salamanca Wharf Café with Ben and Tegan. Conveniently located across the road from my work, this was the cafe of choice for my early French lessons with Samantha. It got to the stage where we would walk in, sit down and our hot chocolates would appear out of nowhere. And we loved them! But all good things come to an end, and the hot chocolate turned into chocolate flavoured milk, so we found a new place to go. Then Samantha upped-stumps and left, but I am sure that was nothing to do with me, my French or the hot chocolate.

Since then Salamanca Wharf Cafe has changed management and I has heard the hot chocolate was on the improve. So when Ben and Tegan suggested we go there for a drink (yes, I am a gooseberry and proud of it), I was excited to go back and see if was back to normal – or at least on the way.

It short summary, it was not good. If anything it was worse than I remember. Milky and bland. I am not even sure asking for an extra-strong version would help. However, to focus on a positive, they do serve great lunch and chai tea 🙂

Cider vs hot chocolate…and hot chocolate wins!

A cider house may not be the first place that springs to mind when thinking of where to buy hot chocolate.  But today I found a great hot chocolate at Willie Smiths cider house on the way to Huonville. After having a scrummy lunch, mulled cider and with a scone on the way (with snow capped mountains all around, it was a day for staying indoors with comfort food), I ordered a hot chocolate. I thought about ordering an extra strong hot chocolate, just in case it was bad, but I am so glad I didn’t. This was the real deal.

The melted chocolate clinging to the sides of the glass and thick coating of chocolate sprinkled on the top screamed richness. And rich it was. It tasted like chocolate cake mix (but a good one – not a nasty packet type). Yummy melted chocolate heaven. This really would have been enough as dessert without the scone, but I managed both (just!). I may not need food for a good day or so now…or at least until dinner time 🙂

Special thanks must go to my sister and brother-in-law for some not so useful (or appropriate) suggestions on what to title this blog entry…

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