Burch & Purchese

Burch & Purchese have a lovely store off the quiet end of Chapel St, where you will often be rewarded with slivers of the latest cake or chocolate, and tempted by the mounds of meringue clouds, or freshly prepared chocolate blocks lining the walls. Darren Purchese is often seen, concocting his latest creations at the back of the shop, and sometimes serving with a smile. I however, am largely distracted by their cake cabinets, often wanting to try all flavours, all at once, all the time.

Pistachio, Green Tea, Yuzu, Blackcurrant, White Chocolate ($8.0)

I was drawn to this cake as I love green tea, and the Japanese inspired flavours seem to be quite popular these days, with Yuzu used as an alternative citrus flavour to traditional mandarin/orange/lemon/lime. This cake was quite delicate; with the hint of green tea sponge and cream so subtle I almost missed it. The yuzu jelly and curd and pistachio cake were the most prominent flavours which I tasted. Even the blackberry cream, which I expected to dominate the cake, was in the background of flavours, along with the white chocolate mousse.

Beetroot, Strawberry, Rose, Vanilla & White Chocolate ($8.0)

This multi-layered cake is made up of beetroot sponge, strawberry & rose jam, rose vanilla cream, yoghurt sponge, strawberry cream, crunchy almond meringue, vanilla pastry cream, white chocolate & vanilla cream, strawberry gel and topped with a micro beetroot sponge. The beetroot sponge was quite dry and not as spongy and moist like the pistachio cake base. The rose flavours came out quite strongly, but this cake was more balanced and cohesive than the Pistachio/Green Tea. I enjoyed the clear jelly-like layer on top of the cake, but unfortunately the crunch almond meringue was lost amongst the other layers.

Raspberry, Laurent Perrier Champagne, Peach & Lemon (Gluten Free, $7.0)

The tubes from B&P are constantly changing, and I think this was one of my favourites. It featured raspberry jam, lemon curd, blood peach cream, raspberry compote, white chocolate & raspberry blondie sponge, champagne & white chocolate mousse and a pink velvet spray which is quite signature to B&P. Though this tube is extremely sweet, and I couldn’t finish it in one sitting, the smooth mousse was combined very well with the more tart tasting curd and compote.

Explosive Raspberry Milk Chocolate (Nut Free, $7.0)

A heavier tube compared to above, the raspberry cream and marshmallow, fresh compote, choc chip cookie crumb, red chocolate velvet sprayed raspberry and milk chocolate mousse and chocolate popping candy made for deeper, more rich flavoured tube. Again, the raspberry was used to bring out some tartness to the dessert, but overall the best part was the popping candy!

Chocolate, Mandarin, Salted Caramel (Nut Free, 18cm cake, $49.0)

This cake was made from aerated chocolate shortbread, orange & lemon marmalade, mandarin cream, Murray River salted caramel cream, dark chocolate mousse, shiny chocolate mirror glaze and freeze dried mandarin. This mousse cake was a deep rich chocolate, highlighted with salted caramel notes. However, the orange and lemon marmalade made the cake quite sour and bordering on salty, which didn’t get balanced adequately by the chocolate mousse. Not my favourite choice from B&P, though it is visually pretty spectacular. 

TL;DR Burch and Purchese are one of my favourite, consistent cake shops!

Tivoli Road Bakery

Tucked away on a nice road, Tivoli Road in fact, this bakery is a nice escape from the hustle and bustle of Chapel and Toorak. They stuff their sandwiches full of gourmet fillings and offer all sorts of tempting pastries. Despite getting rid of their delectable cronuts a while ago, Tivoli Rd still manage to tempt and impress with their regular donuts filled with changing flavours like salted caramel, sticky toffee and crème brûlée.

Today I was lucky enough to grab the choc mint donut ($4.5, and the lemon curd went to That Girl). I have tried their hot cross bun, salted caramel, lemon curd and chocolate fillings and I have to say this choc mint was the best of them all – smooth, not too heavily minted and left me wanting more.

Their caramel banana & coconut muffin ($4.5) was very nice as well, though the desiccated coconut was more evident than the actual muffin and the caramel was quite subtle. Otherwise, the muffin was moist and I enjoyed the banana taste without having to eat chunks of un-mashed banana.

TL;DR Go for the Doughnuts.

Adriano Zumbo Pâtissier

When I heard Zumbo was opening a store in Melbourne town I was a keen bean, I would buy all the macarons I thought, I would buy all their cakes, chocolate and ice-cream I thought. It hasn’t really been that way, but that isn’t a reflection on Zumbo – I’m still a fan. I go there when I want to be punched in the face by sweet, or try his crazy-cool macaron flavours like peking duck or the Pie + Sauce (beef pie flavoured filling and zesty tomato sauce gel inside a pastry-like macaron shell. Yeah, that tasted really weirdbad). No-one really does experimental left-of-centre flavours like Zumbo and he will always hold the title of boundary-pusher in my mind.

On this occasion I picked up two cakes:

Pars the Strawberry Gran - Strawberry & white chocolate mousse, frangipane, parsley jelly and granola.

The Par's ($9.0) beautiful light cake base was great accompanied with the strawberry mousse. The parsley gel was definitely made of parsley and had a distinct ‘green’ flavour but together the combination worked. The granola was added for crunch but seemed to have absorbed some of the cake’s moisture and thus was a little chewy.

Aussie Kids - White chocolate cremeaux, flourless chocolate sponge, banana jelly, blackberry marshmallow, brownie, weet-bix crunch & a blackberry sphere.

I didn’t enjoy Aussie Kids ($9.0) as much as the Pars. The flourless chocolate base was quite bitter and not sweet enough, whilst the blackcurrent mousse didn’t lift the cake up as much as I hoped. There was a crunchy weet-bix chocolate texture which worked well, but on the other hand the banana jelly didn’t come through enough. This cake felt like a shambles, but the one redeeming factor was the Blackberry Sphere; IT POPPED JUICE AND THE JELLY SHELL WAS SO NICE. Amazing. See, it’s the little things.

TL;DR Check out Zumbo for the novelty.