The Architecture Of A Celebration Cake

The Chocolate & Orange Wedding Creation Assembled Yesterday.

Initial Sketch After Consultation With The Clients.

Some Of Our Chocolate Spheres.

Ian Concentrating On The Chocolate Centre Piece.

Close Up Of The Spheres.

The 'Jaina' Chocolate Is Bleached With Titanium Dioxide.

The Chocolate Centre Piece.

The architecture of a cake? We take our creations seriously and work a lot like architects in constructing our unique celebration cakes. From conception to consumption we work closely with our clients to ensure we make exactly what is wished. We pride ourselves on making cakes "that are as interesting on the inside as on the outside", this particular design was layered inside with a dense and moist chocolate brownie, burnt orange cream and 'Tarakan' chocolate mousse. The brief was to finish the cake in dark chocolate glaze and ultra white chocolate glaze and topped with a bespoke chocolate piece. The deep red flowers set off the cake stunningly in a distinct 'Art Deco' style. We met with the clients a number of months ago for the initial consultation and then set to work on a sketch for us to work with. The next stage was a delivery of small samples of the cake with different flavours inside, we were told that the orange flavoured one was the favourite, which worked really well with this time of the year the best for oranges in Australia. As our cakes are made to order and of a fresh nature, the cake was started on Thursday with the brownie base being made, as well as some of the chocolate shapes for the centre piece. On Friday we assembled the mousse and burnt orange in frames with the base and we got to work on the top of the cake. Saturday morning was spent glazing the top and bottom tiers in dark and white and finishing the deep red flowers for the top. We then went to the venue with all of the components and assembled the creation there. We were happy with the result and received great feedback from the venue staff, hopefully the clients enjoyed the cake as much as we enjoyed making it. We currently have several of these projects lined up for the coming months and have taken orders for as far as November 2011. More and more people want something different for a celebration cake, especially weddings, they seem to want it to be delicious as well as strikingly beautiful. That is our ethos as well, why pay for a cake for a wedding that no one really wants to eat? We hope you enjoy an insight into the process of one of our creations. Let us know if you wish Burch & Purchese to create something special for your event!

Update - Consultancy, Cakes & Finding A Home!

First stages in development of a new dish for a well known restaurant in Melbourne.

A chocolate cake design for a client entering a major pastry competition.

One of our wedding celebration creations earlier this month for a client in Melbourne.

Self made design ideas for the next phase of our business.

One of our latest creations for Sofitel's No.35 restaurant.

Firstly we must apologize for our absence from posting anything on this site for the last three weeks. We try to keep as updated as possible but sometimes it is just to busy to post, this has been one of those times! We thought we would give you a quick update from the world of Burch & Purchese and an idea into what we have been doing and what we have been planning.
Firstly we completed a consultancy job for a restaurant here in Melbourne and we have one commencing this week for a very well known two hatted restaurant. Once completed we will reveal the venue so that if you are in the area you could sample some of our creations. We get approached quite frequently from establishments wanting to employ our knowledge and experience and we are happy to help in any way we can. We firstly ask to see current menus and current equipment and space and speak to the chef involved to try and find out a bit about his or her food style so that the cuisine matches. We feel the desserts should be an extension of the savoury menu rather than an add on and as such like to tailor the sweet menu to provide a seamless flow. We also like to provide contrasts in texture, flavour, temperatures, colour and cooking techniques - armed with this information we set to work compiling a menu using locally sourced ingredients and seasonal produce. The first image above, is of the initial stages of working out a dish, we have all the information and now it's time to put our experience into practice. We always use sketches to help us imagine how a dish looks on the plate and then we start to work on the individual recipes for all of the components. One thing we do remember is the level of staffing ability at a particular restaurant, we don't want to do anything too complicated if there is a chance it cannot be practically replicated. At the same time we like to add new techniques to the business involved and try to create a balance. The second image shows a design we have made on behalf of a client who is entering a major chocolate competition later on this year. He wanted to get an idea of how we would approach the rules, theme and execution of a particular section of the competition - Entremets. We provided the clint with a sketch and demonstration of the architecture of a gâteaux just to help him in his entry. These two recent jobs show the diversity of our consultancy experience and for us it is an enjoyable arm of our business as it lets us work with a range of different personalities and improves our overall understanding or kitchens, cuisine and problem solving.
The third image down is of one of our unique tailored pieces created for a clients wedding just recently. The client had a theme of roses and really like our previous crystallized rose petals on other works. We incorporated this component into the garnish for a rose scented chocolate piece that the client enjoyed immensely.
We have also been looking hard for the last 8 months for a permanent home for Burch & Purchese, we have had many emails from members of the public asking us where they can sample our creations and we would like to say "Be patient" - it WILL happen soon but this process always takes longer than imagined. That said we feel we may be able to make an announcement on the next phase of our business here very soon! We are confident of securing a deal in Melbourne this year and have even gone so far as to start the interior design process - starting with transferring some of our previous creation images into smart waterclolour wall mounted designs.
Of course we are still consulting for No.35 restaurant and we have created this stunning chocolate & pear dish which is perfect for this time of year. So if you are in town, check out the dessert menu there and we hope to announce other places where you can try our work very soon. For now, thanks for your continued support and we will keep you as updated as possible on some pretty exciting events planned from now until the next Melbourne Food & Wine Festival in March next year.
Darren & Ian

Masterchef 'Carnival' Recipe

There have been a few requests for the 'Carnival' dessert recipe from Friday's Masterchef episode, so if you are interested then please follow the link below to the official Masterchef Australia website for all of the method & ingredients to all of the components. Thanks to everyone for all of your messages of support and encouragement.

http://www.masterchef.com.au/fruit-carnival-with-sugar-tuile-aerated-fruit-chocolate-and-toffee-apple.htm

Burch & Purchese Dishes - 25 'Carnival' MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA MASTERCLASS

Those of you living in Australia may have caught the latest episode of Masterchef tonight in which Burch & Purchese provided a dessert 'Masterclass' for those contestants still in the competition. We were approached by the producers of the popular show and we were given just two days to devise a new dish centered around the theme 'Carnival'. The call came on Wednesday (a couple of months ago) and we flew to film in the Masterchef kitchen on the Friday. It was great seeing up close the goings on of this show and we met some great people in front of and behind the camera, not least Laki Baker, one of the producers, who was very nice and helped put us at ease. 

The weeks theme on Masterchef was progressive cuisine and we were happy to demonstrate our techniques to the very talented contestants. We produced a raspberry spiral sugar tube filled with vanilla ice cream, accompanied with aerated chocolate fruit salad, our 'tubular gels' and a toffee apple. It seemed to sum up the fun of the carnival and included contrasting textures, flavours and was visually appealing. One thing though, the picture above is garnished with baby pineapple sage leaves which is our preferred for this dish, these were unavailable at shooting so it is the only difference from the dish aired tonight. 

We would like to say thanks to Laki, George, Gary and all of the crew and contestants for letting us come on and promote Burch & Purchese. We hope to get invited again one day but for now we will leave you with a few behind the scenes shots of the Masterchef test kitchen. 

On another note...........stay tuned to this blog in the next couple of weeks as we hope to announce some exciting new developments in our business which we are trying hard to make a reality. As soon as they are confirmed we will let you know! 

Masterchef Australia            http://www.masterchef.com.au/home.htm

Attica Restaurant, Melbourne - World Class!

Recently a Melbourne restaurant was voted #73 in the San Pellegrino World's Best Restaurant Awards, this is some achievement and something for all of us in this country to be rightly proud of. Attica restaurant in Ripponlea is an exciting restaurant headed by an exceptional chef in Ben Shewry, and we were very excited when we were invited by Ben himself to try his cuisine. Ben Shewry and Attica have had an amazing 12 months with the restaurant being awarded 2 hats in the Good Food Guide Awards (should be 3 in our opinion!), and Ben being the first Victorian chef to present at the prestigious Madrid Fusion. We have known Ben for a while now and know that his food is world class and this was highlighted at the recent dinner we had at Attica. We dined with our good friend and chef Adam Melonas who was visiting Australia from Spain on a promotional trip, including an appearance on Masterchef Australia. Ben prepared a special menu for us above and it can only be described as sensational. I would like to focus on the desserts presented that night but you can read more on the other dishes on the links below, including Ben's famous potato dish (final image) which he demonstrated in Spain earlier this year. It is truly one of the best dishes we have eaten in a long time and the recipe is included in the links below. The desserts however were brilliant, these are the best desserts we have eaten for some time and it is amazing that there is no pastry chef at the restaurant as Ben creates all of the dishes himself. His philosophy in food, apart from using the freshest, seasonal and sustainable ingredients, is to create dishes with maximum taste, contrasts in texture and temperature as well as astounding presentation. The dish at the top of the page is Ben's "Terroir" it is a fabulous symphony of flavours and texture. It includes the following components: 

• Beetroot & Organic Almond Cake
• Dried Fruits - including Cranberries, Cherries & Raspberries
• Freeze Dried Fruits
• Wild Sour Clover
• Sorrel Sorbet
• Murray River Salt
• 4 Spice 
• Toasted Barley

This really was such an interesting and more importantly, delicious dish. It has opened up avenues of possibilities for us to explore in our plated dessert work and we can't wait to try some of the flavour combinations out ourselves. The final dessert was brand new, hence no image as yet. Ben explained the dish to us and it was a heavenly mix of Autumnal flavours, perfect for a chilly night. A custard flavoured with black olive, molasses and anise was topped expertly with freshly grated celery, a granny smith apple distillation, grated pink lady apples and an apple skin made from biodynamic braeburn's from the Mornington Peninsula. The dish was topped with the most amazing 'shredded wheat' crumble that added a delicate toasted edge to the acidic tones in the dish. The custard brought it all together and it was a joy to eat. This really was a great dining experience and Ben deserves all of the accolades that come his way. His dedication is superb, as he and his team forage for most of the wild shoots and seaweeds that adorn most of the dishes at Attica and his knowledge of these areas is second to none. Please try to visit Attica if you get the chance and check out these links below for more information, including Adam's blog of the night. Thanks Ben and we hope to work more closely with you in the future.

Useful Links:

• http://www.madridfusion.net/chefs_detalle.php?id=0000000222#activo - Bio Madrid Fusion
• http://www.madridfusion.net/recetachef.php?id=0000000222&idr=0000000510 - Potato recipe
• http://www.madridlab.net/melonas/2010/05/attica-restaurant-melbourne/ - Adam on Attica
• http://www.attica.com.au/ - Attica website
• http://www.theworlds50best.com/awards/51-100-winners - World's Best list 51 - 100
• http://www.benshewry.com.au/ - Ben's new site, under construction
• http://www.colinpage.com/ - Link to Colin Page the photographer of 'Terroir'

Also just a quick mention of the excellent, warm and professional service at Attica - thank you!

Burch & Purchese Dishes - 24 'Aphrodite' MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA SPECIAL!

Aired this evening in Australia, the latest episode of Channel 10's popular reality/cooking program featured a dish from us - and here are the close up shots in case you missed it!

We were very happy to be approached by George Calombaris from The Press Club restaurant in Melbourne to consult on some new dishes to coincide with the reopening of his restaurant after a recent refurbishment. The reopening was the focal point of the latest episode and a "Hell's Kitchen' style battle ensued between the blues and the reds. We were asked to develop a dish for the contestants to participate in preparing for diners as part of an 'elimination' process.

The brief was to come up with a light, and stunning looking dessert which incorporated the theme of 'Aphrodite', the Greek goddess of love & beauty. We decided to come up with a sort of rose garden (Aphrodite was closely linked to roses), but the main component of the dessert is a smooth white chocolate mousse which encapsulates a liquid rose & raspberry centre. This provided a spectacular finish to a delicious dessert but also provided the contestants with an additional technical element to master.

Other components on this dessert were the clear rose jelly, nitro frozen fruits, chocolate soil, beautifully crystallized rose petals and baby tarragon shoots. We hope you'll agree this dish looks stunning and we assure you it tastes just as good as it looks! The contestants on the night (&day), were fantastic to work with and the level of talent and expertise were a credit to them, quite surprising considering they are all still amateur cooks.

Special mention goes to Matthew & Skye who executed the dessert brilliantly. We enjoyed this job and hopefully you enjoyed the episode. If you missed it, check out the Masterchef Australia website to see past episodes. We will inform you of another appearance of ours on the show, lined up for next month, closer to the time.

Click here to see the episode again! http://www.masterchef.com.au/video.htm?vxSiteId=f8066236-e138-457a-95f4-298ed80718f8&vxChannel=Full%20Episodes%20Complete

Burch & Purchese Team Up With Melbourne Food Ingredient Depot

We are pleased to announce that we are going to be working a lot closely with one of our favourite suppliers here in Melbourne. Melbourne Food Ingredient Depot are the number one supplier of hard to get ingredients here in Australia, their range includes modified starches, hydrocolloids, freeze dried products, sugar substitutes and much more. Phil Vernon (above right at our Masterclass this year), the owner, is a highly educated man in this field and is a constant source of knowledge to us in our work. As of June this year we will be working much more closely with this brand to help Phil and his team develop recipes for his products to be launched on the market. We will also be helping them to develop base mixes of different hydrocolloids and starches to be retailed along the lines of other recognized overseas brands. This year with Phil's help we introduced a chocolate application for a kaolin/lactose mix to our attendees at the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival and Phil included packs of products for our gift bags (above). Specific areas that we will be working on initially are a dry base powder to achieve great ice cream results, different applications for different grades of tapioca maltodextrin, recipe development for Phil's new emulsifier 'Emulate' and developing Australia's own brand of the US product Pure-Coat.
If you would like to visit Melbourne Food Ingredient Depot for yourself then the details are below. We are pleased to announce this new alliance and we will of course keep you updated with all of our research and results.

Melbourne Food Ingredient Depot
508 Lygon Street
East Brunswick
Victoria
Australia
ph.03 9386 3206
http://www.mfcd.net/depot/