Sweet delirium at citys first Cake buffet

CHENNAI: After their 100 metre-long photo cake tribute to '75 years of Tamil cinema', dessert lovers in the city have their hopes up for French Loaf's recent X'mas kick-off. The 'All You Can Eat' cake buffet had foodies of all ages pouring in to their Harrington Road outlet on Saturday, several showing up ahead of time, despite their earlier-made reservations. An overwhelming spread of baked delights ranging from German Chocolate Gateaux and Tart de Macaroon (tart filled with macaroon and topped with chocolate) to Butterscorch eclairs, Opera (Coffee flavoured pastry made with almond sponge), Mango Mousse and even Lolly plum balls, complete with rainbow sprinkles on top, were whipped up for the occasion. Chef Boopesh Pichaimani reveals, “It took a team of 10 people 48 hours to prepare it. But beyond the baking, I think the ideation was the more difficult part." Asked how long that took, he responds in a matter-of-fact manner, "About 30 minutes." What can one say? It took some deliberating guests about that long to decide which dessert to start with!While one would expect a large bunch of cream fingered little ones having a ball, (or a plum ball) at an event like this, it seemed the adults were more the ones with a sugar rush on the occasion. "I heard about this event through a bunch of food lovers on Facebook," shares Tasneem K. "Actually, some of us are meeting for the first time, but we came together just for the choice of cake." And judging by the numbers that walked in that evening, and 'yums' of satisfaction, it was evident that no one was counting the calories. Vegetarians may have been apprehensive at first. However, with options that ranged from Carrot Cake to eggless choices such as Irish Fantasy (coffee flavoured cake), Goee Brownie, Fudge and Chocolate Truffle, there was no saying no to this spread. Let's not forget the live counter with dozens of French cupcakes, piped with icing choices of strawberry, vanilla and butterscotch to pick from.The buffet, which continued till 11 pm, was a smashing success all round. Asked whether the kitchen was prepared to handle the massive number of walk-ins to last through the evening, Chef Boopesh replies, "We have made 250 kgs of cake in the last two days. No one is going home without a sweet tooth fix today."