KOI Dessert Bar is the creation of Masterchef 2015 contestant and fourth-placed, Reynold Poernomo. Just seeing his desserts on TV was enough make anyone’s mouth water, so it’s great that you can now – well, for much of the last 12 months – treat not only your eyes, but also your taste buds to his creations.
Located in the trendy area that is Kensington Street, I’m a little surprised it took me so long to visit. One of the greatest joys of visiting with more people on multiple occasions is it increases the types of cakes to try. And over 6 months, I enjoy quite a few –
This is the Matcha Strawberry ($9.00) with matcha mousse, strawberry and pistachio jaconde. The mousse is deceptively light with a mellow green tea flavour and minimal bitterness without being overly sweet, while strawberry slices and jelly added a fresh sweetness, which went well with the mousse and the fluffy jaconde.
This is the Nomtella ($9.00) with espresso mousse, salted caramel, hazelnut and chocolate brownie.
This looks good and it tastes amazing. The espresso mousse is beautifully smooth and rich in coffee flavour. The salted caramel centre is firm and packs a good punch of sweetness and saltiness to cut through the espresso, while the chocolate brownie creates a fudgy textural contrast to the mousse and salted caramel.
And finally, the prettiest of the three. This is the Coconut Kalamansi ($9.00) with coconut mousse, kalamansi curd and chocolate sable.
The kalamansi curd is the dominant flavour of this cake, delivering a deliciously tangy and sweet punch to the pleasantly mellow coconut mousse with the chocolate sable giving a much needed crunch to the softer textures of the cake. The cross-section kalamansi curd in the centre of the coconut mousse gave the impression of a beautiful egg.
On a second visit, the offering has changed almost completely. This is the French Earl Grey Pannacotta ($12.00) with buttermilk and seasonal fruits.
A concentrated Earl Grey flavour comes from the layer of jelly sitting atop the buttermilk pannacotta. The jelly is gelatinous compared to standard jelly, which creates too great a contrast in texture with the thick custard texture of pannacotta so that the two separate both in the jar and in your mouth. A softer jelly or a gel would’ve worked better. This particular dessert aside, I am not a fan of pannacotta generally – the thick custard texture is a dreaded mouthfeel for me that’s worse than tofu – but T genuinely enjoyed the texture and the flavour.
Back to the cakes, though, is the Guava ($9.00) with guava mousse, strawberry and basil.
A guava cake is new to me, and the tropical flavour of guava that’s somewhere between a strawberry and pear came through beautifully from the first bite, with the strawberry and basil centre complementing well. Masterchef taught me that strawberry and basil are a match made in heaven, and here the basil enhances the oozy strawberry centre. The flavour appears fleetingly in the beginning before the strawberry came through, although it’s less noticeable when eaten together with the guava mousse.
This is the Mango Yuzu ($9.00), a mango mousse with yuzu curd and salted almond sable.
Yuzu is my favourite citrus, and here the yuzu came through as an uplifting sweet and zesty tail to each bite that starts off with the sweet tropical flavours of mango, which are enhanced by the bitter notes of the tempered dark chocolate.
This is Guava Raspberry ($9.00), a guava, raspberry and kalamansi mousse with a lychee rose centre.
All the cakes are pretty but this one takes the cake (pardon the pun!) with its gently rippled jewel-like surface. The smooth mousse has the tropical sweetness of guava and the acidity of raspberry, and more mellow notes of zesty kalamansi. The oozing lychee centre is a gel with a piece of fruit, bringing out the tropical notes of this cake beautifully.
This is the Choc Pop Corn ($9.00) with brulee mousse, popcorn, burnt butter jelly, chocolate covered honeycomb and chocolate brownie.
This is the richest cakes we’ve tried here. The brulee mousse is smooth in texture, but its flavour was so very rich and heavy in a way that leaves you thinking you can’t finish the cake by yourself; this is definitely one for sharing. The chocolate covered honeycomb added a delightful crunch to the cake, although it’s hardness also threatens to destroy the cake when cutting through, while the not-so-wobbly burnt butter jelly and the chewy brownie base gave much needed hints of bitterness to cut through the mousse. The popcorn promised in the description was nowhere to be found but there was the burnt butter jelly, which I wasn’t expecting.
This is the Strawberry Pillow ($9.00), a strawberry mousse with lychee jelly and almond sable. N and I had been wanting to try this for a while before getting our hands on it.
This is the ultimate in light and refreshing cakes. The mousse is super chilled compared to the other cakes, with the bright flavour of juicy and fresh strawberries made the more prominent with the layer of lychee jelly atop a lychee centre for that extra tropical kick. Fruit focused flavours are always a hit at Koi.
And finally, this is the White Peach & Earl Grey ($9.00). There’s no description for this cake provided, yet I’d venture to guess it’s a hazelnut base, followed by a chocolate ganache, earl grey sponge, white peach mousse, and rose and orange blossom jelly. The flavours are subtle. While notes of Earl Grey and rose came through and the pieces of white peach are visible in the mousse, the mousse itself carries little flavour of the white peach, leaving it tasting much like a regular cream mousse. The gorgeous quenelle tasted like cream and left us wanting more of the sweet, refreshing flavours of white peach.
KOI Dessert Bar is a delight for two very simple reasons. First, the cakes taste good, and second, every flavour in the description can be identified in the cake and is almost always done well. The second is more impressive than it appears, because I cannot tell you the number of times I have tried cakes that taste nothing like their description. Perhaps Reynold’s stint on Masterchef Australia 2015 helped because Matt, Gary and George would’ve eliminated him very early on if your food didn’t taste like what you said it should.
2017
A dessert of a chocolate mousse hidden under a raspberry coulis, ganache and cocoa-butter on a chocolate soil was declared to be ‘absolutely perfect’ by Masterchef Australia judges in 2015. That was Reynold’s ‘The Forbidden Fruit’ and mere viewers can enjoy an updated version of this memorable dessert at KOI Dessert Bar. How do you improve on ‘absolutely perfect’?
Called Forbidden Fruit v2 ($15.00), this version consisted of apple crumble pannacotta, spiced apple, chocolate mousse, raspberry coulis and almond soil. It is, without doubt, one the most beautiful dessert I’ve seen, and there is no shortage of competition in the the cake cabinet at KOI Dessert Bar,.
Cracking open the crispy white chocolate shell of the apple and you’re reminded by the rich sweetness of the mousse and oozing tart coulis that chocolate and raspberry are a perfect pairing, while mint leaves and a green sponge add pops of refreshing flavour and colour, as well as variation in texture.
Beneath the apple is the apple crumble pannacotta, with an almond soil crumble providing the quintessential crunch atop a thin layer of pannacotta lightly spiced with cinnamon.
And hidden beneath the pannacotta, all in a white chocolate hemispherical shell are apples, cooked but retaining their bite and lightly spiced, sitting atop a generously rich bed of dulche de leche with a hint of bitterness to balance the sweetness in the bottom half of this dessert.
Eating the Forbidden Fruit v2 is an experience in itself, as you move from the light and refreshing qualities in the ‘apple’ to the richer and heavier flavours in the bowl. It’s more expensive than the other cakes on offer, but its complexity in construction and the absolute deliciousness of the result leaves you with no room for disappointment. It is ‘absolutely perfect’, truly indulgent, just like the first version.
This Apricot Black Sesame ($12.00) with black sesame mousse, jasmine ganache and apricot agar is relatively simple in comparison but holds its own.
Unless we’re talking whole black sesame or black tahini, black sesame is an elusive flavour that’s almost always it’s drowned out by more dominant flavours when paired with something else. The cake here, though, has hit the sweet spot by pairing black sesame with apricot agar. Apricot isn’t something I’d think to pair with black sesame, but it works like a dream as the sweetness of the apricot acts as if to reset your palate within each bite so that the flavour of the black sesame retains its strength throughout.
The jasmine ganache is bright with floral notes and its richness provides relief as its overwhelms the flavour of the black sesame. The base also provides a crispy textural contrast to the softness of the mousse.
KOI Dessert Bar is the place to go when you want good cake, and you’re in no mood to experiment with other a new dessert parlour. You’re guaranteed to be satisfied – every time.
Cakes that look almost identical to their fruit counterparts are novel and difficult for me to resist, having first enjoyed an apple one in Tōkyō Station. KOI Dessert Bar released limited editions of such cakes in the form of mandarins (first released in April) and that was quickly followed by pears, peaches and apples.
After much effort, this is the Mandarin ($12.00). N and I had first attempted to chase this down on our visit to KOI Dessert Kitchen in Top Ryde in June and then on subsequent visits to the original KOI Dessert Bar in Chippendale, only to be disappointed each time. Even at the KOI Dessert Bar’s stall at Parramatta Lanes, I had to visit three evenings out of the four it was running – I’m not that dedicated; dropping by is just convenient – to finally track it down on the last day, Friday. It’s one cake that’s very difficult to track down.
The Mandarin is described as a ‘mandarin and vanilla mousse, encased in a lemon madeleine tart and filled with oozing pineapple jam’.
Ordinarily, cakes from KOI Dessert Bar have never always delivered on the promise flavours, but this is the unfortunate exception. The flavour of vanilla dominates the mousse without no trace of mandarin. Rather, the mandarin flavour came through only as candied rind in the jam. The tropical flavour of pineapple is not evident in the jam at all, although it may lend the natural sweetness in it. A citrus flavour came through the madeleine tart, although not identifiably lemon.
Overall, the cake was a disappointment in terms of size (~4cm in circumference) and flavour (lacking promised flavours and complexity) and texture (the pedestrian vanilla mousse dominating). Perhaps I’d have more luck with the other flavours – if I can manage to track them down again! – with the peach sounding promising.
KOI Dessert Bar occupied a stall between 10-13 October in Arcade Jam, Aird Street as part of Parramatta Lanes 2017 at Parramatta NSW 2150.
2022
It’s been a long while since my last visit to KOI Dessert Bar. With things settling down, we revisited to try the Basque Cheesecake – Raspberry Lychee ($28.00). It’s a ‘decadent burnt cheesecake topped with lychee cream, fresh raspberries’ and lychee popping boba.
The cake is around 10 cm in diameter and 8 cm in height. The plastic sheathing provides the structure for the initial aesthetic, but the colours created by the collapse of the cream and fruit are picturesque.
Upon tasting, the cake had an incredibly creamy mouthfeel. Flecks of vanilla showed through the interior of the cheesecake, which was rich and gooey with a gentle sweetness and a hint of savoury acidity, while the caramelised edges added a firmer texture and concentrated richness. The flavour was strong when eaten on its own, but for those who prefer a lighter cake, the airiness of the lychee cream added a mellow sweetness and contrasting softer freshness, while the lychee boba delivered pops of sweet floral notes and the tartness of the fresh raspberries cut through any residual heaviness from the previous dairy components.
KOI Dessert Bar is at 46 Kensington St, Chippendale NSW 2008.