Hartleys Events

Chocolate medicine

Kate — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 07:26:57 +0000

We ran another successful day with the Medicx team yesterday as part of their induction day, I just wish that my induction days had been this much fun.
The day started out as usual with a challenge set by the chef and the group broken in to teams, however during the course of the morning the group were so interested in the chocolate making process we ended up doing a tasting session using single origin bars which were left over in the van from a previous tasting event. They were particularly interested in the medicinal elements of chocolate and we discovered that chocolate was originally manufactured in the 17th century by early pharmacists for this purpose, the chocolate revolution happened in the mid 1800’s, confectioners such as the Fry brothers and Randolf Lindt saw the commercial element of this wonderful stuff by adding sugar and milk and the first bars of chocolate were born. We also discovered that good quality dark chocolate is good for the respiratory system, this was an education for us as well.
We did judge the chocolates at the end of the day but only on the aesthetics and taste which ended in a draw so we had a quiz round which also ended in a draw I must say one of the most difficult events to judge! A pleasure for all who attended with plenty of chocolate consumed!

Does team building work? Read on

Kate — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 22:26:43 +0000

A daring and exciting concept was pitched in the boardroom at the Tower Hotel in London on Tuesday, a small senior management team from a large contract facilities company decided to break in to the chocolate market with a “chocolate part of your 5 a day” concept, the idea was to tap in to the fact that dark chocolate is good as part of your 5 a day with flavours that would reflect the time of day, these would be sold in coffee shops and supermarket chains. Although they were grilled by Sir Alan Sugarplum they managed to get an investment with confident and persuasive sales pitch coupled with an advert filmed with Tower Bridge as a backdrop.

This was a collaborative event in which 2 facilitators wanted the team to use their “insights”(http://www.insights.com/) colour group to make decisions and allocate job roles within the challenge such as package design marketing and manufacturing.

They carried out the task with great enthusiasm with a very interesting outcome when our 2 facilitators gave feedback at the end of the day, all the colour groups in the team gravitated towards each other which fascinated individuals within the group as some may have been a bit sceptical of the insights model at the beginning of the day, which goes to prove that team building does work and is essential to building successful teams in tough economic times. The Insights model is a simple and effective tool that does work in helping managers and individuals who participate understand how different personalities are essential in a productive team.

Ready Steady Cook

Kate — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 23:56:57 +0000

We took on the Russians this week with Kaspersky Lab, we gave each team the same mystery basket of ingredients with a stocked larder of spices , we spoilt them with some challenging ingredients such as sea bass, fennel and porcini mushrooms, teams exceeded our expectation making an impressive display of dishes to include canapés, desserts and petit fours.

The challenge we set was for them to work closely as a team to not only make and produce the dishes but to organise themselves do they worked clean and tidy, the winning team finished before the 1.5 hour deadline with all their washing up done and a polished presentation, their winning dish was pan fried Sea bass stuffed with Fennel on a bed of crushed new potatoes dressed with olive oil and a sweet onion chutney (we went back for seconds)

Thank you for allowing us to use your the feedback Jane

Dear Kate

“I’m sure you have spoken to Paul, but I just wanted to say what a wonderful day we all had yesterday. Paul and Lio were the perfect hosts, with a few laughs along the way. Fantastically organised and excellent customer service. We would highly recommend this event, and your company, to anyone looking for a motivation team build.

Best regards

Jane” 22nd March 2012 Milton Hill De Vere

Something Fishy

Kate — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 22:59:30 +0000

The fish and chips cookery master class at the four seasons was a resounding success with the team’s confidently filleting pin boning and cooking the fish in a variety of batters, after some deliberation we concluded that Old Speckled Hen makes the best beer batter followed closely by Bulmer’s pear cider.

Here is the winning recipe

250 ml Old Speckled Hen

150g Self raising flour

5 g yeast

Leave to stand for 1 hour until the yeast becomes active then deep fry in a combination of sun flour and groundnut oil

The teams also made an impressive range of condiments to include fresh mayonnaise tartar sauce and even tomato sauce, hopefully they will all return home with a “little Britain” in their blood.

Fish and chips

Kate — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:35:25 +0000

We are looking forward to Saturday this week to try out our new cookery units, as we takie an international team from around the world, we have been asked to teach a team how to cook a traditional British dish, after suggesting many options such as sausage making, pork pies, Cornish pasties and afternoon tea they decided on classic fish and chips, they will be filleting and pin boning cod and coley, making their own beer batter, fresh tartar sauce and even a butter mushy pea puree. This is an exciting event for us as we will be fully testing our new cookery units. We will keep you posted, watch this space!!

Easter egg making at the Science Museum

Kate — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:03:38 +0000

Why not get your team to have a go at chocolate Easter egg making? We took a small team from the science museum on an annual team away day, we made chocolate eggs with whole nuts, dried fruit and even some marshmallows for those with a sweet tooth, the teams were taught how to temper chocolate then fill Egg moulds. To finish they decorated the eggs and filled them with some handmade liquor truffles, well done chaps a great effort for just 2 hours!

New Mobile team cookery stations

Kate — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 23:42:24 +0000

Here at Hartley’s we are always trying to improve our events for you, this is why we have purpose built 6 new cookery stations which can accommodate 2 teams of 6 or 1 larger team of 10, they come fully loaded with everything required for a cookery challenge or class, we have both Induction stoves (the very latest technology in efficient cookery) or for where power is limited portable gas hobs, these units can be easily wheeled in to any venue to create a kitchen environment.
Let us know what you think.
All the best the Hartley team

Chocolate challenge for valentines day

Kate — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 12:27:15 +0000

Chocolate challenge

As valentines day approaches the market is ripe for the chocolate market, chocolatiers all over the country are anticipating this special occasion and looking forward to raking in the profits! to celebrate this Hartleys are promoting a collaborative team event the group must take on the coveted role of the chocolatier and work together to create an exclusive range of valentines chocolates.

The team will work closely with our expert chocolatier to make the ganaches, fillings and toppings, teams will have to make chocolates, taste shape, dip, and decorating approximately 1500 luxurious chocolates! (based on a typical team of 15) which will then be packaged labled and sold to collegues or at a local market with profits going to the companies chosen charity . Call one of our chefs or team today and quote “be my valentine” to recieve 10% off any chocolate based activity (subject to availability)

Hartleys Events use fair trade chocolate for chocolate making

Kate — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 14:57:20 +0000

Did you know we have always used fair trade chocolate in our chocolate making classes, we want to do our bit to improve the working conditions for the many people work on the cocoa plantations in Africa. That is why … Continue reading →

Chocolate Making

Kate — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 14:54:03 +0000

Pauls hot tips for making ganaches (make sure its cool)

Make sure the chocolate is cool before mixing in cream or the ganache will be too runny, for Liquor chocolates adjust the double cream with your alcohol the recommended amount is 10% of the cream weight e.g. 50 ml cream = 5g liquor so 45g cream 5g liquor.

Simply mix the cream and chocolate together to make your ganache then either dip in tempered chocolate or toss in cocoa powder.