Sweet & Sticky Event @ Brunetti Carlton (Melbourne Food & Wine Festival)

March is a fabulous month for the food and wine lovers of Melbourne, as it's the annual Melbourne Food and Wine Festival (MFWF).  It is truly amazing how many restaurants, providores and producers are involved in this event, pulling out all the tricks in their bags to showcase their goodies.  Masterclasses, Pop-Up bars and express lunches are just some of the events that are on offer this year, which runs from March 2nd to 21st.  With 3 kids it is difficult for us to attend many of these excellent opportunities to challenge our taste buds, but when an opportunity came up for us to attend the Sweet & Sticky Event hosted by Buller Wines at Brunetti in Carlton, Hubby graciously looked after the kids while I attended with my soon-to-be-sister-in-law.  

The chocolate fondue on arrival!

And what a cool event to attend!  In essence it is a wine and chocolate tasting masterclass, with experts "walking" us through 8 aged fortified wines matched with 8 delectable hand-made chocolates/desserts.  Buller Wines is a fourth generation family winery in Rutherglen, Victoria, and Richard, Mica, Susan and Angela host the informative evening in a casual and relaxed setting.  Those who know me (or have followed my blog) will know of my lack of experience and tolerance for any significant amount of alcohol, but even for such a novice as myself, the evening was very interesting and easy to follow.   

Richard Buller is a well travelled and extremely knowledgeable Winemaker, who is a fountain of information with his extensive  experience in wine including "having grown up drinking it all his life".  Mica Benito is a passionate Chocolatier who has been in the industry for 13 years.  She hand-makes all the chocolates and ice-creams that are matched with the wines on the evening and has taken my chocolate appreciation to another level.

Richard talking us through the wine-tasting.

I quite enjoyed the sweetness of the wines, my favourite being the Vintage Port.  Despite knowing I had 5 more wines to taste I finished this one off!  It was also paired with my favourite chocolate, which is the 70% Dark Chocolate from Ecuador.  Mica's other creations ranged from oh-so-smooth vanilla caramels, to truffles and chocolate with liqueur laced fillings, but something about this combination really hit the spot for me.

One of the highlights for me was experiencing the Rare Tokay poured over hand-made vanilla bean ice-cream.  A very grown up treat for sure!

There are still 2 more sessions of the Sweet & Sticky Event during this year's Melbourne Food and Wine Festival.  Tickets are $65 per person and includes all the wines and chocolates during the tasting, as well as a chocolate fondue on arrival, and some savoury treats during the break (to help me soak up some of my poor alcohol tolerance!)  I had a great time trying all the wines and chocolates with my (nearly!) sis-in-law.  Hopefully as the kids get older, getting baby-sitting will get easier and Hubby can come along next year!

Tickets to the event can be purchased from here.

Check out Buller Wines on their website.

And of course Brunetti Cafe's webpage - I found out they're moving back to the their original site, which is where Borders used to be!

And finally if you're wondering what it's like taking kids to Brunetti, here's my previous post on Brunetti @ Myer

Disclaimer - My guest and I attended the Sweet & Sticky Even compliment of Brunetti Cafe