Chocolate & churches in Adelaide

THE South Australian capital is well-known for Haigh's confectionary and Briar Jensen has a tasting session while taking in the city's architecture, gardens and restaurants.

adelaide choc churches escape

WHO'D have thought a chocolate factory tour would expand your vocabulary? But I've just learnt winnowing means blowing the husks from beans, conching is mixing and panning is coating with chocolate.

I'm at the Haigh's Chocolates factory, a fourth-generation, family-owned Adelaide institution. Established in 1915, the company initially made sweets and ice cream. It wasn't until the 1940s, after training in Switzerland with Lindt, that it focused on handmade chocolates.

I first heard of Haigh's years ago, when my husband bought me the biggest foil-covered chocolate frog I'd ever seen - think Freddo Frog on steroids and multiply  - so on a visit to Adelaide I was eager to join the company's free tour.

The rich aroma of chocolate fills the air as we learn how it is made from raw cocoa beans and watch a gloved worker swishing viscous chocolate over a heated table before swirling truffles through it.

In the gift shop, I sip free coffee while browsing the gleaming glass cabinets filled with artfully displayed chocolates, truffles and tablets, before choosing a bag of seconds  - dark chocolate salted macadamias.

The tour is one of many free or inexpensive activities in Adelaide, which makes it a great destination for families or those on a budget.

It's easy to get around on foot or you can use the free bike-hire scheme. Tram travel is free within the city limits and there's a free city loop bus.

Adelaide is often described as the City of Churches, and it's easy to see why, with spires piercing the skyline and bells chiming in the distance.

But it could also be the City of Trees. Founded in 1836, the city centre was designed by Colonel William Light as a grid of one square mile bordered by North, South, East and West Terraces, surrounded by a green belt of parklands, which are now State Heritage-listed.

Consequently, the central city is easy to navigate, mature trees shade wide boulevards and parklands are never more than a couple of blocks away, from small city squares to sprawling gardens.

A stroll down North Tce takes you past grand colonial sandstone buildings set around paved courtyards, the Art Gallery, Law School, State Library and the South Australian Museum.

I take a free tour of the museum, offered every day by volunteers, for an insider's perspective on the exhibitions, including African mammals, Egyptian mummies and Aboriginal and Pacific cultures.

Children will love the ice wall in the Mawson exhibition and the giant squid displayed over three floors in an old lift well.

There are free guided walks of the Botanic Gardens but I strike out on my own, down an avenue of enormous fig trees planted in 1866.

Children frolic in piles of autumn leaves on Plane Tree Lawn and chase waddling wood ducks.

In the futuristic-looking Bicentennial Conservatory, the largest in the southern hemisphere, elevated walkways take you through the misty indoor rainforest.

The restored Palm House displays arid plants from Madagascar, and in the glass Waterlily Pavilion the enormous leaves of Amazonian lilies look like a fairy playground. I'd love to come back in early spring, when the wisteria arbours are in flower, their pendulous, purple, grape-like blooms dripping from overhead and filling the air with their intoxicating perfume.

Speaking of grapes, it's an easy drive from Adelaide to the famous wine regions of McLaren Vale, Barossa and Clare, but you can sample wines from all these regions without leaving town at The National Wine Centre, next to the Botanic Gardens.

A free, self-guided experience includes an award-winning video of a year in the life of a vineyard. Smelling pods teach the different "noses" of wine varieties, you can make a virtual wine, or just gaze longingly at the cellar housing up to 38,000 bottles.

Displays include Riedel glassware, bottle closures, corkscrews, labels and a 160-year-old vine.

Psychedelic-looking electron photomicrographs (magnified photos of wine), rustic vine cuttings and bottles displayed like a cross-stitch create dramatic displays of light, colour and texture.

Afterwards I head to the cafe for a wine and chocolate tasting that pairs ginger and lemon myrtle chocolate with riesling, Murray River sea salt and caramel with rose, dark chocolate with black currant, and chilli with cabernet sauvignon.

Who said wine and chocolate don't go together?

Next stop is the Jam Factory, a purpose-built studio complex that promotes design and craftsmanship through vocational training in glass, ceramics, metalwork and furniture design.

You can wander through the studios and watch the artists at work, take in the exhibitions in the gallery and pick up some unusual gifts in the shop.

For less than $5, I catch a tram to the beachside suburb of Glenelg. Norfolk pines line the grassy foreshore above the sandy beach and a long jetty stretches into the water. A few hardy surfers brave the wind and cold, but I surf the boutiques instead.

My accommodation is BreakFree Directors studios in Gouger St, a short walk from Adelaide's Central Market where the smells say it all: freshly baked bread, smelly cheese, spicy smallgoods and roasting coffee.

It's a great place to pick up a picnic lunch, from homemade pies and pastries to fresh fruit. Gouger St is also a foodie strip with a host of multicultural restaurants, including Thai, Cantonese, Greek and Argentinian.

But I head to Frome St for dinner at Andre's Cucina & Polenta Bar, an Italian-style eatery owned by former MasterChef contestant Andre Ursini.

The timber decor, including shelves laden with produce, is casual and homely and the place is bustling on this Tuesday night.

Dishes are designed to share and we work our way through tuna and snapper carpaccio, tagliatelle with Italian sausage and porcini mushrooms, iron steak, and slow-roasted duck ragu. We finish with banana and chocolate doughnuts with vanilla custard. 

-- The writer was a guest of South Australia Tourism.

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ADELAIDE

Getting there

The city centre is a 15-minute drive from the airport.

Staying there

BreakFree Directors Studios at 259 Gouger St offers affordable accommodation close to the city centre.

See breakfree.com.au/directors-studios

Doing there 

Haigh's Chocolates Visitor Centre, see haighschocolates.com

National Wine Centre of Australia, see wineaustralia.com.au

Jam Factory, see thedesignfiles.net/2011/07/the-jamfactory

Botanic Gardens of Adelaide, see botanicgardens.sa.gov.au

South Australian Museum, samuseum.sa.gov.au

More: See southaustralia.com