So it's nearly June already! Where did the time go? In addition to the yogurt party, lunch at Embrasse, and our fab weekend away in the Yarra Valley, there was all of this!
At the start of the month, I had a lovely lunch with my parents at Cafe Vue Heide. We had the two-course menu du jour (two courses for $35, three courses for $45).
I particularly liked the Heide garden salad with spanner crab (top left in the picture below), but the mains were no slouch. The grilled Mark Eather Fish of the Day with Heide Garden roasted potatoes (centre) came with cute little waffle chips on top, and the David Blackmore braised beef with ginger and coconut on pomme mousseline (bottom right) was a decadent plate of slow-cooked, tender beefy goodness.
To be safe, we'd booked a table, but this meant we were locked into the menu du jour. Whilst we definitely enjoyed our lunch, I must admit that we were looking enviously at the big sandwiches, burgers and wraps being served to other guests. Apparently if you just rock up you can order from the normal cafe menu - we'll be trying this next time!
Sandra and I had a weekend away in the Mornington Peninsula, visiting restaurants, markets, and food producers in the region. (Disclosure: this was a complimentary media trip to promote the region). It was two days chock-full of fabulous food! Posts from this trip are coming up soon, but for now I'd like to show you one of my favourite dishes from the weekend: stuffed quail leg with, cinnamon gnocchi, dried grape juice and a deep-fried quail egg, at the Terminus Restaurant in the Flinders Hotel. Yum!
And speaking of exciting invitations, this month I was invited to come and visit the Charlie's Cookies factory. (Dream come true, did you say?) It was so interesting to see cookie baking on a big scale, and even better, I got to taste some choc chip cookies fresh out of the oven! (Again, full blog post to come.)
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Chocolate chip cookies at Charlie's Cookie Factory |
We got a Nespresso Machine this month. (I bought it as an early birthday present for Sandra, after she tried the machine at the Mornington Peninsula accommodation and really liked it!) At first, I wasn't too convinced of the need for it, but now that we've had it for a few weeks, I love it! The coffee tastes good, it's so easy to use and it's pretty much impossible to stuff it up. (So important for home coffee makers, I think).
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Nespresso machine |
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Nespresso latte |
This does mean, though, that with the new Nespresso machine, our existing coffee appliances, and a very generous joint birthday gift that some good friends gave us last week, we now have FIVE different coffee makers at home. FIVE! (Six if you count the KitchenAid espresso machine at my parents' house). And I rarely drink more than one a day, hehe.
Mid-month we went to see Prince in concert (squeeeeeeeeeee!). Needless to say, he was brilliant! He sang Mountains! And I was just amazed that a fifty-three year old man could dance for three hours in high-heeled boots. So amazing.
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Prince concert |
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Top: Dumplings in hot and sour soup Bottom: Spring onion pancakes |
Another noteworthy eat was South of Johnston, on Oxford street in Collingwood. I caught up with my friend Kristine here for a midweek lunch - the coffee was good, and I thoroughly enjoyed my lunch of lamb wrapped in filo with pesto, served with a stuffed capsicum.
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Lamb in filo |
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Carrot Cake - $5.50 |
We received another German Care Package from Sandra's folks in Germany. I'm personally a bit indifferent to the gravy and hollandaise mixes, but I can unreservedly declare my love for those delicious Prinzen Rolle biscuits. They're the Oreo of Germany, but much tastier!
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German care package |
I made a little expedition to Burch and Purchese with my parents just last week - my Dad loved it, and we ended up spending $83 in the one go! Eep.
Here's part of our haul: honeycomb; chocolate with popcorn and honeycomb; salted caramel sauce; St. Clements and Vanilla marmalade; nine of those gold bars...
This column of deliciousness, below, is called explosive milk chocolate and raspberry, and it was fabulous!
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Explosive milk chocolate and raspberry |
It contains: milk choc and raspberry mousse / exaggerated (???) raspberry cream / milk choc Sacher sponge / fresh raspberry compote / chocolate royal biscuit / raspberry marshmallow /chocolate coated pop rocks /mirror chocolate glaze. Woah!
On Tuesday night this week, I was invited to The Langham Hotel (with a few - other - bloggers), to try out the buffet at Melba restaurant. I'm a big fan of buffets from way back (I am Malaysian, after all), and I thought this was a great one!
Whilst there was a lot of food on offer, let me show you some of the highlights. I loved the array of fresh seafood...
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Seafood |
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Sushi stand |
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Roast meats |
Also excellent were the fabulous naan breads, cooked fresh to order.
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Tandoor |
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Peshwari Naan |
And of course, no hotel buffet is complete without a chocolate fountain!
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Chocolate fountain |
Here's Maggie and Rick. (You'll remember that Maggie and I are old friends - we go way back, hehe!)
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Maggie Beer & Rick Stein |
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Miguel Maestre and Maggie Beer |
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John Torode & Manu Fieldel |
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Winning team: Adrian Richardson and Miguel Maestre |
And that was May! Phew! I know I say this every month, but I'm sure June will be a quieter month. (I hope!) I literally have no social engagements planned and am trying to keep my calendar as clear as possible... but I guess we'll see how long that lasts!
3 comments
Lots of stuff going on eh...
ReplyDeleteI love reading your monthly round-ups. They remind me of how much (food) you can really cram into a month :D
ReplyDeleteSophie - Thanks! Sometimes it's quite alarming when I look back over my unblogged photos each month!
ReplyDelete