Edit: CLOSED

OH HAI! So how was your weekend dudes? Awhile ago I won a Red Balloon voucher from Nuffnang and so on Sunday, the boy, the mothership and the mothership’s sister and I went to The Victoria Room (Level 1, 235 Victoria St, Darlinghurst) for the Majestic High Tea ($65) which includes a glass of Piper-Heidsieck Cuvee Brut NV Champagne. High tea without the champagne is $45 which I think is pretty reasonable esp as the fruit infusion teas were awesome

The Victoria Room is dark and climbing up the stairs is especially tricky after the harsh sunlit glare driving from Parra. The place is packed full of frocked up ladies chatting away and immediately the boy pouts and crosses his arms. Thankfully our table is in one of the quieter corners, away from the bridal shower group and after procuring his beer Noods uncrosses his arms and relaxes.

3 tiers of deliciousness! See those glasses of champagne clustered down the bottom of the photo? The boy and the mothership’s sister do not drink champagne ohoho more for me wheeee! And hey, I’m curious- do you people start from the top of the tier and work your way down? So savoury foods first, dessert saved to last? Cos I uh kinda start from the scones layer and then sweet and then end on sandwiches… my reasoning is that the sweets tier is always crazy sweet and I always feel like exploding from sugar overload.

I have to say I have high, high expectations of scones at a high tea. I’ve just had so many failure scones that I always reach for the scones first to get the disappointment outta the way but these babies were awesome! Though I wished that there were 2 plain and 2 date scones on a tier for 2 instead of having to share! Light and fluffy with the perfect crumb these scones were fabulous slathered with the Chantilly cream and jam.

Ah my favourite tier the sweets! The classic baked lemon cheesecake was my fav on the whole tier, cute as a button mini cheesecakes with just the right amount of zing balanced by a creamy, smooth cheesecake and buttery biscuit base. The dark chocolate cup with chocolate mousse, cream & fresh raspberries was cute but considering it was dark chocolate it was sooooo freaking sweet and lol it reminded me of my chocolate cupcake. The strawberry & vanilla shortbread tart was buttery and flakey, and speckled with the lives of several vanilla beans, and lastly the red velvet cupcake which was moist (ahem I miss you Ninja!) but could have done without the massive amounts of icing sugar in the creamed cheese icing. Did I mention my aunt is diabetic? Woot more desserts to share! And no I didn’t invite her along just so I could have her share of desserts lol what dya take me for!

And lastly the sandwiches. The bread was fresh and fluffy and woot no crusts ahaha I’m easily pleased 😛 There were- chicken & wild herbs; cucumber, crème fraiche & dill; smoked salmon, rocket, lemon, capers; watercress, celery, walnuts & goats curd. Noods has managed to scoff his share of the sandwiches before I’d even finished my scones but luckily he manages to steal some from the motherships tier who is not too fond of goat’s cheese and from my share since I can’t stand celery. I kinda wished there was a sandwich that had tasty or swiss cheese in it or maybe a mini quiche? Lol I wasn’t a huge fan of the chicken sandwich cos mine had bits of cartilage, the salmon was my fav but I have issues with dill so palmed the cucumber one off to Noods too who ended up getting quite full in the end.

The act of pouring tea into a strainer is still a novelty with me. I’m not a huge tea drinker so stuck to the safe option of ordering a ‘Fruit Infusion’ Turkish Apple tea. Loved the delicate tea cups but had issues with the burning hot metal teapots. Are there not more prettier teapots available?

Say cheeeeese!

Aftermath.

There’s nothing I love more than celebrating friend’s birthdays and when there is a giant porchetta in store you just know you’re in for deliciousness. Helen had booked 6 weeks in advance for a porchetta feast for her b’day and when there is promise of pig, food bloggers go a lil nuts and words like porktastic and porkalicious gets bandied about. I like the word bandied. It sounds like candied.

But first, the night begins with drinks. Happy hour at Bartino’s (9 Union St, Pyrmont) meant a round of Sangrias, vodka & cranberry’s and the famed cachaça, an alcoholic beverage so potent it knocks out our normally alcohol tolerant Minh who cackles about a creature called the sharktopus. Long story.

We manage to stumble over to Signorelli Gastronomia (Accenture building – ground floor Trouton Place, 48 Pirrama Road, Pyrmont) ready for our piggy feast ($55 p.p for pig & veg) where we are greeted by Betty, Ellie, Howard, Linda and Qing, John, Lex, Rita, Sara, Shez, Simon, Yas and spoonfuls of seared tuna with orange.

Wooden platters bearing paper thin slices of Wagyu bresaola and Capocollo make the rounds

Uber fragrant garlic pizza

Prosciutto di Parma pizza

Margherita Pizza covered in molten cheese

But we are all waiting for the porchetta and when it is proudly brought to us we erupt with cheers. Oh Trevor (yes they named him for us) you are looking so mighty fine.

Faster faster! The 9.5kg piggy had been deboned of its ribcage, stuffed full of pork neck, garlic, pepper and herbs before being rolled up again and roasted. Trevor was taken to the counter at the front of the room about 2m away and the porky goodness was soon divided into 3 platters.

Table shot! There was also mixed leaf salad and brussel sprouts for some ahem, healthiness…

The head, trotters and snout make it’s way around the table and it’s not long before all the crackling is stolen and stomachs clutched in defeat tho luckily we are given boxes to takeaway our precious meat.

The staff surprise Helen with a complimentary dessert and it doesn’t take much urging to get us all to burst into a rowdy happy birthday before all cameras are pointed at her ahahaha her turn to be in front of the camera but lol i haz to blur her face or she’ll hurt me 😛

Some of us depart into the night while the rest of us wander down the wharf where I set up Helen’s ‘cake’ hee it’s a Very Hungry Caterpillar! I first saw this done on Coco Cake Cupcakes and wanted to give it a try since I knew Helen had a soft spot for this character. The cupcakes were vanilla with green tea buttercream frosting, green tinted coconut for the caterpillar’s fur, the head is a mini vanilla cake covered in fondant and the legs and antennae were cut from licorice and skewered with toothpicks. I had to use a black foam board cos the art shop ran outta white boards so the legs don’t stand out as much boo

Strike a pose!

♥

Cheers! Happy birthday Helen hope you had an awesome day!

Sponsored by Nuffnang


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HAI! So here’s how I made Simon’s b’day cake! It’s not really a recipe and the photos are a bit too over exposed because I was so sure my idea would fail that I cbf taking more than 1 pic when I made it. So remember ages ago when I made chocolate bowls by dipping balloons into chocolate? So pretty much the same idea but I had bought a giant silicone cupcake mold ($15) ages ago so wanted to see if painting the insides with chocolate and turning it inside out would work ohoho I love it when random ideas work!


First chop up some chocolate. I used about 200g milk chocolate.


Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Or if you’re a noob like me and manages to scorch the chocolate EVEN when using the double boiler, nuke in the microwave until nice and melty.


Coat the mold’s insides with a layer of melty chocolate. Don’t worry if you have holes cos you’ll be doing a second coat. Stick the mold in the fridge to harden (approx 10mins)


Second coat is where you can make sure the walls are nice and thick and there are no thin patches especially around the bottom. Stick back in the fridge for another 10mins


And now the moment of truth! Slowly roll the silicone mold away from the chocolate. If the chocolate is too cold it will snap off, if it’s still warm pieces will get stuck to the silicone.


And woot he’s all in one piece! Do the same with the lid and you’re almost home free!


All together now: Nawwwwwww!


Fill with whatever your heart desires! I likes a combo of brownies, mango, blueberries and several scoops of ice cream 😀 Warning: if you’re not eating the chocolate bowl immediately be careful when storing it- leave too long in the fridge and the chocolate may ‘bloom’ and turn white. It’s still good to eat but not so pretty to look at.

Aaaaand thanks to Noods, Chocolatesuze.com is now mobile friendly woot! Still fixing some bugs so let us know if you’re having any probs.