Happy New Year! Here is my December's Unblogged Files: the non-Christmas edition!
I attended a
blogger dinner at Captain Melville (full blogpost to come once I've visited again on my own coin and tried out more of the menu!). Highlights of the dinner were the punchy
Macedon Gang Punch cocktail, with Cruzan rum, lemon juice, agave, egg white, port and Booker's fire bitters...
 |
| Macedon Gang Punch - Cruzan rum, lemon juice, agave, egg white, port and Booker's fire bitters |
...and the crazy decadent salted caramel banana split with honeycomb.
 |
| Captain Melville's salted caramel banana split |
One night when I really wanted a roast dinner but was too tired to cook, (yes, it happens to me sometimes) we tried the
Roast Kitchen in Kew, who do a range of trad roast dinners in a retro diner-type setting. It was pretty pricey for a dinner, at $19.50 a plate, but the food was great, and they really pile up your plate! We were particularly impressed by their red wine gravy - great stuff!
 |
| Roast chicken from Roast Kitchen - $19.50 |
More
Ottolenghi cooking!
I've been loving the recipes in
Jerusalem - I've found, despite the "coffee table book" appearance of the book, that the recipes are beautifully workable, even when adapting them to suit what I've got lying in the pantry. Examples: I adapted their
lamb meatballs with broadbeans and lemon to use up some minced pork and peas that I had, and it worked wonderfully. Ditto the
chermoula eggplant with bulghur and yogurt, for which I substituted couscous. Total love! I'm going to Europe next year and I cannot wait to visit their restaurants and cafes!
Speaking of fabulous cafes, we brought yet another friend to
Beatrix Bakes in North Melbourne: we're slowly converting all our friends to the way of Beatrix!
 |
| Beatrix Bakes |
Mega love for their
Fry-Day ciabatta, with crumbed flathead and fennel quickle, and The vegetarian
Rocky, with tomato, buffalo mozzarella and chopped basil pesto. Gorgeous!
Less impressive was my one and only visit to the
Workers' Food Room, on Little Lonsdale Street in the city, for a weekday lunch.
 |
| Workers' Food Room |
Whilst the food I ordered was pretty good, I was sneakily upsold a side salad with my Lebanese chicken pastry (the waitress made it sound like they'd forgotten my salad and asked me if I wanted them to bring it out... only to have them charge me $8.50 for that tiny bowl of broccoli salad). Gah! It doubled the cost of my lunch! So irritating! Later on Twitter they apologised - apparently I was overcharged for the side salad too, they're only meant to be $6.50. Double gah! But yeah, there are hundreds of great lunch options in the CBD, not going back there! I definitely do not recommend this place!
On a happier note, I was invited along to the
opening day of the Yarra Valley Chocolaterie, which was a big day of sugar-filled fun! Full blogpost to come, but for now I want to show you my favourite item at their cafe, which funnily enough, doesn't contain any chocolate at all! I really loved their soft fluffy waffles, with fresh berries and creamy house-made ice-cream.
 |
| Waffles at the Yarra Valley Chocolaterie |
Excess sugar can only be combated by excess salt (or you know, healthy eating and exercise, but y'all know I wasn't in the mood for that!!). So dinner after my visit to the chocolaterie was a
Zinger Double Down at KFC. Yeah, I totally hated myself for 5 minutes, but I regret nothing!!
 |
| Zinger Double Down |
And whilst we're on the KFC theme... one very hot day when I went to see a film (it was
Pitch Perfect, and it wasn't very good -
Bring It On for the win!), I decided to try one of those
creamy Krusher drinks from KFC. Previously I'd never really seen the point, but I tried the mint choc one, and it was actually really really good! Creamy, minty, and with loads of delicious chocolate biscuit crumbs. When I Instagrammed it, loads of people told me that they love the Gaytime flavour, so I'll try that next time!
 |
| KFC Mint-Choc Krusher |
I've been working throughout the Christmas period this year, but one of the long days in my office was enlivened by a
personal cookie delivery from my friend Alaina! She'd made these fab
Italian Meatball Cookies with Vanilla Bean Cream Cheese Frosting - they're kinda like chocolate gingerbread, heady with cloves, and studded with walnuts and chocolate chunks. So good! (If you're not all spiced out from Christmas, Google these and give them a go!)
 |
| Italian Meatball Cookies |
And just to prove that I do occasionally choose healthy food, let me say that I do recommend the
Tofu-Don at Tokio, and the
Sushi at Sushi Monger (both next to each other in The Causeway, between Little Collins and Bourke street). Both are great, cheap options for a CBD lunch!
 |
| Large Sushi at Sushi Monger |
 |
| Tofu-don at Tokio - $9.50 |
On that really hot Sunday last week, we stopped into
Coffeehead in Camberwell for brunch, cold drip coffees and sweet, sweet airconditioning. The fruit toast was great, as were the corn fruitters, topped with smoked salmon and a perfect runny poached egg.
 |
| Clockwise from top left: yolkporn; fruit toast; corn fritters with avocado, harissa mayo, smoked salmon and a poached egg; cold drip coffee |
Just the other day I whipped up a huge batch of
Nigella's Chocolate Peanut Granola, from
Feast. One of my faves, and I've made this, the original almond version, and the Christmassy cranberry version many many times*! (Primarily over the 2005-2006 period, it seems!)
 |
| Granola ingredients |
I love eating this stuff, especially with yogurt and berries! (See below in the new Kikki K bowls that my dad got me
for Christmas!)
 |
| Granola, yogurt, berries, coffee |
The last thing I wanted to share with you in this post is the froyo I had at
Cacao Green this afternoon for a treat. (I think I'm getting obsessed with them, haha!) The
Mango Fantasy contained mango frozen yogurt, fresh mango cubes, raspberry compote, lychees, coconut jelly and a little waffle bite. It was really good, like bubble tea in froyo-form!
 |
| Mango Illusion - $8.50 |
We were really surprised by how good the waffle bites were - they were served warm (we could smell them being toasted while we waited!), and were fluffily doughy within, and crispy on the outside. I hadn't thought that their waffles would be anything to write home about... but they were really good! Next time I'm just getting a whole waffle!
 |
| Fluffy crunchy waffle bite |
And thanks to the yummy waffles from Cacao Green, I've decided to make waffles tomorrow morning for my first breakfast in the new year!
Happy New Year everyone! Hope you're all enjoying the evening and spending it with those who mean the most to you!!
*Posts featuring Nigella's granola
a Rafflecopter giveaway
