I’ve Finally Made It!!

That’s right peeps, I’ve hit the big time! A few weeks ago I was contacted by the lovely PR lady from Appliances Online to invite me to a Morning Tea blogger event at their home in Danks St.  Me?? How on earth do you know about me? I know I’m your Number One Customer – all my household electrical purchases through Applicances Online (including my trusty, beloved chest freezer) BUT HOW DID YOU FIND MY BLOG??

That’s a truth by the way.  I do love them. And not because they’re cheap (which they are) or that they’re convenient (which they definitely are) but because their customer service is exemplary. I love great customer service.  I love people who take pride in what they do, and I will go back to you over and over again just for that experience (take Feather and Bone, for example).

As it turns out Breville, who were also sponsoring the event have an employee/team member/fantastic person who enjoys my blog‽ (OHMIGOD that is so exciting!!! Are you serious???) I still find it amazing that people I don’t know ready my blog.  So along I went (taking BFF for support). 

BFF picked me up at 9am and we drove in.  As we arrived way too early (typical FBJ style) we stopped at a lovely French Café and enjoyed coffee and a pain au chocolat. Yum.

Up to the offices – I knew we were in the right place as there were lots of blogger looking types milling aimlessly around (you can always tell them, floral dresses, big cameras* except for the couple of blogmen, no floral dresses for them).  We had a quick tour of the Winning Group's offices by the MD and then into a room to watch the Monday Morning Cooking Club give some cooking demonstrations.  I’d tell you about the MMCC but you can Google them just as easy as I can so don’t be lazy now.

They cooked a few of their recipes and gave tips on some more from their cookbook.  Alas, what with my attention span of a gnat and the fact they were cooking all sweet things I may have been distracted slightly but tried to remain focussed and not miss anything – the serious bloggers were taking lots of close-ups of the sweet treats being produced and serious looking blogger notes, but as I usually use my iPhone for all my quality photos I thought that I’d let the serious camera peeps get the good pics – to be frank I had camera intimidation. 

As you may have noticed from my cake blog I do not have the patience (or sweet tooth) for that kind of rollie, rollie, mixie, bakie sugary stuff.  I mean, you make a cake, then what? There are only 3 of us in the house; none of us are really into sweets and eating that much cake is the slippery, slippery slope to empty calorie madness.

But they made nice stuff, and part of my distraction was admiring their Breville All-in-One Processor, which they were using for making pastry, mixing mixes etc.  My stick blender died a few years ago – and because I have my amazing Magimix** I couldn’t really justify replacing it.  But god I love kitchen appliances/serving platters/small bowls/ cutlery/wine/plates/pots, well, everything.  I wish I had one of those amazing kitchens where I could have one of everything (including an Aga).  I already have a plan that includes a walk in pantry, camphor laurel bench tops, tons of cupboard space…. Mmmmmm camphor laurel…

But I digress.

After they finished cooking, impressing the importance of letting your chiffon cake cool upside down and waxing lyrical about the provenance of their recipes it was onto networking and trying their goodies (some which they’d prepared earlier).  They did have a couple of savoury dishes that I tried.  There was an egg and onion crumble thingy that was lovely; it put me in the mind of the egg, breadcrumb, garlic and honey crumble I make for my asparagus, which featured when I cooked the pork and prune dish.  As an aside, my Mum made the P&P dish the other day, she didn’t follow the recipe I posted, but just used my loose blog description to great success apparently.  Dad loved it.

They also had prepared a gravlax type salmon with bagels that were a big hit.  I tried their wee raspberry and nutella rolls, crispy macadamia crisps and chiffon cake. Cake. You know how I struggle with cake, especially sponge cake.  Sweet, empty nothing.  I KNOW lots of peeps love cake, I just don’t get it*** what is the attraction?  Give me a big bowl of savoury anything any day.  More meat thanks Mrs Feather!

So I chatted to a few nice bloggers and we talked serious blogger business.  You know, camera versus iPhone, the trials and tribulations of remembering to photograph food before devouring it, the ten most popular floral dress designs this autumn…  Then alas, it was time for me to go back to my real job.  Excitingly there were goodie bags which included the all-new soft cover release of the MMCC cookbook and a waterproof iPad protector and also…. A BREVILLE ALL-IN-ONE PROCESSOR – are you serious??? Really?? For me??? THAT IS AWESOME!!! So chuffed.  And now I have to go back to work while the BFF goes home with my processor.  How am I meant to concentrate?? 

Thank you to the aforementioned Breville employee/team member/fantastic person for noticing my blog, the donation of the fantastic gift and Appliances Online for having me.  You are all grouse.

Dinner is on already tonight (more on that later), and no wizzy wizzy required, but I think a soup will be featuring on the menu really soon, so I can stab-blend to my heart’s content.  Awesome.

Also as a one-time-only-special-offer, I am giving away the lovely Monday Morning Cooking Club cookbook to one of you, my intrepid readers.  To win… hmmmm to win… you just…errrr… I’m not sure.  How about, anyone that can make the stupid blogger comment section work give me a suggestion? Who deserves this lovely cookbook? How should I give it away?  If comment doesn’t work, which is often the case, and you have a fabulous idea you could also post a comment on my google+ page (just click on my name under ‘contributors’) – or of course if you actually know me, drop me an email!

I was naughty, and didn’t take photos of the event. Of course, we had to wait 5 minutes before falling on the morning tea for the obligatory blogger photos, by then I was too keen to try the delicious looking spread to bother getting out the iPhone.  But here’s one of me with my new toy.

*Not exactly true, but…

**Thank you Himself, you are the best husband ever.

***Clearly, it must be me as so many peeps love cake – but nothing I can do about that, I am unrepentant.