Little Lauren adventuring on...

To catch my most recent adventures come visit me at my new home: littlelauren.com

Marvelous March!

March in Sydney isn't everyone's favourite month, for one the holidays are officially over and it tends to rain a lot. But people who like food - read as EVERYONE - can now delight because this depressing month is depressing for everyone - even restaurants!

I know this sounds like a bad thing but believe me, it's brilliant! For you and very much so for me.

Like retail slugs after Christmas, restaurants slug after summer and to help them get over that low patch the Merivale conglomerate have created a food sale called March into Merivale! Through out the month they hold numerous foodie and drink events at each of their venues. One of my favourite is the $33 meal deals at ALL the restaurants including the 3 chef hat wonder Est. I've already taste tested est. and Palings for you.


But it's not just through tickling your frugal funny bone that Merivale have lifted March - they also have some pretty spectacularly kitsch and therefore amazing ways of show casing their restaurants.


Earlier this week, we trotted off to the European Laneway. Upon entering you were presented with your food passport which had 8 tokens so you could explore the culinary delights of the UK, France, Italy, and Spain. Most foods and drinks are 1 token and for the "mains" it was a whole 2. It was a brilliant, if not crowded night of food and drink. I love any opportunity for prosecco and empanadas. Next cooking dumplings with Mr Wong!


But this March is even more marvelous because the Argyle Exchange has launched and is fighting back with even more meal deals. REVEL in this food war people, it is nothing but good news for us!
Argyle is offering $25 lunches and $35 dinners at it's group of venues all cozied up together in the Rocks.


I'm off next week to trial Sake's $35 dinner.. I can't wait!

Happy eatings xx

DIY Valentine Cards

Valentine's day is just around the corner! To be honest, I'm not really much of a Valentine girl... mainly because it's the day before my boyfriend's birthday so it's generally pretty low key. Usually I get a little joke present or hand made trinket. This year I decided to opt for something a little more traditional a home made card.

Harry has been dabbling in paper cut recently so I stole his equipment, added my essential glitter and got to play with my new stamp set!

All you need are some plane cards, some craft glue, glitter, and a sharp craft knife. 

I opted to do something really simple as I'm no good with the knife, so I cut a heart window using a "stencil" I found online. I used the same stencil to cut out a heart shape with some spare scrap-booking paper. I glued the heart into the window and stamped on a little "love" message (these ones are for my bestie's)

As you can see my cutting was a little shabby so I decided to cover the the edge with some glitter.

The final card is for Harry so I decided to bling it out! For that card I cut out the stencil just this same then carefully painted glue through the window. I put the glitter on the outside of the card first and then applied the glitter with the card open so not to mix it with the front glitter.

I plan on pairing these cute little cards with some sweet sweeties.

Hope your Valentine's Day is all you wish!

xx

Business Time!

Something really exciting is happening. It's happy dancing time!

Movida

I was very excited when I learned a few months ago that Movida had opened in Sydney. Obviously I was even more excited to actually eat there!

Pedron Peppers

Next to Mumm Mann, Movida Sydney has a sleek interior with cheeky touches. Cookie cutters provide a silver accent (although I'm not sure you are meant to notice they are cookie cutters) to the mostly dark wood and black interior. There is a central bar area with tables floating around the island. The service is super attentive and very friendly, full of fun facts, suggestions, and remarkable knowledge of the dishes. There is usually a bit of a wait, so you may need to pop around to one of the nearby wine bars while you wait.

We started our night with some Pisco Sours, served in the cocktail glass with three drops (literally) of bitters it provides a bit of bite to start out your night - BOOM rhyme. To accompany our drinks we ate the mixed meat platter and the pedron peppers. I LOVE THE PEDRON PEPPERS! So addictively good, you can pop them like pop corn - be warned about 1 in 10 are actually a bit spicy all the others are very, very mild.

We then followed up with this amazing prawn and scallop dish - which was substituted with mussels on our visit**, the lamb shoulder Cordero Moruno (Whole shoulder of Lamb marinated in Moorish spices cooked in our Josper Charcoal Oven), and Cecina (Air cured Wagyu Beef with Truffle Foam & a Poached Egg)

The stand outs: Prawn and Mussels

Stand out: Cecina

The prawn dish and the Cecina were true standouts, such beautifully made food with so much taste and texture. I had to stop myself from slurping up the sauce of the prawns. The dish was light and filling.

The Cecina was not so light but gorgeously silken and rich. You eat it similarly to a steak tarte and it is a messy delicious glob.

By the time I got to the lamb I was feeling a little sluggish, and while it was rich and perfectly cooked,  I was dying for some fresh salads and green leaves... this is probably where the menu was lacking. They have some very good salads but when you are eating such rich mains it would be nice for just a simple green salad so you don't feel so blergh.

As the blergh feeling couldn't be prevented, I went all out with dessert ordering the churros.

The churros themselves were surprisingly light, considering they were fried. The chocalate sauce is like a really dark and bitter chocolate soup. I personally would have preferred a little more milk/sugar but I'm not a dark chocolate person...

I had only heard good things about Movida in Melbourne and Movida Sydney did not dissapoint. Each dish was near perfect. I would go back to Movida in a heart beat, but would opt for a series of small dishes unless we had some big eaters with us!



To catch my most recent culinary adventures head on over to littlelauren.com

**Confession, I cannot for the life of me remember what the prawn dish was called... I really want to say it was on the specials as I couldn't find it on the menu - a thousand apologies! Better note taking next time...