Shoe Party @ Vangoh Shoes

One of my favourite and locally (in Perth, Western Australia) designed shoe store in Perth in Vangoh (owned by husband and wife team). There are two stores located in Perth - Perth city in the Raine Square area (opposite Country Road) and in Subiaco.

In fact, I've been steadily building up a shoe collection from their... well.. shoe collection... So when Vanessa Goh (part owner - she co-owns with her husband Raj and creative head - get it VanGoh??) asked me whether I wanted to do an initiation evening/night of Vangoh shoes to all my beautiful, fashionable, creative ladies in my life I jumped at the chance. After all who doesn't love a shoe party?? It's like a tupperware party except with shoes!!

So after much emailing back and forth between Vanessa and myself, we finally had a date, and decided on which store - Subiaco. She also made me lovely invites of mint green and white (colours chosen by moi - and yes they are very Tiffany's colour...) and I distributed them to all the lovely ladies in my life (well.. as much as I can.. facebook can be a wonderful pre-warning for everyone..).

The invite - the yellow lighting and the over-filtering made it look all blah

I was a little nervous at first mainly because I was afraid that people may not have the same taste as me in terms of shoes and what happens if no one enjoys themselves and left home disappointed? I really shouldn't have worried and trusted that one of my favourite shoe stores would have amazing things. The shoes are on trend and yet are classic enough to last you more than one season of fashion. Are of high quality. Are affordable and the most important thing of all... COMFORTABLE. They are ridiculously comfortable - even the uber high heeled one.

Vanessa, Raj and their staff were so welcoming providing us with mini cupcakes, chocolates, mashmallows and glasses of champagne and for those driving juice/non-alcoholic beverages. However, we were all too excited and to busy pulling shoes off the shelves and trying things on that they were forgotten and Vanessa and Raj had to keep reminding us to have it!

From the initiation evening, not only do we get the whole store to ourselves (after hours of course) and a personalised service, they also provided everyone with 50% off ALL shoes, 30% off bags and accessories and $99 leather boots. 

I can assure you some of us went a little nuts. 

There was a little of ooo-ing.. aah-ing and "does this look good..?" .. "what do you think?" and staring at the mirrors then finding another pair while walking around the store to ensure the pair that were tried were comfortable. 

Apart from the shoes, they also stock some pretty cool leather bags. There was one that was so similar to a celine bag and I really wanted it, but I just couldn't justify having another bag (I have enough of a bag collection as it is!).

They also has a cabinet of pretty sparkling accessories - necklaces, earrings, rings (sourced from Australian and Perth designers) and some were swarovski crystal as well! I think SM scored a bargain on a beautiful swarovski crystal, almost costing her nothing!

By the end of the night we were pretty shopped out. But went home with bags of goodies. 

We all had so much fun and Vanessa, Raj and their staff were amazingly patient and helpful as we pretty much caused the whole store to be turned upside down with all the picking of shoes off shelves, trying them on and boxes flying open everywhere!

Thanks for letting me host a shoe night. It was an absolute success and the girls had so much fun, lots of laughter, smiles and excitement. They are hoping I would host another one soon (not sure if you would agree to it! hahah)

As to my purchases?

I got myself this amazing statement ring (which I forgot to take a photo of..)

I also got myself some very comfortable leopard printed ballet flats (something I have been hunting for - cute, fashionable, statement, comfortable and affordable - these flats ticked all the boxes!). In fact they are so comfortable my mum (who can't wear any old shoes - she needs those supersoft brands or equivalent) tried these on and said they were so comfortable, she couldn't believe she could wear these and it didn't hurt her feet!

I also got some very nice pair of heels (which I just realised that the girl in the photo on the invite is wearing the shoes! sheesh so unobservant!). I usually can't wear rounded shoes because I have really long abnormal toes and they tend to hit the front or get squashed.

But these were rounded but roomy at the roomy at the front for my odd toes. They are suede, are high, but platformed at the front so they don't feel like you are standing on massive high heels. They are t-bar so they elongate my legs instead of cutting it off with just a normal strap in the middle. Not only that, look at the buckle bit! You don't need to undo those little clips, it has a little hook of its own that you can just hook across and your shoes is on! Genius really!

Happy with the buys! and can't wait to wear them out around P-town!

I would also like to thank Vanessa and Raj for allowing me to host an awesome shoe party and letting my friends roam around. They had such a blast and so did I. I hope to host another one if you would let me!

For more information on Vangoh, the brand, the creative team behind the brand and a preview of some of their shoe collection check it out here.

Lapa Brazilian Restaurant Subiaco

***THIS POST IS NOT SUITABLE FOR VEGANS/VEGETARIANS***

Our monthly (or at least tries to be monthly) high school friends catch up took place at Lapa in Subiaco. All you can eat meat feast at a ridiculous price of $49 (plus with the entertainment card x 3 it was further $11 off!) - how can you possibly say no?? (unfortunately some members of the group did - blah they don't know what they missed out on!)

I really should explain what type of restaurant Lapa is. Lapa, as the waitstaff explains, specialises in Brazilian Churrascaria - which literally means barbecue, although they do a la carte menu, salads, pasta and the likes. The interior of the place is simply decorated with a huge feature wall portraying the rooftops of Brazil. The have an open-ish kitchen and TV displaying the kitchen guys getting the BBQ on - which really was useful for us when we were waiting for more grilled cinnamon spiced pineapple. So juicy, so tangy and sweet all at the same time! A must have when you are having the feast (it's not available all the time though - seasonal dependent!).

We were told on booking that because it was a booking for 6 people we were expected to have the endless feast - which we were more than happy to. The endless feast works this way. You are given about 15 different cuts of meats (cuts and types of meat is variable and depends on what the chefs have bought that day)- beef, pork, chicken - along with never ending plates of salad, chips, rice, Brazillian salsa, black bean sauce, farofa, chimichurri sauce and banana fritters. The meats are freshly cooked literally out of the grill/oven/kitchen into the hands of the waiters in their big industrial cooking skewers and are served to you when told to do so by the indication of your drink coaster (red - not ready to start; green - give me all you can eat meat please!).

for better detail of the endless feast please check out Lapa restaurant webiste here.

They also serve you a small bowl of cheese bread - it was cold and wasn't fresh, which was a pity otherwise I think it would have been rather tasty. But then again, why fill up on the carbs when you are going to have a massive protein fix? You have got to leave room in your belly!

Cheese bread

There was large array of meats available on the night we went from pork belly, to rump, to chilli and garlic chicken, fillets and even chicken heart! It's so hard to have photos of the meat because they cut a portion of it for you at the table - a decent sized portion and the waiters come around so frequently it's just not one of those things where it is photo possible (or photogenic!)

Clean plate to start with all the equipment that I need to tackle this massive meal!

Here is what I mean...

Waiter serving up the sliced pork belly..

Bring on the fillet!

My plate.. getting messy and taking photos like this is just not well.. blog friendly isn't.

getting our rump on.. the first cut of the meat that just came fresh out of the kitchen! YUM!

Then one of the yummiest dessert-based thing ever - pineapple and cinnamon. It is so refreshing! especially after consuming so much bbq meat - we went a bit nuts and the waiters couldn't help themselves but laugh a little at our excitement (and amount we consumed!!).

I can safely tell you that I am not a huge fan of all you can eat restaurants - simply because the quality of the food is never as good as places where you can have a le carte. But Lapa proved me wrong. The quality of their produce, the cooking and bbq-ing of the meats, it's delicious. Every single cut of meat was perfectly cooked. Succulent, juicy, moist, flavoursome. Nothing was dry (unless you were lucky to be the last table being served the last bit of the skewer in which case it is possible the meat would have been overcooked). But overall it was meat perfection. Only downside is that for me it was salty. Everyone on the table thinks I'm crazy and they think it was fine. Again - I have major sensitive salt buds!! But I admit the salt is what gives it flavour. It was great flavour and every cut was great - I particularly like the chilli chicken and the rump, especially that first cut of rump - slightly crisped on the outside and juicy medium-rare rump meat.

Lapa is definitely one to try! I got my share of iron and protein to last me a while! and the price is just oh-so-right! $49 of endless plates of meat! SCORE! The atmosphere? it's very casual, relaxed and chilled. The waitstaffs are professional and friendly. The parking may be a problem, but then you are heading into Subiaco!

OH and on a Saturday - for lunch you can have the endless feast for $29!!

And why you are there.. why not get one of their cocktails? JUST DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE (otherwise you are just an idiot) - there was a booze bus on the way home - I'm serious, there was. Lucky I only had one drink and consumed a huge massive meal.

Caipirinha

- like mojito but without the mint and nicer.

Bistro Des Artistes

I've been wanting to go to Bistro Des Artistes since well for a while, especially seeing as it is owned by two well known French chefs in Perth's dining scene - Alain Fabregues and Emmanuel Mollois and I finally had a chance on a Friday night last month, October 19th to be precise, with my boy and a couple of friends.

The first thing you would notice about the restaurant is that it is very very bright. It doesn't help that there is a floor to ceiling mirror that seems to further illuminate the place. It hurts the eyes somewhat with the bright light and the fluorescent whiteness didn't help romanticise the place at all, in fact it made it somewhat sterile. If only they dimmed it just a tad then it would make for mood lighting.

A bit of the interior of Bistro Des Artistes

We were given a corner facing the floor to ceiling mirror and next to the pastry cabinet. The menus were around on our table - postcard menus, very cool, one I can take home. It's a 5 course menu for $75 with the entree, main and dessert having three options for you to choose from. Nicely priced, I like it so far.

The menu for the night

I think that's pretty much when it went a little pear shaped. We had a very inattentive waitstaff. He was too busy looking at himself in the mirror that explaining to us what the dishes actually were (considering they were all in French!). Not only did he not explain to us what the dishes were, when informed that my bf had an allergy to nuts he looked blankly at us (like nut allergies were unheard of!) and then said.. "hmm.. I think none of the choices for sir has nuts.." then went off. There was not a word of "I'll double check with the chef" and his reponse wasn't exactly reassuring. Shocking really.

Our bread and butter were delivered to the table - cold bread - I think I've been spoiled and have been given warm bread at so many other places that I just expect warm bread now. Still it was nice bread and butter (so silky, smooth and slightly salted).

We ordered a bottle of French red - Domaine Charvin 2010 Cortes du Rhone, rather lovely, rich, fruity velvety red. Our glasses were never topped up. Our glasses of tap water was never filled up when emptied nor were we given a bottle to fill ourselves. Service really was lacking, even for a Bistro! Especially one that is owned by two well known chefs (each having very successful and amazing venues of their own - Alain Fabregues and Emmanuel Mollois).

So anyway back to the meals.. for entrees, one of the guys had beef carpaccio served with watercress and blue berry dessing. It looked rather freshing and the carpaccio was thinly sliced and drizzled all over with the dressing. He enjoyed the dish and commented on the quality of the beef carpaccio.

Beef carpaccio served with watercress and blue berry dressing

Bf and DS opted for the roasted scallops with cream leeks and a citrus emulsion. I was lucky to have a little taster of this dish and the scallops were cooked to perfection and the cream leeks gave this dish richness, although the citrus emulsion was a little too tangy and tart for my liking and the acidity and the citrus flavours seems to be just sitting at the bottom of the dish. Wasn't well emulsified perhaps?

Roasted Scallops with cream leeks and a citrus emulsion

I ordered rather blindly, mainly because I wanted something different that the boys didn't have and I wasn't explained what a champignon farci was (I'm really not cultured when it comes to culinary names that I don't come across often and this happens to be one of those). Suffice to say the dish came out and I was pleasantly surprised. Stuffed field mushrooms at its best! The mushroom was nice and juicy and the sauce was creamy goodness. The whole dish worked really well together and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Then the mains came. Bf was the odd one out and opted for the braised lamb shank served with flageolets. It came out somewhat like a stew/curry/very Moroccan inspired. Something he wasn't expecting. Filled with chickpeas, beans potatoes, and spices. The lamb however fell off the bone and was very tender. However, it had that intense lamb smell which wasn't to my liking. However, the flavours of the dish was nice, although it could be a little stronger.

Braised lamb shank served with flageolets

The rest of us opted for the cobble of Atlantic salmon with aromatic beurre blanc and herb mash. This was just divine. The salmon was cooked perfectly. Nice and pink on the inside. It had this wonderful buttery texture and just melted in your mouth. The herb mash was yum and the beurre blanc sauce was delicious was creamy and thick. Melt-in-your-mouth salmon/perfectly cooked salmon is hard to come by and this was one of those moments that was perfect.

Cobble of Atlantic Salmon with aromatic beurre blanc and herb mash

Next is one of my favourite courses that I don't ever get. Cheese. I'm actually not sure what type of cheese we got, but I'm pretty sure it was two different cheese and this apple date salad thing. We weren't explained by the waiter what exactly was on our slab. It was just placed down in front of us. All we knew was that it was cheese and bread and apple matchstick salad with a creamy yogurt dressing.

Le Fromage du jour; La Buche D' Affinois 

If anyone knows what the two French words I wrote up are please let me know because that was what was written as our cheese course. I would love to know as I really enjoyed the cheese and wouldn't mind finding it at the shops for myself. Cheers ^_^

Once our cheese course was finished we were given our pre-dessert, which was this very lovely creme caramel rice pudding with caramelised walnuts on top. It was creamy, sweet, cold and somewhat palate cleansing and perfect way to get ready for the dessert. 

Pre-dessert - Creme Caramel Rice Pudding with caramelised walnuts

 

For the dessert I wanted the creme brulee but they ran out which I was very disappointed about, because after all they are a French bistro how can they run out of brulee!! Very sad. So instead I opted for the Dessert of the day which was a fruit of the forrest tart. It was very sweet and the base was very well done, but I really am not one for sweetened fruits and should have known better than to have chosen it, but for those that fruit tarts this would be for you. I loved the ice cream though and thought that the pre-dessert was better and wished there was more of the pre-dessert! I didn't end of finishing it because it really wasn't to my taste.

Dessert of the Day - Fruit of the Forrest

Bf on the other hand opted for the petite pot de creme vanille with canelle de bordeaux. Which really is vanilla creme and baked/caramelised custard. The custard by itself is a little dry but when eaten with the vanilla creme it is delicious. Light for a dessert and very typically French. 

petite pot de creme vanille with canelle de bordeaux

After our desserts were done our coffee/tea orders were taken, although our dishes were left on the table. They were eventually cleaned well after our pots of tea and coffee were served on our table. In fact we had to ask for our dishes to be cleared in order for us to drink our tea and have the petites four. 

The other disappointing thing was that we were given one pot of small tea between two people, just because we ordered the same tea. Jasmine Tea. Seriously, tea for the restaurant is just throwing in the tea leaves (leaves if you are lucky.. at times it's just a tea bag!) and boiling water. I'm sure they can spare to give us a pot each. The petites four given to us were a jube and chocolate truffles, which were lovely indeed and was the perfect way to end the meal.

Choice of tea/coffee and petites fours

Overall, the food at Bistro Des Artistes is pretty good more hits than misses. Definitely value for money if you are having their set menu and 5 course meal. They also have a nice selection of wines on offer.

There is however, a huge problem with service - lack of service, which really impacts on how your enjoy your night. It's worse when you were 15 minutes late to your car because you couldn't find ONE waiter in sight to ask for the bill at the end of the night. They seemed to have vanished. AND because of looking for a waiter and ONLY 15 minutes to your car - you got a parking fine (and you already forked out $10 on parking ticket!). NOT nice. There is also a lack of ambiance in the restaurant, nothing romantic or cosy or warm and I think it has a lot to do with the lighting, because the decor it self is nice.

If those two things are fixed, in particular the service I think this restaurant has ticked on the boxes.

Will I go back? Maybe, but I'm not in any rush to.

Meeka

The monthly dinners with my group of friends are always an excuse to try new cuisines and places we've been meaning to try but never got around to it. One of those was Meeka.

Meeka is located on the upper end of Rockeby road in Subiaco. It serves Modern Australian dishes with flavours of the Middle East/Morocco. There are a range of  tajine dishes along side  eye fillets, duck and pork.

The service at Meeka was friendly and warm, although I must admit the waitress was rather flustered. We figured she must have been new. She was however, very patient considering we were too busy trying to catch up that we kept forgetting to look at the menu, and when we did, we had trouble deciding what to get.
In the end Wells, MM and I shared a bottle of red from South Australia and we opted to skip the entree as we were more interested in trying dessert. Except V who had the gozleme filled with pumpkin, spinach saffron, Persian feta and lemon.

It smelt absolutely divine and the warm gozleme with the sweet pumpkin, the salty feta and the when the half lemon was squeezed onto the gozleme the variety of flavours worked so well together.

A few of us had the taijines all of which filled our table with amazing aromas of spices and herbs. It's really hard to describe. Each taijine is served with labneh and Israeli couscous or quinoa. I didn't get a chance to taste any of the dishes because I was a little full from my meal. But everyone that had the taijines said it was pretty amazing, with a rich, diverse blend of exotic flavours and textures. I had a bit of food envy.

I let the photos of the taijines speak a little about the dishes, although it wouldn't do much to portray the flavours or the enchanting, mouth-watering aromas.

The rest of us who didn't have the taijine opted for the following;

Bf, had the eye fillet with za'atar sweet potato fondant, vadouvan olive butter, kataifi wrapped asparagus with jus.

Truth be told this to me just tasted like any other fillet, but it did seem to have been marinated in spices before being cooked. 

I had the twice cooked spiced duck leg, roasted carrot almond puree, sauteed spinach, asparagus, dukkah crusted gnocchi and sour cherry glaze. 

 

The duck was beautifully cooked to the extent that it fell right off the bone. The roasted carrot almond puree had such wonderful flavours of saffron with hints of masala. It want so well with the duck. The dukkah crusted gnocchi was just fried little potato balls. Nothing too special, but it did add a different texture to the dish.  

CR and MR choice the slow baked eggplant stuffed with freekeh, prunes, spicy red pepper sauce, house made soft cheese, candied walnuts puffed quinoa and herb salad. (Except MR opted out on the house made soft cheese as she couldn't have diary).

 

The above dish had very intense flavours. It's almost curry like and I wouldn't have minded a bit of rice on the side. I would think if you had to eat this it will get a little too much.

Then the best part of the night... DESSERTS! 

MM, SH and her bf had the Meeka's dessert tasting plate (which I really wanted but bf wouldn't share and I guess it really was a little two much for two people and I was stuffed). So the tasting plate gets you a mini Turkish delight stuffed doughnuts, yoghurt orange blossom panna cotta, candied saffron orange, date and nut filo cigar, nut dust cardamom coffee syrup and coffee date ice cream and raspberry peach liqueur sorbet. So basically it gets a little bit of the other dessert plus bonuses. It looked pretty amazing. 

 

I shared my dessert with bf . The Turkish delight stuffed doughnuts, spiced chocolate sauce, cardamom sugar and substituted the pistachio ice cream for chocolate with chocolate flavoured fairy floss. The Turkish Delight stuffed doughnuts were nice and warm, but I don't think there was enough Turkish delight stuffed in it or at least I didn't get anything, and all I got was doughy doughnuts. But then I'm always disappointed by doughnuts and I rather not get them for dessert. MW's bf had the original version with the pistachio ice cream, which I think would have worked a lot better with the dessert, because it would have gave it a little bit of dimension with the nutty flavours from the ice. Otherwise it felt like eating Turkish delight chocolate.

MW and bf had the spiced dark chocolate white mulberry tart, mulberry syrup, chocolate rose mousse and choc pops. The dark chocolate tart was heavenly. While the chocolate rose mousse was a little lighter and cut through the richness of the tart.

If it wasn't for bf who wanted to share desserts, this would have been my choice - Meeka's Pav with orange honeycomb baby fig cream, orange blossom curd, peanut brittle. This was amazing. It was refreshing, zesty yet sweet. A pleasure to eat.

Overall, Meeka's provided a lovely evening. Although I would have to comment that it took almost 45 minutes for our mains to come out, which meant that we almost missed the movie we were planning to see in Innaloo and also meant that we were starving, considering we had no entrees. In terms of food, if you are looking for something a little different to eat, Meeka provides a good choice. The aromas are enticing, the flavours are rich and variety of textures makes it for exciting eating.