Wednesday, June 30, 2004

One Perfect Day

1 whole month of in-activity at dolci & Qqp
*sheesh* you must be wondering what i was up to during this whole month.
yup. you guess it. the answer is that simple. it's one word that many dreads: 'study'. but not to worry, i have *finally * officially * ultimately* had my lastest of last exam at uni today. that concludes my 1.5year of master of commerce life. to be more precised this event happened just 4 hours ago! (ok. i know it's contigent on the result but who cares really?) yay ! no more exams. at least for the mean time. to think i still have yet to take up CPA. *shucks*

* time to celebrate * yippeeeeee *
On mention of celebration, the first thing that came into my mind is cakes. lots and lots of cakes! mountains and oceansof cakes! yummm. So I am going to devote this special 'back-to-life' blog on cakes. this blog also marks the special reunion with my long lost friend, Dong Liang, my best friend since primary school. we knew each other since kindy! talk about life long friend. here's one. arent I lucky? but it's sad that we seldom meet up. if we are lucky, we will have a meet up once a year. *sigh* she's in KL while I am here down under. I do miss her dearly most of the time and what a strange thing that we dont even talk or email each other at all yet we still remain so closed.

Dong Liang recently visited Sydney. in fact she has just left Sydney 4 days ago. the good thing was we get to meet up. the bad thing? i would love to have said there was none but i was having my exam when she came so we only got around to go out twice. gees. that makes it once a week. anyway on our second meeting, I showed her my favourite place in the city: David Jones Food Hall.

© foodies date: 26 June 2004
© foodies venue: David Jones Food Hall
© foodies time: 10.30am

♥ David Jones Food Hall - cake and patisserie section


♥ more Cakes....


♥ and more.....

this is my favourite section in David Jones Food Hall. it has become a ritual for me to have a wander throught the food hall and look at the cakes (and other goodies of course!) whenever i am in the city. Dong Liang was delighted when she saw the selection of cakes.

dongliang: you havent had breakfast right?
pinkcocoa: no....
dongliang: are you hungry?
pinkcocoa: hmmm not really
the two sweet-tooth girls look greedily and longingly at the huge selection of cakes on display.
....silence....
dongliang: the cakes look so nice
pinkcocoa: yeah.....
dongliang: can we have the cake?
pinkcocoa: that's exactly what i am thinking too!
the two girls decided to go for a walk before coming back for the cake. our reason behind the walk was that walk more first, later can eat more! smart rationale!

© foodies date: 26 June 2004
© foodies venue: Harris Coffee and Tea, Strand Arcade
© foodies time: 11am
after strolling very very slowly at David Jones Food Hall and admiring those yummilicious cakes, we were very reluctant to leave. now you see how girls are so attached to dessert. to most girls, a meal is not a meal without dessert. or rather dessert can be meal. i am sure ShinChan is very familiar with this logic of pinkcocoa. *Oops*

anyway we then proceeded to Strand Arcade on Pitt Street Mall. another of the tourity place that i usually bring visitors to. Strand Arcade's special feature is its manual operated lift! I am always delighted to find the lift's door opened manually by a nice old gentleman and watched him operated the lift as we accelerate to the floor we requested.


♥ Strand Arcade - Harris Coffee's Mocha $3.50

according to my cousin's sydney tourist guide book from taiwan, Harris Coffee and tea on ground floor, Strand Arcade has the best filtered coffee in sydney. it was about 11 in the morning. yes. time for some caffeine boost. dong liang had a machiatto (she confessed that she's a coffee addict) and i had a skinny mocha (i am a chocoholic). the mocha was just right. i would say it's one of the best one i had in sydney. it was not overly sweetened. the coffee taste was still retained with hinges of chocolatey in it. the price was reaasonable too. to get a quality mocha at uni costs about $3 so $3.50 for such a good quality in the city, i would say is on the cheaper side.

© foodies date: 26 June 2004
© foodies venue: Hyde Park
© foodies time: 1pm

after coffee at Strand Arcade, we visited Queen Victoria Building (QVB). we had a bit of fun looking at the jade bride carriage from the Ming dynasty, exhibited on 3rd floor of QVB. on my insist, we went and had a look at The Tea Room too. that's on my list of my "want-to-go" restaurants now. i definitely must have the high-tea!

pinkcocoa: aiya. what to eat lei? you feel like anything in particular or not?
dongliang: no lei. you decide lar.
...silence...
pinkcocoa thinking hard but brain only thinking about the DJ cakes.
somehow dongliang picked up my brain wave
dongliang: let's go back to david jones to get cake if you dont mind just cake. i want to try the cakes there.
pinkcocoa: no objection!!!
the two girls rushed back to DJ.

it was lunch time so it was rather crowded at the foodhall. i took a ticket from the dispenser machine and not long after it was our turn. gees. it's probaly my first time thinking the service was overly fast! we havent even devided on what cakes we want yet! the lady behind the counter was really nice. she actually left us to decide first and went on to serve other customer. she came to us each time she served a customer. very very good service i must say.


♥ apart from its large cakes, DJ also offers an extensive range of mini cakes
many of them are just smaller version of the larger cakes! perfect for those who want to taste a little of everything ^-^


♥ more mini cakes!

the empty space is for manna from heaven's goodies. apparently we were early and the staff were still filling out the foodshelves. this was also the first time i saw such a full shelf of cakes on display! normally there would only be a few slices left when i got to the foodhall at around 4pm. this time we were early. note the pictures were taken at 10.30am

dongliang: aiya. what to choose lei? let's get a cheesecake. you choose one lar
pinkcocoa: you choose lar. i can always come back n get any time one
dongliang: but i want to eat them all!!! this n that n this!

after a long struggle and a lot of ohhhhh and ahhhhhh, we settled on 4 cakes. initially we were going to have only 3 cakes. *Oops* now you know how piggy we are! *blush*


left to right:
♥ bread and butter pudding topped with choc chip and macadamia nuts
♥ blueberry cheesecake
♥ orange and carrot cake with cream cheese frosting topped with pecan
♥ Manna From Heaven's Chocolate Hazelnut Praline


♥ a closer look at the yummilicious cakes!

the weather was perfect.
the atmosphere was great.
the food was delicious.
it was a perfect afternoon for the two girls, who sat chatting and eating for almost 2 hours!

© foodies date: 26 June 2004
© foodies venue: back to David Jones Food Hall
© foodies time: 4.30pm


♥ DJ food hall selection of gelato

4.30pm. it was time for afternoon tea.
the girls remembered they forgot to take 'dessert' after their lunch. so they went back to DJ to get gelato. we were going to have gelato before our visit to Strand Arcade but I insisted to show dong liang about "Australian made" ice cream before deciding on which type of icee she wanted to try out. but my poor memory is playing on me and i totally forgot to show dong liang "australian made". aiks. o well. dong liang said she didnt mind gelato and in fact gelato is nicer since it's more refreshing and most importantly it is *low fat*.

the queue was long at the gelato bar. we waited for a long time before it was our turn. very contrary to the cakes wait! we had mango and hazelnut. no time for picture taking. we were goofing it down rather quickly. very un-ladylike! no seriously it was because the gelato bar had ran out of the pretty paper cup so we were given unsightedly plastic container. it wasnt very nice looking so i decide not to take any pics.

so that concludes a perfect girls' day out!
Dong Liang went back to KL the next day after our perfect day. *sob* i sure miss you here and the not so lengthy chat session we had. ohhhhhh i only wish you live here in Sydney!

Exam is over and i am now officially unemployed meaning i will have a lot of time to update my blog!

david jones yummilicious cakes from several sydney gourmet foodies that pinkcocoa can identify:
♥ Manna From Heaven
♥ Fleur De Lys
♥ Simmone Logue
♥ Rowie's Cakes
♥ Miss Dee's