And not as a res­ult of the Cook­ing with Ice: Liquid Nitro­gen demo.

Yes this middle of the night post is a dir­ect res­ult of WOAP week­end eyes-big­ger-than-stom­ach issues.  I some­how man­aged to have three events this first week­end, and to squeeze in a bur­ger as well (plus observe oth­ers squeez­ing in more).

So to the bur­gers first since you can still get your chop­pers around those:

  • The Ti Kouka Double Beef Bur­ger –  a beef double-down with buns (unlike the Duke Carvell’s Double Down pure a’la’K­FC being tackled by a work col­league – report to come).  TK’s rated as very very good, with Shep­’s usu­al touch of magic.
  • Burger JimmyThe Jimmy’s Bee Piggy (pic­tured) – deli­cious on all fronts and not too meaty for the non-double-down­ers. Also very very good, oth­er than the bor­ing shoes­tring fries (and kinda cool among the theatre ambi­ence).
  • The Spruce Goose’s Bait and Tar­ragon – the bur­ger ver­sion of a white­bait sand­wich.  Rated as good with impress­ive door­stop fries.

And to the events:

  • Fri­day even­ing’s Butcher, Baker and Can­dle­stick Maker – a classy even­ing mar­ket among the BMW’s of Boom­rock­’s sup­pli­ers (Mojo, Bor­deaux, Zany Zeus, Olivo, Ora King Sal­mon presen­ted sev­er­al deli­cious ways by guest chef Glen Taylor of Taylors on Jack­son, Har­ring­tons, Tuatara, Carello del Gelato, to name just a few).  A good remind­er of the import­ance of sup­pli­ers and the won­der­ful ones we have loc­ally.
  • Nitro cookingSat­urday even­ing’s Cook­ing with Ice: Liquid Nitro­gen demo – The most fun ever in a kit­chen.  Lots of smoke, bub­bling liquids, OMG stor­ies and even some hands on cre­at­ing. The swan song being a tiram­isu show­cas­ing all the tech­niques from the even­ing.  And these folks are Wel­ling­ton-based with more events in the plan­ning (keep your ear out for some­thing at the Malaghan Insti­tute or con­tact Caitlin at Caitlin Le Hariv­el).
  • Sunday even­ing’s Han­nahs Lane­way Ban­quet – simply stun­ning.  Set­ting, dec­or­a­tion, food, ambi­ence, logist­ic­al coordin­a­tion, smooth­ness of deliv­ery, weath­er.  The four ‘courses’ were really four series of dishes, hence the explod­ing stom­achs (Laneway donut treesorry K, I just have to show the donut tree finale!), col­lab­or­ated by the won­der­ful artis­ans from the lane (Leed Street Bakery with the TK folks’ magic touch again, Wel­ling­ton Chocol­ate Fact­ory, Pomodoro Pizza, Gold­ings Dive Bar, Wel­ling­ton Chocol­ate Fact­ory, Fix and Fogg pea­nut but­ter, Six Bar­rel Soda, Red Rab­bit Roast­ery, and the Cater­ing Stu­dio soon-to-be-the-new-Egmont-Street-Eat­ery behind WCF – check out pro­gress here).  And again, keep your ear to the ground as there were whis­pers cir­cu­lat­ing about a sum­mer re-run…

Bring on the rest of week one.