Entertainment book: 88
Having recently purchased an entertainment book through the social club at work, I am determined to get more than my money’s worth out of it, so I’m going to try and work my way through it systematically.
First up I wanted a quick dinner before bowling, and since I didn’t have the book with me, only the gold card, it had to be somewhere in the ‘fine dining’ section, and it had to be somewhere in the Courtenay Quarter to be near The Lanes. A quick search on their website led me to 88 on Tory Street.
Your fortnight in coffee
Fairtrade Fortnight started yesterday, so I’m sure you’re keen to do your bit to make the world a better place. The Wellingtonista would, therefore, like you to help us do a little research.
There are a lot of coffee companies in Wellington who now offer fairtrade beans. We want you to get drinking and tell us what the best ones are. You can use the fairtrade locator to start your search, but it may be a little out of date — there is no Malo Cafe anymore, for example — so it might be best if you ask your favourite cafes if they have fairtrade beans — and if they don’t, ask them why the hell they don’t. Go forth and caffinate!
A drink for Autumn: the Negroni
At the wind whips at us with its chill flails, the blustery wet drizzle envelops our heads as we peraumbulate along the streets of downtown, as the night glows into the dawn with a dull damp violet cloud — we’re gonna need a drink to ward off the misery of the season. So I present to you the mulled-wine of the cocktail family: The Negroni.
It seems there are not a lot of people who will admit to a fondness for Campari. Indeed it was not two nights ago that a drinking companion of mine brayed something incoherent about “earwax” when the dreaded C‑word was mentioned during a free-ranging session over at mine. However, for all its perceived sins, without Campari you would not have a Negroni.
It is the Campari that is the medicinal “bitter” and provides the characteristic flavor of the Negroni. A little background: according to my sources, Compari was concocted by Gaspare Campari in the 1850s. Gaspare, at only age 14, was the master drink maker at the Bass Bar in Turin, which was the commercial center for aperitifs at the time. Campari is made with natural ingredients that include herbs, spices, bark and fruit peels. The exact formula is of course a highly guarded secret. And as far as the Negroni is concerned, as with all great cocktails stories differ, but the most popular account of its origin is that Count Camillo Negroni, a Florentine aristocrat, decided one day to add some bite to his favorite drink, the Americano. He had the bartender add gin. From that time on he ordered the same drink every day. Eventually the bartender named the drink after him.
The Negroni. Complex. Spicy. Bitter, although not overly so. The tiniest bit of sweetness to offset that. It’s a drink to warm a cold breast. It’s a perfect aperitif, a drink to wake up your taste buds and shout “Ciao, ragazzo bello! Come stai?”. And the colour! The rich brown and deep red tones seem to glow with soft light and autumnal hues. Hold one near a light and your Negroni will erupt in orange novas. It’s the obvious drink-of-Autumn for a Wellingtonista.
“Bene, grazie!”
Plenty to wine about
There comes a time in everyone’s life when they feel the need to leave Wellington, even if it’s just for one day. No really, it happens! And a particularly good day to get out of town, if you don’t like the colour green, or potatoes, or Guiness or drunken fake-Irish louts, would be this Saturday. So where to go to get away? How about a wine festival — after we all know, that wine drinkers are a better class of people than beer drinkers — somewhere out of town but still nearby?
Well it just so happens that March 17 is your lucky day, with not one but two festivals taking place nearby. There’s the Wairarapa Wines Harvest Festival in Gladstone (as well as the International Balloon Fiesta and the day before Round the Vines, and also the Great Wellington Wine and Food Festival in Paekakariki. So how do you choose which one to go to when they both cost $25 for an entrance fee? Take our quiz to find out.
Not-so Breaking News
- Tupelo has moved its beer menu to all boutique styles, with only Heineken remaining on its menu as a mainstream drop. They also have the very tasty Nelson Bays Gold and Nelson Bays Pilsner on tap, with (classy glass) jugs for just $10.
- Meanwhile the Wellingtonista’s semi-tiki bar of choice, Imbibe is now offering brunch on Friday-Sunday. While there was no obviously displayed menu on the windows, the people sitting contentedly in the sun appeared to be tucking in to large plates of eggs. Hopefully they’ll have more on offer for those of us less eggily inclined, because it’s a gorgeous space and looks very nice and chilled out for a hangover breakfast.
- And finally, the Dominion Post can as usual be relied on to run front-page stories about the weather in exact reverse of what’s going on that day, so today’s rain brings a ‘Drought!’ cover story. Hurrah!
Wellingtonista boos: ads on our sacred space
Adjusting to the new offices on Lambton Quay hasn’t been easy, and a huge part of the problem has been trying to get into a new coffee routine. That is why it’s so distressing that Fresco*, which sells Mojo coffee, is now using takeaway cups printed with Telecom advertising. How many minutes will I spend thinking about coffee over the next two years? A lot more than I’ll think about switching to Telecom, you punks. Even if I hadn’t had my vodafone number since it was Bell South, there’s no way I’d switch now. Leave me alone and stop hounding me when all I am trying to do is wake up!
* Yes, their takeaway lattes are $4.50, but their muffins are $2.50, so breakfast is only 20 cents more expensive than getting a cheese scone and coffee from Kyrani.
Bar None
Well, he’s done it. Wellingtonista Tom has completed his mission to visit every bar in the central city, with all these fine establishments hosting our roving martini expert at one time or another…
Arbitrageur, Arizona, Atlanta, B4, Backbencher, Ballroom, Basement, Beaujolais, Big Kumara, Bisque On Bolton, The Black Harp, Blend, Blondini’s, Blue Note, Bodega, Bohdans, Boogie Wonderland, Boulcott St Bistro, Boulot, Breakers, Brewery Bar, The Bristol, Brix, Bull & Bear, Cabaret, Calzone, Cambridge Hotel, Capitol, Caronia, Caucus, The Cavern Club, Chameleon, Chicago, Chow, Club K, Concrete, Confidential, Copita, Courtenay Arms, Coyote, Crazy Horse, Cue Room, Curve, Dockside, The Dog & Bone, Dojo, Downtown Local, The Dubliner, Eclipse, Electric Avenue, Endup, Ernesto, Establishment, The Feathers, Ferrymans, Floriditas, Flying Burrito Brothers, Gibbon’s Bar, GoGo, Good Luck, Green Room, The Grill at Duxton, Happy, Harem, Havana, Hawthorne Lounge, Hope Bros, Hotel Willis Lodge, Hugos, Hummingbird, Imbibe, Imerst, J’aime Bordeaux, Jet, The Jimmy, JJ Murphy’s, Juniper, Kazu Yakitori and Sake Bar, Kitty O’Shea’s, The Lab, The Lab Underground, The Last Supper Club, Latinos, Leuven, The Lido, Liquidate, The Loaded Hog, Logan Brown, Lone Star, Lone Star Lounge, Lovelocks, The Malthouse, Matterhorn, Maya, Medina, Mercure Terrace, Mercure Willis, Mercury Lounge, Mezzaluna, Mighty Mighty, Milk, Mini Bar, Ministry Of Food, Mixjah, Mojo Invincible, Molly Malones, Monsoon Poon, Motel, Museum Hotel, MVP, Occidental, The Old Bank Bar & Café, One Red Dog (Blair St), One Red Dog (Kumutoto), Orchid Lounge, Our Bar, Paradiso, Paramount, Parlour Bar, The Pit, Pod, Ponderosa, Portland Hotel, Pravda, Rain, Red Square, Sandwiches, San Francisco Bathhouse, Scopa, Seam, The Shack, Shed 5, Shooters, Sojourn, Southern Cross, Speight’s Ale House, Spice Island, Sports Cafe, Stadium Bar, Stellar, St Johns, Sweet Mother’s Kitchen, Syn, The Tasting Room, The Thistle Inn, Toast, Trax, Tupelo, Urbane, UU, Valve, Vespa Lounge, Vintage, Vivo, The Wellesley Cafe, Welsh Dragon Bar & Scorpio’s, Whitbys Piano Bar, Zibibbo, Zing
Tom needs a new challenged for 2007, so head over to WellUrban to make a suggestion.
Malthouse closes on 23rd December
Only to re-open next to the Sports Bar on Courtenay Place around mid-February.
It’ll be interesting to see if the middle management-types and general office dwellers that frequent the current Malthouse will make the Friday night trek down to Courtenay Place.
Having said that it’ll be mighty to have a place that serves good beer (and not the standard sugary s!@t available) in the heart of Wellington’s entertainment ‘quarter’.
And so, for all those that are, like myself, middle management-types — see you for one last drink on the balcony!
Kai in our puku
Recently we asked you where the best places to eat on Lambton Quay are, and naturally, the internet word-of-mouth answered: Kapai Salads in Lambton Square.
There’s plenty of reasons to love Kapai, including:
- Whānau: Everyone knows someone who knows the owners, hence the mass emails and bulletin board postings about the shop.
- Mata: Your salad will be freshly made right in front of you, and you will get to choose the ingrediants yourself. No droopy lettuce and skankyass grated cheese here, no no.
- Taiao: The soup is served in bowls made out of bread, while salads are served in potatopaks (which you probably wouldn’t want to eat, although technically they’re safe enough to), minimising environmental damage. Plus, the coffee’s fair trade.
We’d like them to offer lists of available ingrediants and make it a little clearer which are the gourmet ones that’ll set you back an extra $1.50, but when you can get a rocquette, falafel and feta salad with aioli in less than five minutes and feel good about doing it, you’ll definitely be going back.
Eating outside my comfort box (heh)
Everyone knows that large corporations eat puppies, but what do the people who work for large corporations eat for lunch?
The Wellingtonista is closing down its Courtenay Place branch on Friday and is opening up in mid Lambton Quay instead. After a year and a half down this way, we’d just finally got the good people at Sahara Kebabs to know that we like just a few onions and garlic yoghurt, tahini and hot chilli on our (mixed vegetarian, mujaver and falafel only) kebabs. Where are we going to eat now?