QT, Sydney

You know I love reviewing great food, great venues and great hotels are no different! I stayed a night at QT Sydney, something I'd been dying to do since they opened sometime ago. Let me tell you, it was amazing!

The rooms aren't huge, but the attention to detail, decor, styling and vibe is just uber cool. I loved the cute furniture, and the ambience is made to feel like your home rather than a hotel room. Everything feels comfy, but highly stylish at the same time.

See, look at that uber comfy bed with the copious fluffy pillows! And the cute fur rug/blanket on top was a nice touch.

Now lets not forget a great selection for the mini bar - with cocktail shaker and martini glasses! Points for attention to detail.

Excuse the blurry photo, but did I mention that was only the start of the mini bar? The photo above just shows how many amenities and offerings they had in the room! I didn't even get the chance to check it all out but there were cute and useful notepads and novelty items. Plus a Nespresso machine for coffee lovers.

Just like Crown Metropol, one of my favourite hotels in Melbourne, the open bathroom scheme is in play here. Though that definitely is the new cool thing with hotel rooms which is of course partially because these smaller hotel rooms benefit from the airy open plan feel of such bathroom setups. Anyway, I still thought the lighting/display was a nice touch and added mood lighting. Can you see the bathtub behind?

And finally, a proper pic of the bathtub, complete with his and hers robes. Love!

Given it is a boutique hotel, it actually isn't as expensive as other high end chain hotels in Sydney so if you get the chance to book it at a discount, I would definitely recommend it!

Storytime

So it took me a bit longer to get back to blogging than I originally planned, so I apologise! But I am back now, albeit a bit slowly at first because I want to ease my way back in. And is it just me, or the end of the year is always crazy for me!

Anyway, I took the hiatus because of a few things happening in my life, including being in the early months of a new job. I also was taking time to spend with some people near and dear to me as it seems all my friends are leaving me to move overseas! Every week I hear of a new 'farewell' - I think I'm at that age where all my friends are at crossroads and making huge life decisions like moving across the other side of the world.

As some of you might recall also, I only just returned from holiday in July this year, however due to a certain turn of events and circumstances, I took the plunge and booked an impromptu trip to the US over Christmas and New Years! So I'll be busy organising that, but hopefully also means I'll have more fun things to post about!

So with that, I've also been enjoying myself a lot these last few weeks so I hope to post all about the things I've been up to as soon as I can :)

Cooking for Beginners

If you haven't already realised, I love food related infographics and this one has to be one of the cutest I've seen recently. How to cook for beginners! Love!

Hiatus

So things have been hectic lately with still settling into my new job and a whole lot of other stuff happening in life also which has been a whirlwind of fun, exciting, decision making and everything else in between.

I've been doing lots of cool stuff which I am dying to post about but I don't want to let my little blog down and fall behind with my normal schedule of trying to post twice a week. So I've decided to officially go on a blog hiatus for the next month until I sort out some stuff in my life. Don't worry, I'll still be around, and when I do get a free moment to breathe I may try and post but for now, I need some 'me' time and blogging is the first to fall off the priority list unfortunately.

If for some reason you're crazy enough to want to continue hearing from me, I will still be tweeting so follow me there :)

See you in a month, and let me leave you with a photo of beautiful Sydney when I was walking around the harbour last week!

Magnum 'Pleasure' Store

I love Magnums, but am really picky - I only eat Ecuador Dark Chocolate Mini Magnums. Specific, I know! Partially because I can't stand the sickly sweet non dark chocolate and I just can't finish a whole magnum by myself. Anyway, when I knew that the make-your-own Magnum Pleasure pop up store was opening in Westfield Sydney for August I just had to go. Plus Whitney Port endorsed it, which is enough to convince me!

I of course started with Dark Chocolate. My add ons were rose petals, crumbled meringue, chopped hazelnuts and rose praline. Then I chose a drizzle of white chocolate, which wasn't really my first choice but I got peer pressured into it. Excuse the blurry photos!

Look how many choices there are though!

I was specifically told by disappointed friends not to get the dried strawberries or the sea salt, but otherwise I would have got the first one.

Verdict? Definitely tasty! It is also smaller than a normal full size Magnum so I was able to finish mine. I liked the mixture I chose, but to be honest I can hardly see any combination failing. Sugar, ice cream, chocolate and more sugar, how can that go wrong at all?

Get in before the end of the weekend if you would like to try it! The lines have been long long long (even on a Sunday afternoon, when I went, it was a 45 min wait and that was considered 'good').

A Beginners Guide To Wine Infographic

Don't you love a good infographic? I'm not much of a wine drinker (spirits are my vice...) but I might just have to start consulting this pretty little picture :)

Reuben Hills, Sydney

I finally made it to Reuben Hills, a hugely popular cafe in Surry Hills with Honduran/South American influences. I have to say, everything on the menu sounds absolutely amazing and from what we shared amongst a table of four, it definitely didn't disappoint.

One thing I think is great too is the prices are really quite reasonable and with sizeable servings it definitely makes one of the 'cheaper' cafes around the area in my opinion. No doubt that probably is one reason why the wait can be quite long for a table at times!

Anyway, here's some snaps of the food we ordered:

Clockwise from top left -
Baleada - Honduran tortilla and this one had pulled pork filling. This was really large and quite tasty, though not the most amazing tortilla you've ever had

f-ing great fried chicken - this was crispy, tasty and not too greasy so definitely a winner for finger licking goodness!

Chorizo grits - this serving size was really decent and the grits, avocado, beans nachos dish was easy to share and flavoursome

Dirty bird - this chicken burger as you can see had a huge lean slice of chicken. I inhaled my share of the burger so fast I can't remember really how it tasted exactly but it must've been good for me to eat it so fast!

And a meal wouldn't be complete without dessert - this is give a dogg a bone which is a raspberry icecream sandwich with blackberry mousse. This was really well balanced in that it wasn't too sweet but it was rich enough to make it a very good dessert.

I will definitely be back, though now I've tried most of the non breakfast menu I think I may have to wait a bit!