Melbourne Good Food & Wine Show 2011 + Photos

My lovely friends and I went to the fantabulous and amazing Melbourne Good Food and Wine Show this year, Saturday June 4.

We originally started as 3 people but one had to leave early, too early that she practically missed out on all the fun, sadly enough, which left me with my friend G to take down the exhibition centre filled with delicious, free and amazing goodies it had in store for us. 

To start, we went to watch My Kitchen Rules judge and famous French Chef, Manu Feildel, to cook up a storm in his cooking demo at the Fisher & Paykel Celebrity Theatre. We arrived 30 minutes late and we almost begged the ticket box officers to let us in. They not only let us in, with a fair warning that it's almost over, but they also gave us free tickets to see him again on his next demo. Fantastic start to the day!

We watched him finish his main meal and his scrumptious looking dessert of poached pear placed in a 'sexy' dessert glass with vanilla ice-cream and melted chocolate (sorry it doesn't sound as good as it looked). After coming out of the theatre, full of smiles and still in the state of what I call 'gobsmackery', my friends and I headed out to have something to eat.

Photos: Manu Feildel Cooking Demo and Book Signing

We tasted a couple of samples from different stalls including chicken on crackers, roasted lamb on crispy bread with goat's cheese and sun-dried tomatoes, those delicious appletisers that we kept coming back for, before deciding to have a proper brunch. 

We decided to grab two main meals to share between the three of us at the gorgeous Oxford Landing Estates Restaurant located, somewhat in the middle of the exhibition centre. Funny, to buy the food, we had to buy this cute little cards that represented $8. 

What was on the menu? 

Two main meals that absolutely blew me away. 

Dong Do Pork with Chop House Fried Rice

This dish was Poh Ling Yeow (Masterchef Season 1)'s recipe. It's an absolutely delicious dish and all the elements complemented each other.

Dish of the Day: Confit Duck with Star Anise Sauce and Potatoes

This dish was Marion Grasby (Masterchef Season 2)'s recipe. I really, absolutely, ridiculously love this dish. It was the most delicious dish I've ever tasted in my whole life. 

The duck was perfectly cooked, the potatoes were nice and crisp but soft in the inside and that Star Anise sauce... don't get me going. This dish is plain WOW. Nothing else, infinity more.

Kaffir Lime Panna Cotta with Strawberries and Lime Syrup

After that ridiculous shake-up-of-the-pallet session, our friend finally left and G and I tasted an abundant more of things including that yummy minimelts where the guy behind the counter asked us to scream, "Mini Melts Dot Com Dot A U!!" before giving us a sample, which tasted divine!

Some of my dreams came true as well when I managed to take a photo with MKR judge Manu Feildel, Masterchef's Poh Ling Yeow and managed to laugh out loud watching Masterchef funny boys/judges Gary and George in their cooking demo, see a cook-off against My Kitchen Rules Grand Finalists, Kane and Lee and the gorgeous sisters Sammy and Bella. What a fantastic day!

Some not so great photos can be viewed here:

My Kitchen Rules Contestants Cook-Off
(Sammy & Bella, Kane & Lee)

Gary & George Cooking Demo and Book Signings

Tobie Puttock Cooking Demo and Book Signing

Food part: Top Class! Wine part: Underaged. Ha, G and I could have been rebellious but decided against it.

Watch out Melbourne Good Food and Wine Show 2012, I'll be back...that is, if the world hasn't ended yet.

Fingers Crossed.