Last night, Decay and I attended the tasting session held by Rivers, apparently to help us decide what we were going to put on the menu for the wedding reception ... When the original invitation was offered, the tastings were going to be conducted on one of the chartered boats that the Rivers group run, but the venue was changed at the last minute, probably to accommodate some last minute RSVPs by the corporate bunch ...

I think we were seated on tables according to which function coordinator we were working with, and as a result, Decay and I ended up on the corporate functions group. This would've been ok, except for the failed attempts to join in on conversations thing. The person sitting next to Decay tried, but the rest... not so much. Maybe they'd be the sort to be treated nicely @ B of A ... Anyway... we sat down, we tried some food ... pictures courtesy of Decay's phone cam ... excuse the quality, we work with what we've got!

Prior to the entree, the table was set up, with a thick-cut loaf of bread. I'm not a bread expert, but it was sourdough, I think? It wasn't hard and stale, which is definitely a good thing. To accompany the bread, we had hommus and tzatziki, as well as a small pat of butter. No pictures of this stuff, cos it got attacked before we remembered about the phone cam ... The hommus wasn't that strong in flavour, so Decay ate some of it, and the tzatziki was nice too ... it's a nice change from getting just a bread roll and individual pat of butter on the side plate...

For entrées, we had:

Mediterranean antipasto including: continental meats, roasted marinated vegetables and bocconcini cheese

I didn't get much of this, but it looked very nice on the plate... Decay I think got some prosciutto, and there was baby octopus ... there was also some sort of vegetable terrine blocklet, and your requisite green leafy stuff in the middle. I assume it was ok since most of it was eaten ?

Roast pumpkin and Parmesan Cannelloni

This was quite yummy ... the cannelloni wasn't overcooked to the point of falling apart - there was still enough that you needed to squish with the long edge of the fork to cut off a piece. There was a strong white wine presence - not the alcohol bit, but the rest of the taste. And there was pumpkin and Decay ate it even though he's not the hugest pumpkin person. While we only had a little bit (probably about 1/4 of a tube of cannelloni each, in the end), it's probably a bit rich if the day gets to be really hot.

Marinated chicken salad with grilled eggplant and capsicum

This was ... ok. The slices of chicken were cold, and ended up being a bit dry. Not everyone's a fan of eggplant or capsicum, but I liked the taste ... they arranged the capsicum/eggplant stuff as a small tower moulded out of a cup of some sort, and it was pretty ... Oh yeah, this picture was taken of the share platter, because the plated dish was already being attacked by one bunch of people on our table. Below the chicken slices, you can see some cannelloni sitting there waiting to be attacked.

For Main Course, along with roasted chat potatoes with herbs and garlic, some steamed broccoli with flecks of other vegies, and a green salad of sorts (bowls to share amongst the table) we had:

Salmon Fillet Topped with Gremolata resting on a Risotto of Pine Nuts and Grana Parmesan

Decay didn't try any of this, but I did. The salmon was ... cooked, and non-fishy. This is a good thing. I'm not the hugest fan of fish in general, but I'll eat it. It might be a good test of the freshness of their supplies - if they can get fish in and cook it so it's not fishy tasting, they're doing well in my book. The risotto for this dish was cooked to super dry state so they could mould it into a flat disc about egg-ring sized, and 2cm in height. I found the risotto to be a bit ... grainy to eat. That might have something to do with the time it took for me to get a bit of risotto though. Anyway, it's salmon, and there's no way it was going to end up on a menu of Decay's choice.

Eye Fillet Medallion Parmesan crusted and set on Potato Rosti with a Port Wine jus

This was really yummy... the beef wasn't overcooked and dry, so it was moist and flavoury... the Parmesan crust thing had lots of pepper in it, which helped the whole cheesyness of the crust be less rich. It's likely to be the 'beef' dish we'll pick because it's hard to go wrong with this. The potato rosti thing underneath was pretty interesting... Decay asked the Chef dude how it was made - grated potato, shaped into cakes, then ovenned and grilled to finish. Nice. We might have to try a variation on those Mashed potato ball things with grated potato instead ... Hmmm ...

Cajun Spiced Breast of Chicken Served with Sweet Potato mash and Tomato Chilli Jam

If you're going to call something Cajun spiced, we're within our rights to expect something that has a small amount of kick in it ... this... didn't. I mean ... it was flavoury... tomatoey, and a bunch of other flavours... but it just tasted ... mushy. It wasn't that mushy in texture, and the chicken wasn't dry like in the entrée, but I couldn't spot any chilli in anything! Maybe I've burnt off all my tastebuds with Decay's vindaloo, but ... no. Decay reckons we do a better version of this at home.

Right. On to the important bit ... Desserts!
Sticky Date Pudding: Served warm with a Sticky Caramel Sauce

Yum! This wasn't super dense, or super sweet, it was just yummy! The pudding was made in individual serving sizes turned out of their moulds, with some slivered almonds to decorate the side... and a large puddle of caramel sauce after they'd drenched the thing... Thing is, it tastes lots like dates, but the cake was pretty light in texture, which helped lots to make this something we can pick as a dessert at the end of november when it's not really the right kind of weather to be eating super rich things... For all those sticky date pudding fans... your wish may well be granted...

Death by Chocolate: Rich moist Chocolate Cake, filled with a Chocolate Supreme

I didn't like this much ... too much chocolate in one hit, and it was very very sweet... the lady next to me took half of a serving of this, tasted it, and promptly declared it too sweet and left the rest on her plate... given that there were only two whole servings of each item for each table, taking half of the thing when there are 9 other people on the table is a bit... Hmm... Also, the way it was served as a cylinder of cake was a bit deceptive as to the actual size of the serving ... there was actually quite a lot of cake and chocolate mousse type stuff in there ...

Apple and Rhubarb Tart: Apple and Rhubarb in a Pastry shell, baked with a German crumble, then iced

This was nice, but boring ... Decay tasted a whole whack of cinnamon they put in the pastry shell... which I'm not sure it needed. I got a small mouthful of this cos most of it had gone by the time Decay and I were handed the platters ... Mostly due to someone taking half the serving again, when there were two full serves to share between 10 ... It's ok, at least they finished it ... (:

Yes. So that was the food. We sorted out other things like seating arrangements - 8 to a table instead of 10, because it was really quite squishy sitting at a full table of 10, and we want to give people some elbow room and also give the plates some room to sit by themselves instead of hiding the cutlery and stuff... besides, we have the entire venue to ourselves, we might as well utilise the space with more tables!

After all this food, we've sort of decided what some of the dishes will be for the reception ... but as always they're not final until we have to tell them ... which is ... not yet (: