Foodie heaven...

We've just spent the morning eating our way around the Westpac Stadium at the Food Show. Yum. Heaps of new tastes, new wines to try, samples of every food group from chocolate to Indian :), and heaps of people. We got there just as it was opening at 10am, which was good because we got around it twice before lunchtime, and left as it was starting to get really busy. Small daughter had a great time and tried almost everything: she wasn't too impressed by the chilli olive oil ("'ot, 'ot!") but adored the cheeses, different breads, meats, and the juices. She even had a little taste of wine ("yummy") and coffee (which we already know she likes).

Stand-outs for me were the 2006 Charles Wiffen riesling - still quite young, but a gorgeous combination of crispy passionfruit, citrus, and honey flavours that will really cellar well. It hung on the palate for ages too. There was also a Chilean riesling that I liked, and the Brown Brothers Rosa (Aussie, but I'll forgive it that): a sparkling rose that had lovely hints of strawberry. It wasn't very complex, but it was a nice drinking wine. The only problem is that it would go down far too easily! I also tried Lemon Z (a NZ limoncello), which I loved but would only drink in small quantities (although I could imagine it would be good on my vanilla-bean icecream, if that's not a sacreligious thing to say!). Silky Oak chocolate was good, but the Lindt was better - their 70% dark was fabulous.... and there were endless samples of pesto, smallgoods (mmm, garlic cabanossi!), olive oils, and spreads.

The big surprise, however, was a hot drink that I will drink that isn't hot chocolate. It's called Chai Latte, and it's not tea - it's a syrup with cinnamon and other spices in and it can be mixed with milk etc (we sampled it with latte-frothy milk), and it is divine. The same stand also had a vanilla-bean one that we tried which was even better, so we got a bottle of each syrup. They're not sugary and small daughter loved them too, so there is now a hot drink that we will all drink.

Small daughter is now crashed out asleep - she was really good, especially as we went to the show directly from her 2-year Plunket check so we were out for about 4 hours.

Me speaketh too soon: she's just woken up. Better go!

Pachyderm