Work experience Jess

We have been fortunate enough to have had Jess from NMIT helping us for a couple of weeks. Here is picture of her filleting John Dory.

What a great time we had with her, and she will be working with us every Thursday as a member of staff.

Mint Dining Room

Another book blog update

http://mint-book.blogspot.com/2011/11/another-week-further-into-it.html

Then again, why slow down!

A couple of weeks have passed, and its all systems go! The deck looks amazing, lights, tables....everything.

We are more than pleased. And it gives us another couple of seats. We are still the smallest restaurant in town, just a bit bigger!

The wine list just broke the 60 choice barrier, and we got some nice old french wine in to add a bit of interest. My next project will be to create a raised bed garden and picket gate in the front driveway.

Outdoors dining!

Time has come to open up the deck and offer alfresco dining.

For the last 3 weeks, chef/painter decorator has been renovating the front of the restaurant.

Dave the sparky will finally finish the lights tomorrow morning, and I pick up the tables and chairs tomorrow.The tables as with all our tables were hand made by Katie's father, David Pinker.

We also get a bit of lighting out over the disabled access.

We head out on location photo shoots for the book next week.

And we invested in some different wines for our library list.

There's no time to stand still around here.

Next job, making a garden in the driveway area, with a picket gate.

Nice letter regarding FWG Dinner

Hi Grant

Just a quick note to thank you again so much for doing us proud on Friday night at the Guild of Foodwriters dinner. Both the beef and lamb were superb (and I know that because my dining neighbor and I swapped a couple of times to show each other how delicious our meals were!)

The feedback from the foodwriters, both on the night and the following day, was absolutely outstanding – and I can assure you that’s no mean feat, coming from a fairly fussy bunch, as you can imagine. Many of them have asked me to pass on their appreciation to you directly.

Thanks again for a job well done.

Kind regards

Jennie

jennie dean I foodservice manager
beef + lamb new zealand inc.

wow, time to slow down!

What a challenge we had last week, but even after Airline blunders, missing lamb and savoy shortages, we made it!

So no trophy this year, but we had a great trip to Christchurch, and caught up with family, and enjoyed the awards.

Came back, and nearly was bumped off our flight......the one I needed to be on to cook the dinner for the NZ food writers guild. But after a bit of protesting, threatening to sue and the threat of me litterally exploding in the middle of the airport, I flew back on time.

Katie and wee Brodie had to wait for another flight.

The dinner went very well. Big thanks to Bill and the team at the Rutherford for their help,

and Wangapeka Prime Lamb for finding the missing lamb(Through no fault of their own, or mine), and Lamb and Beef New Zealand for sponsoring the dinner( and asking me to cook it!).

And now we get to enjoy the first normal week in some time.

Aaaaaah

So back into book writing mode.