I turned 48 this week (Wednesday 01 May) and enjoyed some fun food.
Before the food though a little reflection. I’ve never really been one to ponder too much about birthdays and getting older. We’re born, we live and if we’re fortunate we age, grow old and then we die. When I turned 30 and 40 I didn’t have a party because in my mind it wasn’t a big deal. Over the last year or so I’ve experienced some evidence of ageing in terms of my health. I’ve had to think more about my weight, my blood pressure and my diet. While I still eat more, I’m more and more conscious of the need to keep my weight at a certain level. On Tuesday night I went to bed and for the first time reflected on the following day I would be 48. Forty-eight sounds old. Forty-seven seemed to be a little way before I hit 50, but 48 is two years away from 50. In my mind 50 is old. That means in 2015 I reckon I’m taking a couple of days off around my birthday and spend some time in quiet reflection. The last place I want to be is at work.
So on Wednesday I woke up feeling quite flat. I needed something sweet and refreshing. The best thing in the morning though was a text message from Miss15 who sent me a pinch and a punch for the first day of the month. Normally I get in first.
I made the smoothie with Chinese gooseberry and pineapple pieces. The coffee was also strong.
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On checking my post office box I had a couple of cards. One from my parents and one from Bron.
Coffee and cards
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I work with great friends. A couple of them decorated the glass outside my work area.
The good news is I move work areas again next week.
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I decided against lunch because Bron was taking me to dinner. When we got there I got a gift from Bron.
Popping candy and chocolate.
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We went to our local Canberra Southern Cross Club at Jamison. The club does a pretty good steak which is what I wanted to eat.
This is a Scotch fillet steak with hollandaise sauce and mash potato.
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Bron bought me a nice cake and we had some at the club. It was great going out with Bron and having a good meal and enjoying each other’s company.
One candle was enough
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The next morning I walked
Hello Mr Owl
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I had some cake for breakfast
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I only had a little
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Office coffee with popping candy
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I got a nerf gun for a birthday present from a work friend
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It’s a nice little pistol
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Chicken and vegetable bake was necessary before I could finish off the cake
After the last blog post last weekend I finished with an image of chicken schnitzel. Here it is cooked with some fried eggs. Yum comfort food.
Chicken high schnitzel with fried eggs
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On Sunday morning I had breakfast with Bron and we went to Black Pepper for Eggs Benedict.
I always ask for more Hollandaise sauce
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I went to work on Sunday to catch up on some work. Fortunately I had a snack there.
An extreme chocolate whoopie
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From my garden
I do nothing to the garden bed in my apartment. I do not even add water and look at what grows.
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Sunday night dinner of salmon salad
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Monday was a public holiday. I visited Bron and we had her homemade hot cross buns
These were really good. I had two and lots of butter.
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After another day at work on a public holiday I made chicken salad
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Tuesday night I felt a little blergh and just made chicken and potato gems (tater tots)
I felt better after eating this.
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Bron has been busy making macarons. Look at these babies. Salted caramel, rose water and vanilla.
A salted caramel maracon.
This is the best salted caramel macaron I’ve ever tasted. These were so good. I love the way the flavours change as I bit into them and then as my tongue made contact.
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My personal passport expires in about eight months. It is easier to renew it before it expires. I pick up my new one in a couple of weeks.
Most of the travel I do is for work and for that I use an official passport. My current personal passport expires in January 2014. Given a passport cannot be used for the last six months of its ‘life’ and because renewing a current passport is many orders of magnitude easier than renewing an expired passport, I thought it was time.
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Nothing beats a sausage roll for a quick lunch
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It was nice having a WIZZ FIZZ lollipop
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Thursday morning treat from Bron
Now this is the morning after the meal at Morks so I wasn’t that hungry but who can resist macarons.
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It was Jacqui’s birthday at work. We didn’t our usual Pay day Pie day, instead we had a burger. You may recall Jacqui from last week’s post.
This is an Urban Cheese. It is a cheeseburger from Urban Bean Espresso Bar. It has an Angus beef pattie, tasty cheese, bacon, fried egg and beetroot. The chips came with homemade mayonnaise.
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I just had a salad for dinner
Followed with macarons
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Mmm…Friday morning rituals. Mavi Breakfast wrap. This one was amazingly good.
The owner made this one and we reckon he put in more bacon and mushrooms.
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Hot chip Friday lunch of course
You’d think I would have had enough of these but no.
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Saturday morning breakfast
This was a mistake. We had breakfast at Gourmet Deli in Belconnen Westfield shopping centre. This place has great coffee and is a fantastic delicatessen. This breakfast was a little too ‘greasy’.
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For dinner on Saturday night I was at Bron’s place. Bron has been thinking of making Jamie Oliver’s Yorkshire puddings again. She’d made them a little over a year ago and we blogged about it.
Here are some very short video sequences of the puddings being poured and rising in the oven. I have uploaded them on Vine but don’t know how to embed Vine into this blog so I’ve embedded YouTube uploads.
It’s very hard to describe just how nice it is to have the tangy trout and horseradish along with the crisp fresh fluffy pudding
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Dinner is served
It looks great doesn’t it?
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Bite sized morsels of happiness
This is perfection between my fingers
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Oh yeah there was a pear and walnut salad
This added a lovely touch
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Dessert was Bron’s amazing sticky date pudding with butterscotch and custard
This is I think Bron’s signature dessert. No one makes it better. The butterscotch sauce is to die for. The custard is perfect. The ice cream was Madagascan Vanilla Bean.
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Sunday breakfast was simple and in two stages
Poached eggs are so yummy
Check it out. Hot homemade hot cross bun.
I hope you agree this looked so good. It tasted better.
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After a walk today I needed a snack.
Australian Havarti cheese on toast
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For dinner tonight I made some honey soy salmon and a salad.
I like the sweetness of mixing honey with soy on the hot fry pan and reducing it.
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For dessert Bron gave me some of her sticky date pudding.
It was a nice big piece with extra butterscotch sauce and custard. This was just so good.
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So ends this post.Thank you for reading this and going through my instagram experience. I’d also invite you to view my Facebook page and if you like it please click the LIKE button. Thanks.
I hope everyone has a great week at work. I know I’ve been finding my new role a challenge and it seems there is a lot of fatigue around not just in my workplace but from what I hear and read around the place. I hope everyone finds balance in their life. Take care. Live long and prosper.
On a good note, the Brisbane Broncos defeated the St George Illawarra Dragons this week and the Gold Coast Titans defeated the Canberra Raiders. It was unfortunate that the Melbourne Storm defeated the North Queensland Cowboys. I don’t feel that bad though because Melbourne are my number four team. For those who don’t know me well my top four teams in the National Rugby League are 1. Brisbane Broncos, 2. North Queensland Cowboys, 3. Gold Coast Titans, and 4. The Melbourne Storm. For Soccer it’s the Brisbane Roar. For the Australian Football League it’s the Brisbane Lions and the Gold Coast Suns. For cricket it’s the Queensland Bulls. For Rugby it’s the Queensland Reds. For State of Origin it is the Queensland XXXX Maroons. One day I’ll reveal the teams I detest.
Since returning from a weekend in Brisbane I have posted so many photos to @instagram. It really is an addiction. This week I went past 2300 photos and 68 000 tweets. Of course most of the images are of food. I had also hoped to make an effort this week to eat better. You know more leafy greens, more fibre and less fat and cholesterol. I don’t think I was very successful. My waist has started to thicken a little and my trousers are feeling a little tighter. I have been walking and exercising, I need to increase that and decrease the food intake.
This tasted so good I’ve asked Bron to make it again (and again and again).
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The next morning (Thursday) I made my iced coffee banana smoothie with left over beetroot.
Looks like a strawberry milkshake.
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Thursday morning was a beautiful blue sky morning in Canberra. I started a new hash tag #coldanddry Those who know me know I like #warmandmoist
Blue skies. One of the beautiful things and why I #likeCanberra
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Some light reading with a coffee
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On Thursday evening Bron and I went to dinner with a couple we’re friends with to The Chairman and Yip in Civic (P and LP are our special friends we often have dinner with at their place). We arrived at 1800 AEDT for the Early Bird Specials (because we’re old people). We chose the Early Bird Banquet. We’ve previously eaten there.
Look at this lovely stuffed mushroom.
It was amazing. In the background is some steamed wonton and fried calamari.
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For our entrée we had 1. calamari tossed with spicy salt and chilli, 2. steamed wontons dressed with hot chilli infused oil, and 3. grilled field mushrooms with cashew and herb pesto.
For our main course we shared 1. sesame crusted salmon with cinnamon infused soy, 2. portuguese spiced corn fed chicken, 3. beef and scallop ground pepper hot pot, and 4. pumpkin and cucumber with caramelised chilli and kaffir lime.
This salmon was a little over cooked but the taste was amazing.
All in all the experience was really good. The Chairman and Yip is well worth visiting for dinner, even the early bird dinner. The service is fast and the wait staff are friendly. It’s definitely worth the $38.50 per person for the flavours.
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We went to Koko Black for dessert. Koko Black is an institution in Canberra and one of the places to go for a chocolate hit after dinner or after a movie at the Dendy cinema.
I had a chocolate affogato. Delicious. I’ve been told because it has no coffee it’s not really an affogato. Who cares?
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Another shot of coffee on a Friday morning before breakfast.
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For Friday breakfast we have restarted our Mavi Breakfast wrap tradition, with a change.
We now share it so we don’t feel so full all day. Connor wasn’t cooking this morning so it was a little loose and had too much barbecue sauce. That said, the bacon, egg, cheese, mushrooms and hash brown all tasted good.
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For lunch we were meant to do @snagstand but didn’t get to because we were busy. I elected to have a pie with @jacquimkane
These was a cheesy bacon and chunky beef pie along with an extreme chocolate whoopie and a Bundaberg ginger beer (nectar of the gods).
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In the afternoon we had planned a little afternoon tea, really a birthday party for @jesskirkham88 who was 25 on Friday.
Flowers from Jess’s husband
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Preparation for the party begins
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More preparation
Note the sausage rolls are made by Jess’s mum. They were delicious.
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Mars bar cars
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Fairy bread. Jess is an expert at making fairy bread.
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Someone made a rookie mistake and cooked cheerios in the microwave oven.
So how did it compare. It compared very well. The service was friendly and attentive and timely. The staff appeared interested in the customers. They were also helpful. Two of our party asked about gluten-free options. On asking about a redistribution of crispy egg noodles, this was greeted with enthusiasm so everyone else received extra noodles and as a lovely touch we received a large extra plate of noodles and fried basil. Without asking we had more than enough rice which was a constant problem at Woden. The dish, i.e., #39 tasted better too. More spicy and more flavours. My only concern was the restaurant is quite small and therefore because of its popularity it’s very noisy. With my hearing deficit and tinnitus I had trouble hearing my friends. I had placed myself next to a wall mirror to improve my photography which meant my bad ear was ‘facing’ my friends. I know what you’re thinking Gary puts photography ahead of friends…
We will go back, probably multiple times. I would recommend Lemon Grass in Civic over Woden and independently as a Thai restaurant in Canberra.
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We all wanted #39
When dining at the Woden franchise we had come to love #39 the creamy red curry. We had even set up a WhatsApp group called #39. We were all basically keen on #39.
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Everyone except me had wine.
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Yum, creamy red curry with beef and lots and lots of egg noodles.
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Sadly it came to an end.
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For dessert we went to Koko Black. I didn’t mind two nights in a row.
What should I choose?
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I went with the vanilla ice cream spectacular.
The caramel sauce was smooth, warm and sweet and oh so good. We joked a bit about warm smooth purulent discharges.
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I also had another chocolate affogato
I felt pretty full after this.
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On Saturday morning I went for a walk
The sun rising over the Belconnen Arts centre
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Hello Mr Owl
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Coffee at Gormet Deli in Belconnen
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At lunch time I had a coffee with Bron. I love lunch with Bron at Ricardo’s Cafe.
This week I’m attending a meeting in Leesburg, VA. I’m writing this post as I go, if I was in the mood I’d add a timestamp with each entry but given the different time zones I’m going to be in that is a little too anal retentive even for me and my obsessive compulsive personality.
Since my last post I’ve been spending time going over my meeting briefing notes and watching DVDs. I picked up the first series of The Walking Dead and I’m hooked.
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A local Gourmet Deli Belconnen does good coffee
This deli is full of good stuff from an amazing range of chocolate to other sweets to large containers of beans and cheeses and cold meats. There are all sorts of oils and spreads and spices to choose from. The staff are pretty friendly and always happy to assist.
The shop is opposite Coles so if your heading to Westfield Shoppingtown in Belconnen for your grocery shopping, the Gourmet Deli Belconnen is a good place to relax and have a coffee.
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After some early morning shopping I made myself some scrambled eggs for breakfast. I like to make thick and rich scrambled eggs. I usually use a couple of free range eggs that I’ve warmed up to room temperature plus an almost equal volume of pouring cream. I whisk vigorously (now using my Magic Bullet®) along with a pinch of sugar, salt and pepper. I melt real butter in a small heavy fry pan until the butter foams and starts to brown, then I add the egg and cream mixture. I wait a minute before touching the mixture. I slowly pull away from one side the mixture and watch the liquid replace the solid fluffy curds. I repeat this slowly until most of the mixture has has formed soft shiny curds. I removed the pan from the heat and scoop the scrambled eggs onto freshly toasted bread. If you like you can garnish with parsley and if it feels right a little freshly grated cheese (Mersey Valley or Coon) can be added.
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Avocado and tomato on toasted light rye sourdough bread
Avocados have been expensive lately. It’s been a while but I wanted some so I bought a Hass avocado for $2. This makes a great lunch.
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Fruit and the Magic Bullet®
I have been enjoying the warm days and there’s nothing more refreshing than crushing some ice with mint, adding a little fruit and some cordial. These are the fruits I used today.
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Mango coleslaw with a little salmon and a crushed ice minted lemon lime and bitters
This is the last coleslaw I make for a week. I think all my Instagram followers are happy not to see any more red cabbage spam
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The start of my journey in the Qantas Business Lounge at CBR
Even though I made myself a caramel coffee banana smoothie for breakfast, it’s hard to pass up some yoghurt while in the lounge along with a nicely made flat white.
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The snack served on QF704
This biscuit was a little too sweet. I should have chosen water instead of juice. Too much sugar at the start of a long day.
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An awful cup of coffee at The Terrace near the check-in aisles at SYD (T1)
This was disgusting. Too milky and the coffee wasn’t strong enough. It was also tepid rather than the right temperature for frothing milk.
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After checking in I made it to the code share lounge for United Airlines, viz., the Koruclub which belongs to Air New Zealand
The Koruclub is well appointed and always has fresh supplies. It’s not in the same class as the Qantas lounges, but with the best fare of the day policy, I cannot complain. I am grateful that I get to travel for work and work with international colleagues.
They also have a hot dog stand.
This is a chilli dog with onions and cheese. I really should stop this senseless eating.
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So the flight to San Francisco was delayed by about an hour which in my mind at the time made my connection with Dulles just that little more tight than what it already was.
This is the view from my seat. I was facing backwards.
It’s nice to see the engines intact
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This is the menu for the main meal. The question was steak or salmon. Given the amount of salmon I’ve eaten lately I chose steak.
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To start we always get some nuts, usually almonds and peanuts that have been warmed up. That’s always a nice touch. The entrée was a nice salad plus some smoked salmon so I wasn’t missing out on salmon altogether.
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The fillet mignon was okay. The flavour was pleasant but the meat had been cooked too long for my liking and it was a little dry. The mashed potato was okay with it plus the little fried onions as part of the gravy.
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What I like about United Airlines is the dessert is always a sundae of some sort. For some reason the flight from Sydney didn’t have much choice. There was either strawberry or chocolate sauce. I chose strawberry.
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I spent most of the flight reading for this meeting but I did watch one movie, viz., The Expendables 2. A great action flick with the classic modern day action actors.
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For breakfast rather than the poached eggs I went for the deli plate. The plate consisted of ham, cheese and some smoked salmon. The passenger next to me chose the eggs and the yolks looked like yellow squash balls. I’ve had poached eggs on many airlines and it’s uncommon for them to serve the yolk soft let alone runny.
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Scenes coming into San Francisco.
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On getting into San Francisco International Airport (SFO), I had a mad dash to get my connection, UA525 to Washington DC Dulles (IAD). The lines at Customs and Border Protection were really long, fortunately as a government employee I carry an Official Passport and along with a Visa and the correct forms I don’t need to spend time with finger prints and photographs. The usual questions are usually asking about the meeting I’m attending and that’s it. I picked up my checked-in bag and moved quickly to the domestic terminal area to drop off my bag and dash to the departure gates. About half the time I travel to North America the airline or connecting airport (usually LAX) doesn’t get my bag on my flight so I have to wait another day for it. That means I attend a meeting in crushed clothes I’ve carried as carry-on luggage.
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On UA525 to Dulles we had a choice of cannelloni or chicken caciatori. I chose the chicken because I didn’t want the pasta and the cheese. I should have had the pasta and cheese. It looked very appetising while the chicken didn’t and it tasted blergh. It was a breast and it was dry.
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That said United Airlines made up for the main course failure with a nice ice cream sundae. I had vanilla bean ice cream with caramel sauce, nuts, glacé cherries and whipped cream.
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I got to Dulles at about 2200 and waited for the shuttle to the National Conference Center in Leesburg. The bus arrived and started to back up and despite the bus behind it honking its horn and flashing its headlights the bus driver didn’t stop and connected with the bus behind causing some minor damage. This little bingle caused a 45 minute delay so I didn’t check into the National Conference Center until after 2300.
It didn’t take long to get to sleep. I ended up sleeping 5 hours without my CPAP machine which is pretty good. I still felt a little tired.
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The Center has a good dining room. I had eggs prepared by an egg chef. I like fried eggs sunny side up.
The Center is pretty cool. The closest thing we have in Australia is the Australian Emergency Management Institute (AEMI). The NCC used to be owned by Xerox. It has accommodation for nearly 1000 guests and 250 meeting rooms. The better thing about the rooms compared to AEMI is that the en suite is private and not shared. The rooms are very small but there is enough room for a double bed and television. There is no refrigerator in the room but there is a drip filter coffee maker. The best thing is free high speed broadband in each room and free high speed wifi across the entire site.
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The same dining room is used for lunch. I had snapper, beef and pumpkin.
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The snack machine options were mostly these very sweet granola bars.
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For dinner we went to the Black Olive Sports Bar. We ordered a few pizzas. I tried pepperoni and a super deeper deluxe.
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Okay that’s enough for this post. I’ll continue blogging about my travels in another post when I get back to Australia. Catch you later.
Gaz
It’s finally starting to feel like Summer. Yesterday and today we had maximum temperatures >30 °C. It’s just a pity it was so dry. The weather would be perfect if we had more humidity and some rain.
After a breakfast of scrambled eggs I spent today Spring cleaning for a rental inspection this week. I used my new Magic Bullet to prepare the eggs with a little cream. I served it on quinoa and flaxseed toast. I really needed a good mug of coffee after another poor sleep.
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This evening I enjoyed an almost tropical meal of salmon with mango coleslaw. The coleslaw has red cabbage, red onions, carrot, coriander, mint and parsley.
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This afternoon I received a visit from a friendly magpie.
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This morning while walking I captured an image of the trees down Benjamin Way. Using Diptic I posted to Instagram a comparison of the Winter and Spring images. Canberra truly has the best expression of seasons in Australia with true demarcation between each of the four seasons. While it is beautiful I miss the simplicity of the wet season, dry season and build up in Subequatorial Australia.
Last night (ACT election night) we went there with friends for a meal. All in all it was an okay night. The place is packed with tables and it was a little like being in a sardine can. The table we had had a chair combo with two seats being a lounge cushion thing and the other four seats stand alone units. It wasn’t great and our friends who ended up with the lounge cushion thing weren’t that happy. The place has two levels with the mezzanine being largely out of sight. Because of my deafness and tinnitus I like to sit with my good ear in the best position. That doesn’t always help if the place is noisy. This place is pretty noisy. Not their fault I know, but some sound baffling can help people with a hearing disability.
While I enjoyed my meal, one of our friends asked for the seafood risotto and it came with whole crab pieces rather than crab meat incorporated into the risotto. This made it pretty messy and unappetising. In addition, it didn’t taste too good. Bron and I both noticed the snapper a couple of friends asked for smelt pretty fishy which is something that would put us off asking for it.
Onto the good things. I had an entrée of lamb sausages which were delightfully spicy. I could eat much more of these sausages. The serving size was pretty good for an entrée. I also had a fillet steak cooked rare on a bed of mash. For $36 I expected some greens too. Oh well, not a big deal. The steak was well cooked and very enjoyable. If I compared it to Tommy’s Bistro from last week though, I’d go for Tommy’s. I finished off with the Crème brûlée which contained white chocolate and raspberries. It was pretty good.
Taze lamb sausages
Taze fillet steak [rare]
Taze white chocolate and raspberry Crème brûlée
We had a good night out. Civic is the place to be on a Saturday night if you’re young and want a good time. With Spring developing everyone seemed to be wearing suitable bright coloured clothes and revealing a heap of pale skin.
On paying the bill, the manager removed the price of the risotto which was very nice of him and for me would be a positive to come back and try some different dishes from the menu.
I really don’t like saying good bye to work mates. This week we had a farewell and the person brought in home made vanilla slice as a thank you to everyone.
A heap of Vanilla slices
Made with Lattice biscuits
My work mate also shared the recipe her Mum gave her. I guess it may have been a Women’s Weekly type receipe. I know my Mum used to use lattice biscuits too to make Vanilla slice when we were kids.
600 mL thickened cream
100 g packet of instant vanilla pudding mix
¼ cup icing sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
1½ packet lattice biscuits
Mix together with a beater for 3 to 4 minutes until thick. Spread between biscuits and then refrigerate overnight.
After eating my farewell Vanilla slice I ate lunch which was a Cinnabon that Bron had made.
I then went to the dentist for a an appointment I made two weeks ago. It’s a good thing I had a tooth brush at work.
Bron has a plan! We have some dear friends who were regularly eat dinner with; most often we go to their place and we have a fantastic time. Bron is keen to have our friends over to her place for dinner.
As a follower and reader of David Lebovitz’s blog and cook books, Bron is going to cook Chicken mole.
I’ve eaten chicken mole in Mexico City while there for a meeting. My recollection is that it was enjoyable but nothing I’d want to make myself.
On Friday night I was Bron’s guinea pig for her second go at cooking Chicken mole. She’d previously cooked it for her sons.
Okay, this was magnificent. The chicken drumsticks had been skinned and then pan fried and then immersed in a casserole. The result was incredible taste and tenderness. The mole sauce was amazing with the ancho dried chilies adding so much flavour yet no heat. I’m embarrassed to say that I grabbed more corn chips, corn and sauce and when the chicken was finished I used the sauce and corn like a dip and consumed a heap of corn chips. It. Was. Amazing!!!
In yesterday’s post I wrote about buying a Reed avocado for the first time. After a day of ripening with a banana I tried my first Reed avocado. When I picked it up it was still firm to hard. As I sliced through to the seed it didn’t feel green and felt like a just ripe avocado should. On cracking it open though the flesh is very light and creamy. There was also a milky substance which oozed between the skin and flesh. I had been warned of this by Instagram and Twitter friends.
The avocado accompanied a piece of skinless chicken thigh which had been in a moderate oven for forty minutes, a cob of sweet corn which had been oven cooked with the chicken too. The chicken sat on a bed of mashed potato which I had prepared through a ricer and had a little light cream and olive oil spread added.
Chicken with Reed avocado | I like my potato ‘mashed’ with a ricer, that said, I like it having a slightly rustic and rough look.
Chicken with Reed avocado | The avocado looks like it isn’t ripe, yet it is soft and creamy. I was so happy it wasn’t stringy which is what I really feared.
The flesh was soft and creamy, it didn’t have a strong flavour of avocado so this may suit some people who don’t like a strong flavour. It wasn’t stringy which was a big plus for me. The flesh itself tasted nice with the corn and potato.
I have another Reed avocado which I will use tomorrow night. We’ll see how that goes. At the moment, the Hass avocado remains the variety of choice for me.
It’s been a little while since our last outing to Lemon Grass at Woden. We love the food, especially number 39 on the menu GANG PANANG (Creamy red curry (chicken or beef) with crushed peanuts and kaffir leaves topped with crispy egg noodles). We wanted to give them another go. We were patient and as clear as possible when speaking. Yet we waited and waited and at the end when we wanted to ask for dessert, the wait staff cleared empty tables rather than tables with customers. They main problem with this restaurant is the ratio of wait staff to customers. On a large floor with seating for more than a hundred or so customers there are three wait staff. They’re friendly enough but I’m not sure what food service training they’ve received.
We started with entrée and around us we had fish cakes, curry puffs and pork patties. These were not that good, they were tasty but not really anything special.
Pork patties (iPhone)
I then had the beef red curry (Number 39).
Beef red curry (iPhone)
One of our party noticed you couldn’t get a 69 at this restaurant. Mind you, you can’t get a 63 or a 64 either
We all wanted something sweet and were prepared to stay and order dessert here. Lots of other tables had been vacated and dirty plates were stacked on each. We had dirty plates on our table and were clearly wanting to stay. The wait staff avoided our attention seeking behaviour and proceeded to clear the other tables. In the end, we went to the front desk, obtained the bill, sorted out the money and left.
