What could be better than spending a beautiful weekend at The Rocks enjoying a delicious high tea with friends and family?

One of my favourite high tea places of all time is situated right in the heart of The Rocks just next to The Rocks Weekend Market which is pleasantly enjoyable to walk through and immerse yourself in all the wonderful exotic stores.

When walking past the row of shops parallel to the weekend markets, you will see an inconspicuous shop house The Irish Design Shop with a sign saying "Freshly Baked Scones", if you love scones, this is the perfect place for you to go to and have a delectable afternoon tea.

When you walk into the shophouse, you would immediately feel like you're walking into a homely and warm little cafe with little teapots lined up by the sides of the staircase. The front of the shophouse is a small Irish store that sells traditional Irish gifts, tea sets and celtic jewellery.

The Tea Cosy is all the way at the back of the shophouse where it is beautifully decorated with a very traditional Irish feel and lovely little accessories.


I absolutely love their decor! It makes me feel like I'm in a totally different place altogether! Don't you think?



The thing about The Tea Cosy is that it only sells scones and that's that! So it makes it so much easier to decide what to eat! They have a fairly wide choice of tea to choose from to pair it with the scones.

The great thing about The Tea Cosy is that they change the scones selection every month so you will never get bored with the selection! The last time I visited The Tea Cosy, the scones were Apple Strudel, Plain, Cheese and Onion, Date and Apricot.

The scones for the month of October are plain, spinach and feta, currants and white chocolate berry!

This is the tasting basket for 2, it has 4 scones, 2 jam selections. The tea comes seperately

I absolutely adore their scones! Their scones are piping hot and huge, it is very moist on the inside while slightly crumbly on the outside. The best thing about their scones is that it is baked fresh in the morning and afternoon so you won't have to worry about eating old and overnight scones! I love their teapots too! All of the teapots come with their own little tea cosy and every one is hand knitted and all different and its so cute!

The tasting basket for 2 which we ordered comes with 2 selections of jam, if I remembered it correctly, we ordered raspberry jam and triple berry jam which is my favourite jam from the teahouse! The clotted cream is really smooth, light and fluffy and we could not stop spreading generous portions of cream on our scones! I heard from the waitress there that they make their own jam and cream which makes the scones even more delectable.

You could also order a scone set instead of a tasting basket! The scones set comes with 2 scones, a jam and a clotted cream along with tea of your choice for only $9.50!

The outdoor area is really small but really pretty and simple, looking out of the window from the cafe makes my mood perk up immediately. It is really different from all the other cafes I have been to and I feel that you should defintely visit this place at least once!

My family absolutely loves their scones and on one occassion I wanted to take their scones away and the scones were priced at $1.50 per scone which is really much more affordable than I expected!

Delicious and fresh scones at such affordable prices and with such a homely and comfortable ambience, what more can you ask for?

FYI: The Tea Cosy is only open on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays while The Irish Design Shop is open on all days.

The shop has vibrant posters all around, they are absolutely gorgeous!

The Tea Cosy

Address:
33 George Street,
The Rocks, Sydney,
Australia 2000

Opening Hours:

Fri:	10:00 am	-	4:00 pm
Sat - Sun:	10:00 am	-	5:00 pm

Telephone: 02 92473233

Website: http://www.irishdesign.com.au/g/4145/the-tea-cosy---tea-room.html

Or you could visit their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Tea-Cosy/178079518915595


Hope you guys have a great weekend!

Bain taitneamh as do bhéil!

Foodling 3

Okay so these two recipes also work for afternoon tea, but if you make them for breakfast you can enjoy the leftoevers in the afternoon:)


Happy cooking!
Foodling 2

The way my family and I eat is pretty interesting, we eat according to craves. Yes thats right, cravings. It's just like when all of a sudden you have a sudden craving for pie, you can't seem to stop thinking about them, so why not just make it!

Just last week, I was having a sudden urge to have pie so I went to the all famous MasterChef website and pulled out what seemed to be the easiest and most doable pie recipe there which is their Beef and Potato Pie and I really really enjoyed it!

So I was savouring it with mum the other day and she said she had a similar recipe but she prefers her's way more (obviously!) and true enough, I really like her Pork Mince & Potato Pie more! Maybe because it has mum's magical touch! And it's really quick and easy!
Let's get to it then!

The ingredients listed here make a delicious pie good for 4 people

Minced Pork & Potato Pie
Ingredients:
4 Medium Sized Golden Delight Potatos (or whichever potatoes you prefer or are available)
1 Carrot - Diced
1 French Shallot Onion
250-300g Pork Mince
2 Cloves of Garlic 
2 Tablespoons of Oil
3-5 Mushrooms
1 Tablespoon Cornflour
3-4 Tablespoons of Butter 
1/4-1/2 Cup of Milk
3 Hard-boiled Eggs
2 Tablespoons Soy Sauce
3/4 Cup Grated Cheese

Procedure:
1. Skin the potatos and dice one of the potatoes into small cubes, boil in water until soft. Drain and set aside.

2. Cut the other 3 potatoes up and boil seperately until soft. Drain and set aside.

3. Marinate the minced pork with soy sauce along with 1/4 teaspoon of salt and 1/2 teaspoon of sugar with a dash of pepper
Cooking Tip: When marinating meat, the sugar quantity should always be double the quantity of salt! 

4. Chop the garlic and shallots into fine pieces and heat the oil in a saucepan
Health Tip: You can substitute your daily oil with olive oil for a healthier pie!
 
5. Once the oil is heated, stir fry the shallots until golden brown and add the minced garlic.

6. When slightly browned, put in the minced pork and stir fry the pork till evenly cooked. Add carrots, chopped mushrooms and diced potatos. Add a little bit of water if minced pork filling is dry. 


7. Add salt, sugar and pepper according to your taste.

8. In a small bowl, add the cornflour to 3 tablespoons of room-temperature water. Mix well.


9. Add the cornflour mixture to the filling at small intervals until the sauce starts to thicken. Set filling aside.

10. Preheat oven to 180 Degrees fan forced mode


11. In a seperate saucepan, mash the remaining 3 potatos evenly and add in the butter. Mix well and add milk at slow intervals till you feel that the mash potato is creamy enough.  Add salt, sugar and pepper according to your taste.

12. In a casserole, spread a thin layer mash potato on the bottom and scoop the minced pork filling onto the mash potato base.


13. Slice the 3 eggs and put them on top of the filling and cover it up with the remaining mash potato.


14. Spread the grated cheese on top of the pie and bake it in the oven for 10 minutes, turning the oven to grill mode for 5 minutes after that.


15. Take out from the oven, serve and enjoy!


 
I know there may be quite a number of steps but it's really fast and easy to prepare! Mum and I were making this pie this morning and I couldn't wait to blog about it! It takes less than an hour to make, so I really hope you guys could try it out one day!

Feel free to comment if you have any queries!


Have a great weekend everyone!

Foodling 3

Being a novice foodling my adventures in the kitchen have been somewhat mixed.


2 tablespoons of finely chopped fresh 'chives'



Now as you can imagine cinnamon didn't really cut it as a substitute, one being a herb and one being a spice.

Cinnamon

Chives

FOOD TIP 2: Never replace cinnamon for chives..... :)


I hope your enjoyed this story as much as my family likes to tell it!

Hope these tips help!
Foodling 4