A royal lunch in our test kitchen

There are many things that make spending time at Yuppiechef HQ good for a person, like the ping pong table, being able to amble through row upon row of the world’s best kitchen tools, felt shrews, happy people, Rubix cubes, coloured pencil crayons… But the lunch we had today in our new kitchen? A new league of goodness.

Once upon a spatula, Shane (one of our big cheeses) spoke of a day we’d sit down in a kitchen of our own to eat a hearty lunch followed by pudding, together. It’s hard not to feel really lucky to be living in those days (yebo) and to welcome chef and food stylist, Jenna Viney, to our growing team.

Jenna has spent numerous seasons over the past few years in the Antarctic serving tourists five star food under rather hairy conditions (ask her about the snow storm). We’re all very happy to have lured her to warmer pastures and this morning, as we minded our own business and tapped away at shiny keys, Jenna got busy in the kitchen.

Noel and Sigrid were pulled in mid-morning to assist with the pudding making and to learn how to make two decadent tarts.

When one o’clock came, we trouped upstairs and were met with a mighty spread, fit for kings and queens but magically, all for us.

Fig, Gorgonzola and brittle salad; mustard crusted fillet; pesto, pine nut and asparagus pasta and smokey paprika soup with fresh bread, very nice.

Death by lunch? Almost, but pudding looked so good we had to stay alive and tucked into slices of warm pear and almond tart and a rich-beyond-belief Fererro Rocher creation.

With the gentle click of back-to-back ping pong challenges humming in the background, we chilled out and discussed Louise’s broken arm (she had a kite surfing accident), the most recent escapades of The Yuppiechef Cycling Society® and whether or not the whole team will get taken out by flu this year, or not.

Good times? Yes they are. The recipes for our lunch spread will be up on Spatula in the next few weeks, so keep an eye out. Bye for now.