twoninenine & ever after: trial dinner recap

On Wednesday, 1st of August, the future hubby and I had our trial dinner at the Sebel! We took along my parents, my brother and his wife, and my MOH, Annie.

The night started with canapes and house drinks at 6:30pm, in the bar area where our guests will spend their time between the ceremony and the reception. There's a lot of couches and coffee tables in the bar area, as well as a pool table room (which I also believe has a dart board?) and a couple of TVs. Silly me, I didn't take any pictures in this area at all, including of the canapes [bad blogger]. I was too busy enjoying the atmosphere and chatting. Mind you, I was already getting stares from the other families at dinner so maybe it's a good thing...

The canapes we tried were wonderful. While we didn't get to select the canapes to try on the night, it was Chef's choice, he had ended up picking 2 (out of the 4 we tried) that we had chosen for our wedding day. And one of those 2 was everyone's favourite of the night, so that was fantastic! The other 2 that we tried were very yummy, but we've decided to stick with our original selections. Based on our experience of the night, no matter what we choose - they will all be delicious!

After trying our canapes and house drinks, we moved into the restaurant where they had sectioned off a room just for those involved in the trial dinners. Here, we had gorgeous little menu plaques (as displayed above) showing what we had ordered for the night, and we got to sample wine and beer from our specific packages.

During the dinner I managed to get photos of what myself and future mister ate, but I thought it would be strange if I went around taking photos of my families meals. Since we decided on my Mum's entree though, I kind of wish I'd snapped hers! But my SIL is like me, and took photos of her food so I "borrowed" her pictures and have included them for your viewing pleasure as well!

First up, Entrees!

Cajun Spiced Chicken Tenderloins - the entree
myself and my father tried. Very yummy spin
on the traditional Caesar Salad!

Future Mister and MOH tried the Roasted Pumpkin
Soup with seared scallops and chive cream

SIL Justyna tried the Spinach Ricotta and Pine Nut
Ravioli

My! Those entrees were big! I would have had mine as a main. I think my brother's was the smallest, the Rare Roasted Beef. Justyna's entree was the vegetarian option, which any of our guests who are vegetarian will receive. My Mum's was the Caramelised Onion and Beef Ravioli, which we have settled on as our second entree (with the Cajun Spiced Chicken Tenderloins as our first) and is also a large serving!

Second Course, Mains!


Slow Cooked Lamp Rump with crushed garlic and rosemary potato and ratatouille

I didn't get to get a picture of the future hubs meal here because he already started to inhale it! He had the Prosciutto Wrapped Chicken Supreme with cream cheese and spinach risotto, buttered green beans and thyme jus

SIL's meal - Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb

Wow. Mains are HARD. There are so many options on the menu that the future hubs and I would love to enjoy, but we know won't be terrible popular with guests. Both my Dad and brother had the Pan Fried Barramundi as mains, and to be honest both the future mister and I love Salmon, but we vetoed fish options as we know way too many people who won't eat it. And there were a lot of seafood options on the menu. We decided a traditional "meat and chicken" option was safest but there were only 2 chicken options available, one being Tandoori Chicken - which we thought was too specific for tastebuds for a wedding choice. So the future hub's option it is! He really enjoyed the Prosciutto Wrapped Chicken, but wasn't too keen on the risotto that came with it. Given it's our only chicken option however, I think we are going to stick with it. I had some and didn't mind it, I think the future hubs isn't used to such subtle flavour though - he likes his food full of flavour!

We also quickly vetoed Juz's lamb racks, as delicious as they seemed - too messy for wedding guests in pretty dresses. Mum had the Char Grilled Veal Cutlet, which she said was delicious, and MOH has the Char Grilled Scotch Fillet with shiraz jus, which she said was nice as well. I thoroughly enjoyed my lamb rump and the crushed potato was to DIE for. As in, I've been craving it since we had it. The ratatouille was nice, I could take it or leave it, but give that the lamb and potato were so delicious and filling, the ratatouille is more of a side thing that people can eat if they like it or choose to leave if they don't. So we're still tossing up on the mains but overall, the quality of food was delicious - it's more a matter of deciding what is more likely to be popular with our guests.

Last but not least, Dessert!

The Future Mister's Dessert - Chocolate and
Walnut Brownie with white Belgian chocolate
ganache

SIL's Dessert - Tiramisu with kahlua anglaise and
almond biscotti

Mum and the Brother's Dessert - White and Dark
Chocolate Teardrop Mousse...how gorgeous is this
plating?!?!

So, Dad and I had originally ordered Creme Brulee for dessert, however the Chef apparently wasn't happy with the quality of the creme brulee that night so didn't send it out. Instead, he came out and apologised and sent out two more orders of the teardrop mousse. As disappointed as we were not to get to try to creme brulee, we were both impressed that a) he refused to send out subpar food that he wasn't happy with and b) with the impressive presentation of the dessert we did receive! How pretty is it?? If I wasn't SUCH a creme brulee lover (see this post) I would be tempted to have this dessert just for it's pretty factor. In fact, I'm still tempted. Hehe. All of the desserts were AMAZING. The only one not pictured was MOH Annie's Sticky Date Pudding, which came served with the most MOUTHWATERING cinnamon ice cream. Nom nom nom...They should do a serving platter of all of them!

All in all it was a great night. We enjoyed good food, good company...