VIDEO: My Weekend as the Wellington on a Plate Social Media Reporter

Watch my vlog of the whole above and read the blog post below for all the spicy bits about my Wellington on a Plate Weekend

[NB: This video has had issues with how it was displaying - these have now been fixed]

Earlier this year I shared that I had entered and won a competition that put me in the driver's seat of the Wellington on a Plate Social Media Accounts for a whole weekend during the festival. This weekend just gone was that weekend.

This weekend I was privileged enough to have the opportunity to be the Visa Wellington On a Plate social media reporter for the weekend. Yes, that meant that Welly On a Plate were handing all their social media accounts – Twitter, Instagram and Facebook – over to me. The opportunity came about due to an exciting competition that was part of the VWOAP Festival which I entered not long after the launch in June. I run a blog about Wellington (theresidents.co.nz) so I thought I might have some of the skills that were required for this job – and let’s be honest – I was really excited about eating lots and lots of food.

When I found out I’d won, I was stoked – and my boyfriend, Matt even more so. Fast forward to the 19th of August, I began my weekend of eating by heading down to Gelissimo for their Festival Event,Five Flavours of Fun. There we tried 5 flavours of ice cream – I chose the local artisan collaborations, with brands like Libertine Teas and Lot 8 Olive oil adding their flavours to ice cream. Matt chose the Kiwi Dinner flavoured variety – with roast chicken, peas, carrots, beetroot and hokey pokey ice-cream flavours no less.

Around 5, we drove down the road to the Bolton Hotel, where we would be staying for the weekend. Staying in a hotel was hands down one of my favourite things about the weekend because Matt and I hadn’t ever actually done so since we’d been dating. After arriving and getting changed, we headed on down to the Nam D Pop Up Hawker Stall to try some amazing fragrant Vietnamese Food. This was Matt’s pick of the three days of eating. After, we walked to Fork and Brewer where we enjoyed their Dine Wellington Menu – I ordered the Fish Cakes and Matt ordered chicken. We had a beer, a wine, and then the hugest slab of chocolate cake I’ve ever seen! We finished up our day at The Library bar where we tried some incredible cocktails – the Clouds Over Wellington one was particularly memorable with spicy chilli blowing our minds and our mouths.

The next day we ambled downstairs at the Bolton for breakfast before heading out to L’Affare’s newly opened roastery in Mount Cook. There we were treated to some fab single origin coffee and sweet french pastry by French Can Can. We then went and ate a burger at The Lido cafe & bar and tried one of the Garage Project Festival brews, Lola.

After a quick pit-stop at my parents to visit their dog, we headed down to the Food Truck Rally at Odlins Plaza. I was especially excited to try The Lucky Taco who had driven down from Auckland and visit my all time fav – The Greek Food Truck.

But there was no rest for the now-incredibly-full-but-not-actually-wicked. We hot-footed it up to C.G.R Merchant on Courtenay Place to try their B.G.R by C.G.R Cocktail Wellington offer. We got our timetable a bit mixed up, so ended up at Match Wine Bar, an incredible Pop Up at Noble Rot (which had been re-scheduled for Sunday afternoon – but by this stage we were thinking – what the heck?!) drinking champagne and guzzling oysters. I’m not gonna lie – this was my favourite thing of the weekend, even though we were huddled into the corner of the bar. We tumbled into bed at the Bolton and quickly fell asleep.

The next morning, we went down to breakfast and I was very excited to discover that Annabel Langbein was also staying in out hotel (well – that’s actually hardly surprising) after she asked Matt where the plates were. We went back upstairs, got ready to go and I made my way to Plum on Cuba Street. The Dine menu at Plum was seriously good and one I would recommend to those who think of Plum as a cafe more than a restaurant. The next stop was the Good Bitches Baking #BakingitBetter mystery box judging at the St James where I observed the ‘Good Bitches’ scoring cakes and all sorts of entries. All the while I was Tweeting, Instagramming and Facebooking up a storm.

Finally, after going home briefly for some much needed R&R, Matt and I went to the Le Cordon Bleu cooking school for the first in the ‘Southern Soul Series’ – yes, at last I would see Annabel again! Annabel Langbein and Chef William Dissen, a Southern Chef, both cooked up a storm before our eyes, preparing a twist on Southern Cooking. It was very interesting to see two such acclaimed cooks/chef’s side by side. Their rapport was easy and their event was something I would definitely recommend – especially because we got to eat the dish at the end!

My weekend at the Festival as the social media reporter was amazing. I had such an incredible time getting to truly immerse myself in the VWOAP experience. It was also much more challenging that I had experienced, constantly having to be on social media. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed myself and everything I ate. Thank you to the Visa Welly On a Plate team for sending me on this incredible adventure!

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