Duck and Waffle

Last week, after becoming an official Law graduate, me and my family zoomed up to Duck and Waffle for arguably the best meal of our lives. 

Shooting up in the glass elevator to the 40th floor, it felt like we were ascending to heaven. And we were.

We sat for a few unique cocktails in the bar because we were early - make sure you book - they had no available extra tables at 2pm on a Monday!
The views were incredible. 



^ me and my truffle cocktail... I love truffle a LOT but drinking it was quite odd!

Then we were shown into the restaurant where we went crazy ordering all of the abstract sounding food...

Ox Cheek doughnut - meaty and sugary in one, me and Dima loved it but my parents not so much.

Fois Gras Creme Brulee - a literal creme brulee with lobster chunks on brioche toast. A bit rich for non-fois gras lovers.

And the money shot..

The famous duck and waffle. We ordered three for six people, and it was more than enough - at £17 each it should be! It was the most amazing thing I have ever eaten - a perfect waffle topped with a tender ducks leg, duck egg (which interestingly holds your entire cholesterol limit for the day) and honey mustard sauce. Heaven.


We also got from the 'big plates' the potato gratin (above) which was lovely but we were all too full to find room for it, and the home made gnocchi which was fabulous. I didn't manage to capture a good picture of it though because everyone was too busy digging in!
We also had incredible oysters, and the special of the day which was home made bread with goats cheese and honey. The bread was one of the best things I ate - definitely a must have!

Phew! Are you sick of all that food porn? Now it's time for... dessert!

I had the macaroon sandwich  - huge pistachio macaroons holding a chubby chocolate mousse - wonderfully decadent.

My dad had the Baked Alaska (conjure images of Ben & Jerrys..) which was incredible.

Dima went for tiramisu, his favourite which was beautiful

We then rolled back into the elevator, three hours later stuffed to the brim with rich, wonderful food. An amazing experience but maybe a once-a-year type thing, for the bank account and waist line! We pottered around for a couple of hours then went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory musical which was absolutely amazing.

Graduation!

So this week I officially reached the end of my three year law degree and had my graduation! I can't believe that after all of the stressful 400 pages reading a week, ten hour revision days and still managing to have never fully read a case I managed to get a high 2.1 and finish it completely!


It was really odd seeing everyone for (probably) the last time, dressed up in their robes! And to be able to celebrate with my best friends :)

And parents..


And boyfriend..


Who had the job of photographer for the ceremony! The ceremony itself was very lavish and posh, with a few of our lecturers sitting on the stage watching as our names were called and we shook hands with the headmaster and head of law at Queen Mary University. I didn't fall!


It has truly been the best three years of my life at Uni, and I've learnt so much more than law. I've learnt how to balance things - modeling and law is not easy! - that I can't leave all my reading to the last month (first year drama), made the best friends I will ever have and had amazing experiences with those I was lucky enough to have met before uni as well! Living in London has been incredible, it was definitely the place for me to grow, and I'm so proud that I didn't get killed living in east London :)

I have no idea what the future holds other than modeling at the moment, but it's quite exciting not knowing what will happen! Goodbye my university years, hello real world!

Date Day

For our fake-kissiversary (I see our anniversary as when we first kissed, Dima doesn't - so we get two!) me and Dima had a marathon date day. 

We started off for lunch in the most amazing place I have ever eaten - Barrafina - which deserves its own separate post, and made our way around London.

Dima felt like a second dessert, Asian style so we first stopped at Candy Cafe in Chinatown for some unusual treats. 

Dima very happy with his mango shaved ice and bubble tea!

^ What I can only really describe as a cold sugar explosion..

Whilst I settled for stealing his treats whilst sipping demurely on my white coffee - I have loved this coffee since Steph gave me a couple of packs on it and it's quite sad to go back to plain coffee :( 

We then strolled around Chinatown and came across a seemingly ordinary convenience store... but I spotted the birthday cake flavoured oreos in the window. 

It was a magical shop. 

THESE ARE INCREDIBLE. 

AS ARE THESE. The caps are out. 

Filled with mini pretzels, 'shortbread cookie' which is more like a mini shortbread, almonds and peanut m&ms, these made the perfect energising snack to run around London on. I demand all American treats come to London immediately! 

We were on a search for a board game (I love them and for once Dima was in the mood!) and ended up in the most crazy fan shop ever. Filled with comics and tv show memorabilia, it was quite surreal (Game of Thrones pendant for £100 anyone?!) but also quite (ssh) fun.  

It was quite freakily centred on Adventure Time, which may or may not be one of the weirdest cartoons you will ever see. 

We then pretty randomly ended up at the British Museum, which neither of us had ever been to before! It was beautiful, and huge. 

Then obviously it was time for ice cream. We stopped off at Selfriges, where there is a Magnum pop up where you can MAKE YOUR OWN magnum. Magnum is one of my favouritest ice creams in the woooorld so this made me very happy, even though I wasn't allowed one for myself because of the sugar highs and lows I had been on already that day. 

You pick your own topping - we went for coconut, sea salt and bits of gold but they had a huge range including goji berries, brownies, silver balls, honeycomb, mint pieces, edible flowers.. You choose three and they get a mini cocktail shakeabout to mix things up a bit. 

The next step is choosing which kind of ice cream  you want, Dima went for vanilla (why anyone would go for vanilla over caramel or chocolate is simply beyond my comprehension) and then choose the outer chocolate layer - white, normal or dark. Dima went for normal. If I had had it my way it would have been a chocolate on chocolate on chocolate magnum! 

The result was aaaaaaaaaaamazing. The best magnum I have ever had. I helped Dima finish his off, good girlfriend award :') 

Looking back I can't believe how much we managed to do in one day, and I haven't even told you about the main event yet... Barrafina's godliness. It was a fab day with a fab boy :) 

Summer nights

Haven't we been so lucky with the English weather lately - everyday has been up to 20 degrees and the sun has (mostly) been shining! I love summer evenings when it stays light until 10pm and everyone in London is smiling for once (above ground that is, the tubes can become pretty awful in the heat) - they call for BBQs! 

I found myself a handsome fellow and a working BBQ in his garden he wasn't aware of, and we set to cooking a feast!

I was on Pimms duty... I make it half lemonade, half pimms and a splash of elderflower - works brilliantly! ;)

This BBQ in particular ended with us all toasting marshmallows (or setting them on fire and blowing it out quickly) and stuffing them between two lebinz chocolate biscuits - perfectiooooon. 

We also had a baking afternoon, I made The Londoner's irish soda bread which is amazing and ridiculously easy to make..

but very difficult to not eat all in one go!

...it's healthy right??

Whilst Dima relived his past travel adventures and cooked Thai Pancakes which was a very laborious process, but oh so worth it. After making the dough, letting it set for half an hour, rolling out many extremely skinny pancake bases and cooking them quickly, you are 'supposed' to have them with condensed milk, banana and egg but I found that nutella, marshmallows and banana works much better. Nutella>everything. 

Here are a few other random snaps from the past week...

Sheltering from the summer showers!

Hippy hair at Asos - if only I could recreate this at home! 

Very cool flowers found in Mile End

Jelly shoes - so excited to wear these in Croatia! 

What have you been up to this Summer? xx