Short and Sweet: Our 4 Year Wedding Anniversary

As I mentioned in my previous post, Paul and I got thoroughly spoiled by Audi Australia again! This day happened to fall on the week of our wedding anniversary. Every now and again I'll get an email from Audi Lifestyle Experience for an upcoming event. Last year we got to dine at Matt Moran's Chiswick (you can read about that here). This year we got an entire morning with Matt Moran! Because limited places are available for these events, I always try to reply to the e-mail and RSVP straight away. Best of all, it's completely FREE! Apologies in advance for the bad quality photos taken with my phone.

We spent the night before at the Four Seasons Hotel. We absolutely love staying here for its comfort and luxury, and because it happens to be Canadian in origin it's Paul's favourite. But I absolutely love it for the stunning views. This was taken at about 7AM.

After a delicious coffee prepared by our church friend who works at Mecca Espresso (across the road from the Four Seasons, in Circular Quay), we waited for our driver for the day to pick us up. Yes, Audi even gave us a free driver to take us around in an Audi A8 - which meant no worrying about our blood alcohol concentration :)

Matt Moran (right) with the owner of Sonoma Bakery

Our first stop was Sonoma Bakery in Alexandria - the bread supplier to Matt Moran's Aria restaurant. We had flaky golden croissants, pains au chocolat and Danishes with Sonoma's own coffee. We discovered that Sonoma doesn't only do bread, they also create their own muesli and have recently started roasting their own coffee - amongst other products you can get here. Our group of about 20 people donned hairnets before getting a walking tour of the premises.

Sonoma had very humble beginnings - it all simply started in the 1990's with a jar of sourdough starter smuggled in a bag on a flight to Sydney from the Sonoma Valley in California. We got to meet the starter - still surviving today in large vats, we observed dozens of workers pounding, folding and shaping dough and also marvelled at the cutting edge facilities - from flour storage in warehouse-height silos imported from Canada, to the temperature and humidity controlled rooms for proofing dough.

My hubby Paul with Matt Moran in the 0 degrees celcius room

Our next stop was at the seafood supplier to Aria, Cleanfish Australia in Botany. We were told about their fishing methods and shown a few different fish they had caught that morning. As it was a chilly winter's day, no one stayed in for too long - especially when they allowed us to tour the 0 degree C room! Matt Moran agreed with Paul that Canadian Sea Scallops were the best in the world. You may remember that dish from my 28th birthday here.

Suet coating on the ageing meat

Matt Moran with Vic's son, at Vic's Meat

We then hopped over to Mascot to visit Matt Moran's butcher, Vic's Meat. Here they talked about the ageing process of meat before it is sold. The meats are hung in a temperature and humidity controlled room to "age" for several days to weeks - in this process a lot of moisture is drawn out of the meat, giving it an old, crusty appearance on the outside and encasing the tender, extremely flavoursome meat inside to be cut out. Vic's Meat is currently experimenting with ageing beef for 150 days and they claim to be the first in the world to try it.

We finished our visit with a tour of their storage room (another cold room people didn't hang in for too long) filled with stock ready to be shipped. Matt Moran was snooping around at what the "competition" was ordering - this included restaurants such as Neil Perry's Rockpool, Peter Gilmore's Quay and Peter Doyle's Est.

The hired drivers were ready as always to drive us to our final location, Matt Moran's restaurant, Aria in Circular Quay. We were given a set menu to choose an entree, main and dessert from, and the wine flowed!