For-Fork Sake: Urbanologi

Hello Lovely People of the Inter-web

Welcome to another blog post. Today is the first of my For-Fork Sake series. Where I share our experience with a new restaurant we tried. Leroy and I Love trying new places and new Foods. Leroy normally goes on the website Eat out, you can check it out here. And then we plan our next trip with that restaurant.

So, in today’s post I will be sharing Urbanologi:

It is in New Town of Johannesburg, they have won restaurant of the year a few times now and going there you can see why. When you walk in, it has this open rustic feel, you feel welcome and you can’t stop from looking all over the place.

The meal portions are small but o my goodness so flavourful. Leroy read up that you need to take a few dishes and we share that. So of course, that is what we did.

Firstly, we had Pickled Chokka Wings that was served with coriander pesto, orange puree and turnip spaghetti.

 I love Wings I have this thing of I would love to try as much wings from different restaurants as possible, and I thought this was those kinds of wings but when the waiter told us it was raw our minds were a little bit worried.

When the dish came it looked so beautiful with the colours and how it was plated, having the first bite I was honestly so surprised it was so good. It was squid that was raw and pickled. Defiantly something you should add to your list when you go.

Then we had the Pork Dumpling that was served with a citrus broth and Asian vegetable salad in the broth.

I love dumplings and this one was out of this world that broth complimented it so much.

We then had the Crispy dropped black pepper pork belly that was served with tamarind dressing, butternut puree, cucumber and smoked peanuts.

I saw almost every table was getting this dish and I was hoping we somehow ordered it too, and thank Goodness, we did. This was by far my favourite dish and the dip sauce that comes with it was mouth-watering good. Just thinking of it now is making me hungry all over again. I would suggest you don’t get this dish to share 😊

We then had the Teriyaki poached sweet potatoes that was served with yoghurt & pilsner honeycomb.

 This dish was plated beautifully and tasted good, but from what we had this one was just a little bit to plain.

Yes, there is more, lastly for the main we had Spider Steak that was served with pickled shimeji mushrooms and okra salt.

The steak was perfect medium rare, it’s like that moment you just take a good steak off the braai and eat a bite and the mushrooms was so good with it.

For our dessert, we tried the Ginger Malva that was served with Lime leaf ice cream and popcorn soil.

That was good too, we were worried what they meant by the popcorn soil but relieved to see it was just bits of popcorn, although to my opinion it could do without the popcorn soil.

I would defiantly recommend this place to anyone who is willing to step out of their comfort zone and try new dishes. Don’t forget if you do plan on going to make a reservation you won’t be disappointed.

If you have any other suggestions for us please feel free to leave them in the comments below.

Till Next time.

Wedding Wednesday: Our Wedding Day

Hello Lovely People of the Inter-web

After nearly 2 years of planning our big day has finally come and sadly gone. Everyone tells you how fast it goes and I have been a backseat witness to that on my cousins wedding when I was fortunate enough to be a bridesmaid. But you have that tiny bit of hope that it will grace you on your day and slow down. Read that speed limit and stop for a second.  

Today I will share my first Wedding Wednesday post: Our Wedding. Just a bit of here and there. I will go more into detail of each section in other posts.

We got Married on the 18^th November 2017. We chose a little farm just outside our town Kriel. We fell in love with the chapel church look and with the space. Bonus points was that we could bring in a lot of our own things that we either made or specially bought for our big day.

My Bridesmaids, mother, the flower girls, ring bearer and myself all got ready in the honeymoon suite at the Windpomp accommodation in Kriel. It was a full house that day but so much fun.

The men Got ready at an aunt’s house. According to me they had it easier, less craziness. I mean Leroy Even got his nails taken care of.

Being a bride, I was a bit late to our wedding, but as my brother drove me, my father and my two bridesmaids to the wedding emotions were running high and my girls had to help my wipe without damaging my makeup the tiers that were starting to form. I think was the excitement of its finally happening kicking in. 

Walking down that Aisle I didn’t look at anyone because I knew if I saw someone crying that would be it for me and apparently me and my dad walked a bit too fast down the Aisle.

how precious is my mothers face in this picture, I love it.

So, a few minutes in and I start being so hot I can feel the sweat start to drip. (Side note I get hot so darn fast.) besides the fact that the woman marrying us was calling me Ilana and not Elena by the time I realized I was getting so hot that was the last thing on my mind. Then our pastor said that she won’t take too long as she can see the Bride is starting to get hot. Might I add that I have then been looking around to my bridesmaids and parents to turn the darn AC on. The ceremony was stopped so that the smallest man-made fan could be placed in front of me which did nothing. It was crazy.

Either way I survived and we were officially Mr and Mrs Swartz.

Once we got outside our guests threw us with confetti, we got two confetti bombs for my cousin and maid of honours fiancé to pop as soon as we get out. Of course, there would be some people that couldn’t get the streamer loose and they just threw the whole thing as is.

After we took pictures we had a few minutes alone for me to change my shoes, take selfies and for Leroy to make it for really official on Facebook ha-ha. Cause it’s not official till its Facebook official, right? It was also nice to just talk to each other a bit hear what he did and what he thought.

The Reception was so much fun, from the speeches,

Our MC's

Playing the Shoe game

My Maid Of Honour

The Groomsman

My Husband

My Brother 

to the dance me and Leroy set up and for being able to share a dance with my dad.

to the kids running on their sugar high.

We cut into our beautiful cake that a special friend made for us with the cupcakes showing our life timeline.

I threw my bouquet which my beautiful friend from work caught and Leroy had to blind folded search for the garter and of course my brother caught it. (side note it’s a thing at weddings now of him and his Girlfriend catching it both). Our MC’S made them share a dance which was so much fun to watch.

poor man needed help with all those layers

But the biggest hit was the candy station it was like for a second or two the adults became kids as they helped themselves to our wide range selection of handpicked sweets.

Looking back there isn’t much I would change on the day, we had so much fun and for friends and family to call and say that they enjoyed the wedding so much means even more to us. It was really the best day of our lives.

Hope you guys enjoyed this blog Post