Sydney Food Bloggers Christmas Picnic 2013

This time last year my friend CW was telling me about the Christmas picnic she got invited to. It was by invitation only for Sydney food bloggers. She had decided not to attend as she had other commitments but I immediately felt very left out. I thought to myself 'why wasn't I invited? Am I not considered a food blogger? Is my blog so insignificant?' After all, at that point in time, my blog was a year and a half old. Big mental sigh at that point in time! But I got over it as I knew it would take a while for any blog to have any form of attention.

I really don't know what makes a blog more popular than another. I suppose there has to be a point of difference for readers to visit regularly. But over time, my blog has started to pick up more readers and it literally has a life of it's own these days. All I do is contribute to it. :)

Okay, enough postulating I think! So this year when I got contacted by chocolatesuze through twitter as she could not find any way to email me (information not on my blog) I was very thrilled! Suddenly I felt included and part of a community of people I had yet to meet!

The designated day started by being cloudy then sunny then stormy and windy. Seriously, one minute I thought yay the picnic is on and another minute I thought it cannot be on when the rain was bucketing down Parra way with thunder and lightning to boot!!

Twitter was my main mode of comm that morning. There were tweets between jeroxie, the adventures of miss piggy, myself and grab your fork. Finally Helen of grab your fork tweeted the picnic was on irregardless!!

Traffic was heavy driving into the city but I eventually got to Centennial Park and was only 20 minutes late. Not bad for all that happened that morning!

The organising committee of Helen and Suze bought tents so the food could be protected. They even bought larger tents for us adults in case the rain returned. How sweet and thoughtful of them. I cannot believe their commitment and can only thank them for being who they are.

The weather turned out beautifully, there was sun shining down on us and a slight breeze throughout the afternoon. There was so much food brought by everyone who attended. I could not possibly eat everything so I picked a few and was very happy with my selection.

I couldn't get my hands on ramen raff's macarons! Darn it! Missed out on love swah's cupcakes which looked so pretty! And I saw a picture in Instagram of a dessert served that day which I didn't even see in person! Darn, darn, darn! :)

But from a food perspective, it was the pork crackling donated by Mr Crackles which was the absolute star! I cannot believe they were so generous and gave us 25kg of pork crackling and it was a gift of their volition. AMAZEBALLS!! It was deliciously crackling and quite addictive. I have not seen so much crackling at one time in my life!

Mel having fun with one of the crackling!

And I met fellow bloggers I had known previously and got to know others for the first time. I really felt part of this community and it was a nice feeling! The other thing that was very obvious to me was how many of these food bloggers were young. I definitely did not feel young and nubile but that's all right! I am who I am and nothing can change that! Get over it girl!! Lol!!

Suze with her brightly coloured hair and the ever present crackling 

Simon Food Favourites serving out his Gin and Tonic

In the latter part of the afternoon, Secret Santa kicked in. Each one of us brought a Kris Kringle of up to $10 and if possible it should be food themed and even better if it was quirky. It did go on for hours but there was a bit of fun and a cheeky twist to the game. Evil Santa was in town and we could steal someone else's gift if we cared to. Trust me, there was a lot of stealing throughout the afternoon. There were 71 of us attending this so imagine the number of stealing which occurred. By the way my ticket number was 67!

Amongst us was a celebrity. It was Billy Law of Masterchef. Billy has a renowned food blog (a table for two) and is obviously good friends with Helen and Suze. I was tempted to go over and say hello but I refrained. Somehow I was overcome by shyness and stayed away from his group of fans!!

It turned out to be a lovely afternoon. I was glad to finally meet Helen and Suze who has been very supportive of my blog in the past few months. What do I mean by support? I know they visit and read my posts and have dropped an occasional comment. And for that I am grateful to them as it is lovely to be supported and this is a community of food bloggers who support one another.

Thanks to Simon (the heart of food) for your generous offer of the group photo.

So I say thank you to Helen of Grab Your Fork and Suze of Chocolatesuze. Your dedication and commitment in organising this annual event is amazing. You both are absolute stars for doing all the research and reading up on all the new blogs and making all the effort to contact us. Thank you, thank you and thank you!!!! :)

Hope to see you and the food blogger community same time next year!! Promise to be more creative with my plate of food than a cheese platter! :)

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