Chambord- The return of Champagne Friday

The theme of today's post is Chambord. The lovely black raspberry flavoured French liquer.
There are lots of reasons I adore Chambord. Here are some of them:

 It comes in a really beautiful bottle.

It originated from a really beautiful place.

The Chambord Castle in France.

It makes great sangria and it makes really delicious cupcakes, 

(I made some last week for my gorgeous friend, Pie.) I found a great recipe here.

(The recipe calls for Creme De Cassis but I used Chambord instead and it was delightful)

It makes lots of other delicious things like these sophisticated jello shots

and these yummy French Martinis,

But best of all, it turns an ordinary Champagne into something spectactular!
Add a splash of Chambord to your glass of bubbly and enjoy!
Happy Champagne Friday! xxx

Behind the Scenes at Fanantique

As you may have noticed, my posts on the blog have became more and more sporadic, I'm sorry about this- I haven't even kept up with my 'Champagne Friday" entries! There has been quite a lot of things going on behind the scenes here at Fanantique, all of which deserve their own post and in time will get one!
Here is a run down of some recent goings on, events and also some work in progress:

DesignEx- Interior Design show
At the moment DesignEx is on in Melbourne. DesignEx is a trade only exhibition open to anyone in a field such as interior design, architecture, furniture, furnishing fabrics and textiles etc. It is always good to go along to these events to keep an eye on what's new, current and emerging trends in interior decorating. (Not to mention there is usually a glass or two of Champagne involved!) I will be going along to this tomorrow and hope to report back to let you know what beautiful things I see....
In the meantime to find out more about 'DesignEx' click here



The Royal Wedding
Unless you have been living under a rock, you will know that it is not long now until the Royal Wedding of Prince William of Wales and Kate Middleton. I thought it was as good an excuse as any, for a celebration. The day of the big event, April 29, does happen to be a Friday so we will be celebrating with an extra special Champagne Friday. We will be featuring an extra special window display in store, co-curated  by renowned Melbourne milliner, Peter Jago (aka the self proclaimed 'Queen of Everything') we have started putting together some special pieces including some limited edition Peter Jago hatpins.

Melbourne Fine Art- French Fashion Illustration 
There is currently a very special exhibition on in town at the Melbourne Fine Art Gallery:
Vintage French Fashion Illustration. The images I've seen from the show all look divine and I can't wait to check out the show on Monday. I look forward to reporting back on the visual delights that await me! For more details about the show click here

Bay St One Off Event - Vintage Fashion Sale
As you may or may not know, we have some rather interesting neighbors here on Bay St. One of which is a fabulous Antique shop - 'A Joy Forever'. The owner, Francesca is currently having a clean out of her warehouse and amongst her treasures she has a great collection of vintage clothing and accessories. We are teaming up and are in the midst of planning a one off vintage fashion sale along with some other purveyors of fine vintage fashion. Stay tuned for more about this soon......

The Deck Bar
Speaking of neighbors,  another one of our neighbors is the lovely Brad, who has 'The Deck Bar' further down the street. He is currently in the midst of a renovation on the function room of the bar. I was lucky enough to be asked in to have a look and offer my opinion. His interior decorator, has come up with the inspired theme of 'Midnight at the Oasis' , a luxurious Middle Eastern flavor. I am currently loving being part of the creative process and have come across some gorgeous points of inspiration for the project. To give you an idea of the feel, here are a few images. (Again pictures and more details coming soon)

New Products- Besame Cosmetics
Of course I am always on the look out for beautiful things for the store. After chatting recently with the lovely Candice DeVille (aka Super Kawaii Mama- to see her amazing vintage style blog click here) I decided that Besame cosmetics would be a fabulous addition to our range. I am still in discussion with the company, but things are looking good and I am hoping to introduce their gorgeous range of vintage inspired lipsticks soon. To get a sneak peek at the beautiful collection click here

Vintage Fashion
Of course there are some more beautiful vintage pieces arriving soon, amongst other things,we have some beautiful coats and handbags for winter coming soon. My mum is currently in Seattle and she will be bringing back lots of goodies for the store at the end of the month!


Illustration
Outside of Fanantique, things have been busy also. I have been working on illustrations for a book for an educational company, Take Note Music. I hope to share pictures soon, after the book is published. It has been a fun project with some gorgeous characters. The concept of the book is all about teaching children how to read music. It has been fun to step away from fashion illustration and explore other styles, and I must say illustrating for kids is a lot of fun.

The Wedding
Of course another thing that is occupying my thoughts is of course my wedding! I have been slowly putting together a collection of ideas (creating a mood board) but have yet to really do any tangible planning. The current plan is still to go to Hungary for the event, but Gabor is not a big fan of being the center of attention so is getting a little nervous about this idea. He is gently trying to talk me into opting for a small wedding on a remote Western Australian beach or a shot gun style wedding in Las Vegas! I must admit Las Vegas is very tempting.....but I am sticking to my guns and still planning a European Wedding. Once I finish the book I am working on, I will get to work on designing my dress.

There are also more things in the works for further down the track, including a Spring Racing Event, a special excursion to the Grace Kelly exhibition next year and more, stay tuned!

Valentine's Day Cocktails

"Little Nips of Whiskey

Little Sips of Wine

Make that Rosey Nosey

On my Valentine" 

- Vintage Valentine's day Postcard

I'd like to wish everybody a Happy Valentine's Day! While here in Australia, Valentine's day is promoted as a day for lovers and romantic love, it is really supposed to be a celebration of love in general and a time to be reminded of and show our appreciation for all who are near and dear to us. In my opinion there is no better way to show your love for someone than to make them a delicious cocktail!
Why not try one of these ideas, they are all easy and have a gorgeous Valentine's Day hue.



Valentine
Champagne flute

Rose Champagne
sugar cube
Dash Agnostura Bitters

Dash the bitters onto the sugar lump, place in a champagne flute and top up with rose champagne.

Strawberry Fizz
highball glass


30ml Gin
1 tsp sugar syrup
30ml strawberry liquer
soda water
ice
strawberry to garnish

Combine ingredients in a highball glass with ice. Top up with soda and finish with a strawberry slice and a sprig of mint.

Valentine's Day Boutique

As you know, Valentine's Day is coming up soon, so I have given the shop a bit of a romantic theme.
Here are a few current snaps of the store .... Oh and Happy Champagne Friday!
(today I am drinking a simple glass of Champagne, but I will have some recipes for Valentine's Day themed cocktails coming soon!)

Lady Bugs and Bees and Happy Champagne Friday!

This week at Fanantique we have had a very strange week indeed. Earlier in the week we had a swarm of bees (...yes bees!) decide to come and sit in front of the shop. They looked like they were waiting for coffee...or maybe they heard about Champagne Friday and wanted a free drink. They were out of luck as it was only Monday.....

As you can imagine, they scared away anyone wanting to visit Fanantique or Angelo at Il Caminetto next door. Thankfully, there is such a thing as an 'emergency bee service' (you learn something everyday) and the lovely Dr Nikolai came and rescued the bees. He was most impressed and said this was quite unusual. 

Amazing! The bees had a strange attraction to this chair, at first I though maybe the pattern. Emma of Fleurage had a much better explanation. She suspected that someone (not naming any names) may have spilled wine or Champagne on the chair causing the bees to be attracted to the sweet fruity aroma. This made much more sense......

 Dr Nikolai as he starts to relocate the bees. He is not even wearing any protective clothing!
(he did put on his special bee keeper hat later). He was such a lovely fellow, he even gave me a jar of honey! (I will make my Champagne Friday cocktail with it).

Inspired by my experience with bees, I thought I would share our insect inspired collection of vintage dresses with you today. These pieces are from the range we titled "Lady Bug"

And now for our Honey Bee Cocktail...

Honey Bee

2 oz dark rum
1/2 oz lemon juice
1/4 oz honey

pour the rum, honey and lemon juice into a cocktail shaker over ice cubes and shake well. Strain into a chilled glass and serve.

Champagne with Miss Havisham

Rough Luxe Interiors, Champagne and Ghosts....
It's a very late Champagne Friday post indeed this week! My apologies, but things are getting super busy at Fanantique right now in the lead up to our very first Spring Racing event, and then Christmas not long after that. Of course, I have been working away on our vintage fashion extravaganza coming up in about six weeks time, and it is shaping up to be a fabulous event with an amazing team of creative talent already involved..but more about that later. Right now, I am going to tell you about an event that Gabor and I attended last night.

Last night, we were invited by one of our suppliers to attend the opening of their new showroom. (It said 'Champagne served" on the invitation, how could I resist?)
With a name like "Vixen and Velvet" you can already begin to imagine the type of range they have. They bring gorgeous vintage furniture and decorator pieces from Europe. Most found in old manors and castles, that have long been neglected.

Anyone that knows me well, knows that I have a fascination for fairy tales, ghost stories and Gothic literature, especially anything involving vampires...no, I am not talking  the pasty faced, angst ridden 'Twilight' vampires running around North of Seattle, but the real old school Eastern European variety. (Maybe that's why I ended up with Gabor, a real life Transylvanian, the poor guy I often ask him to repeat lines from Bella Lugosi movies just to hear the accent) It makes sense that pieces with such an interesting and mysterious past appeal to me. I love the romantic idea of looking at the piece and wondering about and all that has taken place around it, if it were not just an inanimate object I'm sure it would have a great story to tell.

(We ordered a gorgeous chandelier for the shop and are hoping to have it hanging in store next week. I also have some incredible Christmas decorations coming from them later in the year)
The showroom was beautifully set up and certainly inspired a magical feel. The style could be described as 'rough luxe' , old world luxury that has since deteriorated or been neglected, the grandeur remains but the pretentiousness is gone.

Along with ghost tales, this look conjured up thoughts of Charle's Dicken's character from Great Expectations, Miss Havisham. Of course it is a classic story that has been reinterpreted many times.  I particularly like the movie produced in 1998 starring Ann Bancroft as Miss Havisham (also featuring De Niro, Gywneth Paltrow , and the wonderful Ethan Hawke). I adored the depiction of Miss Havisham's delapidated mansion and it is exactly what the 'rough luxe' interior style is all about.

The costumes are also incredible, Bancroft's vintage attire is divine and Paltrow's character, Estelle, wears nothing but Donna Karan during the whole movie (look out for a stunning backless, velvet evening dress)

Another perfect example of this is the 'Rough Luxe" hotel opened in London not long ago. The interior designer combined luxery with vintage and industrial effects to create the look.

Of course if you want the real deal, I can recommend a fabulous website, where you can look at hundreds of heart-breakingly beautiful photographs of abandoned buildings that were once great.
Never mind the title, but click here  just watch out for ghosts!

For a touch of 'luxe' this week, add a splash of Chamboard to your Champagne.
easy and delicious!

Bastille Day!

Well it's Champagne Friday again and this week it has been Champagne Wednesday, Thursday and Friday! Wednesday was of course Bastille Day and being lovers of all things French (especially Champagne!) we thought it was a great excuse to celebrate! Amongst the guests, I had the lovely Natasha Burns. Natasha is a talented artist who has a fabulous blog that you can see here.
I was lucky enough to have some beautiful photos taken of the event by Natasha which she will be posting on her blog soon...stay tuned.

In the meantime, here are a few photos of our cupcakes. Of course we featured the Champagne Cupcake and Parisian flags that I have been working on in my last posts.

Champagne  cupcakes

Marie Antoinette cupcakes (featuring fairy floss 'wig')

'Cocoa Chanel' (Chocolate) and 'La Vie en Rose' (Rose) flavor cupcakes

Thursday the celebrations continued and a group of us braved the Melbourne winter and ventured out for another Bastille Day event at  'Red Bennies'. It was fab! I never realized there were so many French people in Melbourne! With conversations happening in French all around us and the cool sounds of the Martini Sisters (you can listen to them here) It really felt like we had been transported to a cool Paris Jazz club.

 

The invitation for the evening encouraged fancy dress, amongst the costume choices were the Jazz age and the Moulin Rouge , so I jumped at the chance to get my feathers out!

 

Emma of Fleurage and I,  Heather of Trouve accessories and husband Julian

Gabor and Julian share a laugh

In honor of the fantastic performance last night by the Martini Sisters, I thought what better cocktail to drink than a classic Martini?

Martini

Martini glass

3 ice cubes

2 pitted green olives

2 teaspoons dry vermouth

1 1/2 Cups cracked ice

3 ounces chilled top quality gin, such as Bombay sapphire or Tanqueray

1.Rinse a martini glass with cold water, fill with ice cubes and place in freezer for 5-10 minutes to chill completely.

2.Meanwhile,spear the olives with a toothpick. Pour the vermouth into a small saucer. Add the olives and turn several times to coat with the vermouth. Let stand for 5 minutes.

3.Fill a cocktail shaker with the cracked ice. Drain the vermouth from the olives and add it to the shaker. Then add the gin. With a long handled bar spoon, stir very gently to chill, about 15 times in a clockwise direction. Or just swirl the gin shaker until chilled. Either way, work quickly so the ice doesn't melt and dilute the gin.

4. Remove the glass from the freezer and discard the ice cubes. Set the speared olives in the martini glass. Strain the gin over the olives and serve.

Recipe taken from 'Highballs High Heels'- A girl's guide to the art of cocktails. by Karen Brooks,

Gideon Bosker and Reed Darmon. Published by Barnes & Noble

Champagne Friday- "Let Them Eat Cake!"

Champagne Cup Cakes

As you may have seen in my previous post, I am busily preparing for Bastille Day next week. All the plans are starting to come together and I am getting very excited! I was looking around for inspiration about what to eat when I stumbled across a gorgeous blog called 52cupcakes. (to check it out click here) This blog has the most wonderful collection of inspirational ideas for cupcakes. It was here that I found a recipe for Champagne Cupcakes! How divine. I think these cakes will be perfect for Bastille Day! I did give them a trial run last night and all I can say is YUM! Marie Antoinette would definitely approve! So for Champagne Friday this week, I am posting a cake recipe instead of my usual cocktail recipe. It is as equally indulgent!

Take inspiration from Marie Antoinette with a selection of items from Fanantique

Here is the official recipe for Champagne Cup Cakes taken from 52cupcakes. Please see further down for my quick and easy cheat's version!!

Champagne Cupcakes - Official version

Ingredients:

2 3/4 Cups Plain Flour

3 Tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Salt

2/3 C butter

1 1/2 Sugar

3/4 C Champagne (the sweeter the better)

6 Egg Whites

Pre-heat oven to 175 degrees C, prepare cupcake tin with cup-cake liners.

Cream together butter and sugar until very light and fluffy. Sift Flour, powder and salt together and blend into creamed mixture alternately with Champagne.

In another bold beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Fold 1/3 egg whites into batter to lighten it, then gradually add the remaining egg whites.

Fill the cupcake liners to about 2/3 full.

Bake at 175 degrees C for 20 minutes.

Champagne Buttercream Icing

3/4 C vegetable Shortening

1-1/2 sticks of butter (room temperature)

3 Tablespoons Champagne

4 1/2 C icing Sugar

In a large bowl, beat the shortening and butter until combined, add the Champagne. Slowly add

the icing sugar and blend until smooth.

If this is all too hard, try my cheat's version.......
(tried and tested)


Cheat's Champagne Cup Cakes


Ingredients
Vanilla cake mix (I like Betty Crocker)
- refer to cake mix for other ingredients needed, usually eggs & butter.
A bottle of Champagne

Directions
Prepare mixture as directed on cake mix box BUT substitute Champagne for the water then take out a Champagne glass and get drinking the left over Champagne. Spoon mixture into lined cup cake tin and bake for approximately 15 mins in moderate oven.
Icing - If you are lucky enough, the cake mix that you purchased will include ready to spread frosting. Simply add a little champagne to this( this will make it a little runny but if you put the mixture in the fridge for a bit it will thicken up again..if it is really runny add a little icing sugar)
Important- Don't forget to finish off the bottle of Champagne, an opened bottle will not keep well!

mmmm Cake and Champagne

Champagne Friday kicked off early this week with 'Champagne and Cake Thursday afternoon'.
While it doesn't have quite the same ring to it, it is delicious. While we shouldn't need an excuse to celebrate, I had the perfect reason with a visit from the lovely Emma Leah, perfumer extraoidinare.
Emma has fast become a great friend of Fanantique (and a dear friend of mine) with a selection of her luxurious range of Fleurage products being sold in store. (look out for a more in depth post about the world of Fleurage in the near future).

A selection of the glamorous Fleurage range available from Fanantique.

As we sat and enjoyed a lovely sunny Autumn afternoon we decided that the only thing better than Champagne, was the combination of Champagne and cake. So in honor of this conclusion, this week's cocktail recipe is cake inspired, served in a Champagne flute of course!

Cheesecake Rodriguez
champagne flute

45ml Licor 43
15ml lemon juice
15ml lime juice
10ml orange syrup
dash of orange bitters
dash of egg white
splash of prosecco
twist of orange and 1/2 split vanilla bean to garnish

Combine all ingredients, except for prosecco and garnish. Shake and double strain into Champagne flute. Top up with prosecco and garnish with a twist of orange and vanilla bean.
mmmmmm.

recipe taken from "Cocktails and Rocktails" by Jane Rocca, published by Hardie Grant books

Fabulous Friday

 

Happy Champagne Friday! I just love this picture of Marilyn...you can see a certain sparkle in her eye as she enjoys a glass of bubbles. This week's cocktail I chose for it's name , "Diamond Glove" it seemed very fitting to accompany this image..but reading the list of ingredients, it does sound delicious! I love the combination of apple and cinnamon. yum!

Diamond Glove

highball glass

60ml Irish Whiskey

15 ml sour apple liqueur

15ml apple juice

10 ml cinnamon syrup

3-5 mint leaves

45ml ginger beer

apple slices to garnish

Combine whiskey, liqueur, juice and syrup in a shaker. Shake with ice and pour into a highball glass. Slap the mint in your hands and stir into the drink. Top up with ginger beer and ice if needed.

Garnish with fanned apple slices.

Happy Champagne Friday! - Riddle Me This.......

HAPPY CHAMPAGNE FRIDAY!!!

Just in time for Champagne Friday, we have just received this gorgeous vintage, French oak Champagne rack. The best part about it ? It can hold up to 120 bottles !  I admit that this piece is now mainly appreciated for it's aesthetic quality, but back in the day it actually had a very important purpose.

I was lucky enough to do a "Champagne making tour" (well technically it was a Sparkling wine making tour because it was outside of Champagne France) . It was at the Moet & Chandon winery in the Yarra Valley , Victoria, Australia.  During this informative tour I learned many interesting Champagne related facts, the first one was the correct pronunciation of 'Moet' I now know that you are supposed to pronounce the 'T'. I had always assumed Moet was a French man and had been saying it with a silent T. I have since learned that he was Dutch. Anyway, another interesting thing I discovered was about a process called 'riddling'. This is where these racks come in. (apparently, they are called 'puprites') During this stage of Champagne making the bottles are placed in the rack at a 45degree angle with the cork pointed down. Every few days the bottles are given a slight shake and turn and dropped back into the rack. (I wonder if people who do this job are called riddlers?)

 This manual way of riddling sparkling wine is still used for Prestige Cuvées in Champagne, but has otherwise been largely abandoned because of the high labor costs. Mechanised riddling equipment are used instead.

So after that history lesson, I'm thirsty. Of course, I will have to make another Champagne cocktail.
This week, it's an oldie but a goodie, the Mimosa. One of the best things about this drink is that it's perfect for breakfast and will be sure to kick the day off to a great start.

(Once again, this recipe is taken from "Highballs High Heels" by Brooks, Bosker, Darmon. published by Chronicle books for Barnes & Noble) 

 Blood Orange Mimosa
Champagne Flute


2 oz  fresh blood orange juice
2 oz fresh tangerine juice
 6-8 oz well chilled Champagne


Garnish- 2 spiraling blood orange peels


1. Combine the blood orange and tangerine juice and divide the mixture between two Champagne flutes.
2. Slowly add enough of the Champagne to fill the glasses, but do not stir.
3. Drop a blood orange spiral into each drink to garnish.


Enjoy!