Five Marvelous places to treat your Mum in style for Mother’s Day

There is one thing we all have in common: we’ve been carried around by a woman for 9 months, prior to first seeing the light of day. All of us have. I don’t know about you, but I don’t like most commercial holidays (above all, that means Valentine’s Day).

Mother’s Day I do like. It’s simple, I like my mum. I bet you do, too… at least to some degree. So give that old lady a call and tell her to pencil you in for the 10^th of May.

Next, check out this article here and give the good folks a call to reserve your table.

Mummy deserves it…

Or could you imagine carrying yourself around in your tummy for three quarters of a year. I can’t and spending one day with her sounds like a fair deal, doesn’t it?

Mumm High Tea at the Stables of Como

Stables of Como

So you fancy, huh?

You made some nice bucks last year and maybe even got a little tax refund, which you have been saving and now you can’t wait to show some gratitude towards your mum for teaching you all those great things when you were young?

Perfect… We got a nice spot for you.

For only $85 per person, you can treat you mum to an “afternoon of decadence” in the historic grand ballroom of the Como house. A bargain, considering how much she spent on nappies and pampering your behind.

Upon arrival, the two of you will get a glass of free “Mumm” and plenty of tasty food to chose from. You can even bring along your own little kid for only $45 and show your mum how much you learned from her about raising kids…

Mother’s Day at Saint Crispin

Mothers Day at Saint Crispin

In case your mummy is a food-lover, Saint Crispin has got your back for Mother’s Day. The friendly fellows are hosting a five-course feast in their bright and ambient restaurant.

Expect some of the finest food your taste buds have ever processed. The Head Chef Joe Gbrac will display his marvelous European cooking style. Hopefully your mum won’t be jealous at what he has got to serve.

Bring along your munchkins for just $35 each and make sure they are well-fed.

Mother’s Day at Grosvenor Hotel

Mothers Day at the Grosvenor Hotel

For those of you with meat-loving mums, the Grosvenor Hotel came up with the perfect treat. Their Chef’s designed a three-course meal that will satisfy even the most demanding mothers out there in Melbourne.

For only $65 per person you will be started off with a cauliflower velouté, to be followed by a roasted rib-eye of beef, root vegetables and beef fat potatoes. Delicious and well worth the cash, considering all those hours your mom spent sweating behind the stove while you got your pants dirty playing outside.

Parties of 6 and more get a free bottle of wine… a good free bottle of wine, no cheap stuff. So show up your cousins by inviting the whole family along.

Mother’s Day at Mister Bianco

Mothers Day Lunch at Mister Bianco

Mister Bianco is bringing you typical Sicilian flavor to satisfy your mums wildest Mediterranean dreams. He is also throwing in a gift bag, consisting of t2 tea and L’Occitane hand cream… in case you were too busy to hit the store yourself.

You can put your name on the list for either a three-or four-course feast, running you $75 and $85, respectively. Not bad, considering the wide selection of signature struzzichini and taste-blowing desserts straight from Europe.

Kiddies eat for $38 a piece. Cheaper than hiring a babysitter for the whole day…

Mother’s Day Sky High Luncheon at Eureka 89

Eureka 89 – mothers day melbourne

So, you really love your mum? You have been waiting all your life for an opportunity to monetarily express your affection and gratitude? Ye shall wait no more!

Eureka 89 is hosting a special Mother’s Day Luncheon, including breath-taking views on the city and a stunning atmosphere. Your mum will love it, I betcha. Food will be served for $140 per adult, including three-courses and high-class drinks. The feast begins with an entrée of seared scallops, spanner crab, fennel pollen and avruga followed by the main course of roasted lamb rack, rolled shoulder, Ceylon spinach and honey.

Dessert, tea and coffee will be served, too, of course and kids under 18 eat at a discount.

Reservations are essential, to pick up your smartphone and dial: 03 9693 8889

Still haven’t found something you like? Thats ok there are plenty more on our events guide

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Four Apps essential to living in, and escaping from Melbourne

Like it or not, Apps made human life a lot easier… and more fun.

Some Apps I don’t like. Candy Crush and the like. The ones that kids spend all their time on.

Some Apps are smart and can save users lots of time, money and headaches. If you live in Melbourne, consider this to be your lucky day… sort of like Christmas in April.

Here are the four Apps essential to living in Melbourne:

Parkhound – whenever you want cheap urban parking

Parkhound helps you find a carpark use our code reallynetworks for a 5% discount

Parking sucks… especially when you are in a hurry.

Whenever I have got a meeting with someone inside a big city. I take the estimated arrival time my GPS shows me and add around 15 minutes for parking and walking to the meeting point. We all know that this approach is no longer any good, because GPS apps suck as much as much as finding a park does

Luckily, the smart guys at Parkhound came up with the solution: to connect car park owners with people in need of parking. Like AirBNB connects people who offer spare rooms with those who need living space. Parkhound is doing the same for parking, saving drivers exorbitant parking fees and headaches.

On top, the App offers parking space owners a chance to make some extra cash. Easy… while working towards the good cause of undermining overprized car parks.

The best thing about parkhoud… is parkhound just got better. Parkhound now displays various forms of on-street city parking. Allowing the user to filter for free parking spaces. Also, the App shows how many parking spaces there are in each area and let’s the user pay through the App. What a great way to park.

I hope these guys expand this service into all major cities of the world.

Aston Club – whenever you want to close your bar tab quick

Use our Aston Club Code: 8MDVHHQZ to get $10 free credit download the app at bit.ly/downloadaston

I hate the pressure of trying to think of a bar to go to when I am a new part of the city. Most of the time I will go to the same old same old, just because its easier.

Ugh. I immediately push all my anger buttons.

Luckily, Aston Club has a solution to that.

With the App, I can chose any participating restaurant and create a tab on my phone before I even know where it exactly is, sit down or order. The App also cooperates with bars and coffee shops. Now I just have to tell the waitress that I am paying with Aston Club and show her my tab number and everything starts falling into place.

I get my food, I eat, I enjoy my food, the conversation and my friends. Whenever I am ready to, I can just close the tab on my phone. In bars i don’t have to worry about my card safety, or forgeting it.

goCatch – Whenever you need a cab

Sign up to goCatch with my voucher: BBTRJ and we’ll both receive $10 credit. Download the app: http://ift.tt/1DKgKjs

Don’t get me wrong, the scare tactics used by cab companies won’t stop me using UBER Black. I wouldn’t use UBERx because I wouldn’t get into a car with a stranger. I even hate letting my mum drive me places, let alone letting your mum, brother or third uncle twice removed drive me around. Uber Black is a great service for a part of the market but it is a premium service, with the associated costs.

Catching a taxi is crap. They are often late. They take you on strange routes, to destinations you know well. They

There is a solution to that: goCatch

The App allows users to see available taxis on a map and book them directly. I get all the benefits of Uber. An easy-to-use interface and direct contact with my driver, while being sure to be in an authorized vehicle.

goCatch shows me the location of my driver and I can see the route we are taking. This way I am certain that I am not to getting had. Of course, payment happens through the App, too. Simple, safe and efficient.

adioso – Whenever you got to escape the winter

Adioso

I am going to be honest, I dislike is the way most travel search engines work.

Often, I don’t know the dates I want to travel on and I don’t care. Most of the times I don’t even care where I am going. I like all places. Colombia or Chile? I have no idea where I want to start. Take me to wherever is the cheapest. Call me a tight ass, if you like.

I get frustrated whenever I have to enter the exact details of my trip.

Luckily, atleast one person in the world thinks like I do. The team behind adioso App are travelers themselves. Sharing the same hang-ups I have with the way conventional travel websites work. So they created something better…

I will explain how ADIOSO works. I tell the App a broad outline of what I’d like to do. Often, all I have a broad outline for all the things in my life, so this works for me. Then, with the click of a button, I see the best trips available for me. How great. How easy. I just ask the App for the cheapest Friday to fly anywhere in Asia for two weeks and I get results.

All power to them. I hope this app flourishes and allows the developers to travel for the rest of their lives… using their own App, of course.

So there you are, four apps essential for living in, and escaping Melbourne.

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Porgie and Mr Jones

A recipe for a Happy Morning.

1. Take an ex violineri workshop. Combine it with fresh market produce, fresh flowers, and a little Billie Holiday.

2.Leave those to sit, while you add school chairs & walls of blackboards.

3.Add some poached free range eggs, organic noisette breads and the smell of scones that have just come out of the oven?

4.I know that you are salivating!

5. A shot of cold drip coffee to wake you up, or a latte to ease into the conversation.

6.Add a secret fernery garden’, plenty of natural sunlight or some nooks and crannies to read the morning paper, or chat to the friends and/or familia.

7.Now sprinkle a touch a France, a little Italian romance with the comfort of Hawthorn.

Then, TA DA! We are ready to serve up a cute little cafe for your breakfast lunch and afternoon tea.

Note: This recipe is dependent on your definition of morning.

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Porgie and Mr Jones by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Now like every good meal is followed or precluded by a great dessert. Every Happy Morning Recipe should be followed by or precluded by a kick ass night recipe.

1 Take an ordinary Friday and/or Saturday night.

2. Turn the lights down low, and light the candles up.

3. Chill the champagne or select the wine.

4. Depending on the season or your choice, this step has two choices.

A. Head out to the courtyard, to enjoy an evening among the greenery below the twinkle of floating lights

B. Snuggle up next to the fire place or into the other romantic nooks and crannies inside.

5 Let the food kick up a notch.

Feel free to claim these recipes as your own. Remember Porgie & Mr Jones is cash only, I would hate for you to ruin your shot at MasterChef glory with that little hick up.

CONTACT

Porgie + Mr Jones

291 Auburn Road Hawthorn Vic 3122

03 9882 2955

eat@porgiemrjones.com.au

Breakfast, brunch & lunch 7 days

Monday to Friday 7.30am to 4pm

Saturday & Sunday 8.30am to 4pm

Porgie + Mr Jones does not take bookings during the day on weekends and on public holidays.

Dinner Friday & Saturday nights from 6.30pm

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Ant Williams

When I heard you speak at tedxmelbourne, I was particularly drawn to how you came to the sport of freediving, can you share that with our readers?

Growing up I loved sport, but I was never particularly good at it. I got in to coaching instead and trained as a Sport Psychologist. After years of working with athletes who competed in dangerous sports like big wave surfing, MMA fighting and motoGP I realised I was a fraud. Everything I was teaching these athletes came out of a textbook, none of it was based on my own experience. I believed that if I took up a dangerous sport, then I would become a better coach by understanding the fears my athletes faced.

What do you think is the biggest lesson that freediving has given you?

Humility. To successfully dive truly deep in the ocean you have to let go of your ego, your desire to be the deepest athlete, and allow yourself to relax and accept the immense water pressure bearing down on you. Sinking alone in the open ocean in deep water is one of the most solitary things you can do on this planet. The experience teaches you to believe in your ability to calmly handle whatever comes your way.

You talked about coming to melbourne, and how after a weekend here to feel the city out, you decided that this was home. Tell us about that and what it was that created that homely feeling?

My wife didn’t want to move here. We were very settled in Sydney and loved the lifestyle offered by the Northern Beaches. We came down for a long weekend and within 24 hours we had picked where we wanted to live and where we would buy our coffee from in the morning. There is something so inherently attractive about Melbourne. It’s vibrancy, energy, and warmth drew us in!

Over the last year, you have developed your own online business, Speakerbook, we are in a lift for 30 seconds, give us the elevator pitch.

Outside of freediving, I am passionate about keynote speaking. But for most people, booking a guest speaker is expensive and time consuming. We are solving this problem by giving event planners an online service where they can find and book Australia’s top speakers without the middleman. Called Speakerbook, it is Australia’s fastest growing speakers bureau.

Speaker book offers a two edge sword, what do you think the true value proposition is for an event manager and then for the speaker?

Event planners get a simple and safe way to book a speaker without wearing the cost of booking fees. Each speaker collects audience votes on to their profile page making it easier for you to comparebetween speakers. The site even has emerging speakers that can be booked for less than $1,000. Our speakers get a free marketing service that promotes them actively to event planners right across Australia.

Businesses create stories of their own, what is your favourite Speakerbook story?

We get to meet some very cool people! Olympians, The Block contestants, Big Brother housemates, TEDx speakers, celebrities and other wildly successful people. But a standout story for us was spending our entire marketing budget on a single event. It was crazy in hindsight, but we decided it was “win or bin” for us. We gave that event 100% and didn’t generate a single booking. It taught us an important business lesson that taught us toinvest every dollar wisely. This year we partnered with the event organisers, spent less money, and got our money back in sales within a week.

As someone who is consistently speaking in public, what are 5 tips to help our readers in their next public speaking engagement.

1. Preparation & practice is key. Anyone can be an engaging speaker if they put in the work beforehand. Begin by talking to people who will be in your audience and crafting your presentation around what their need are.


2. Ramp up the energy. On stage the “regular” you is just not high energy enough. It might feel weird, but your audience want you at your most engaging & energetic.


3. Go to the theatre. Actors are the masters of stagecraft. Watching a play will give you a sense for how actors hold the stage to create an impact with the audience. Look for where to stand, when to move, how to punctuate your talk with your body language. Learn to handle your nerves. Going on stage to speak can be a harrowing experience but don’t let your nerves get the better of you. Your audience wants you to be successful and enjoy yourself. So expect the nerves, but do it anyway!


4. Want to be a professional speaker? Then go out and invest in some high quality speaker training. People often approach us for representation before they are ready.

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Adara Collins

What is it that usually attracts you to a hotel? I don’t mean when you are looking at shiny pictures on the internet. I mean when you are walking along the street, and you look at a place and decide “that’s where I want to stay.”

Adara Collins, Collins Street Melbourne

Clyde House is situated at 182 Collins Street, Melbourne, and is unassuming in its beauty. The kind of beauty that draws you in, so that you wonder what is behind that beautiful and historical facade. As it turns out Clyde House is the heritage listed building that is home to Adara Collins, a 4-star property in the heart of Melbourne. Nestled between luxury boutiques, the Athenaeum Theatre and opposite the Regent Theatre – when you stay at Adara Collins you are surrounded by the best of Theatre, Art, Fashion and Food. Foodies will love the fact that the city’s best restaurants surround the hotel.

The Atheneum Theatre & Clyde House home of Adara Collins by Jeremy Bray

The Paris end of Collins Street is a leafy strip that is almost sheltered from the hustle and bustle of the Melbourne CBD. You are also just steps away from everything. Federation Square, Queen Victoria Market and Melbourne Town Hall are all within walking distance. Not to Mention the Forum Theatre, Palais Cinema and Bourke Street Mall.

The Regent Theatre, across the road from Adara Collins by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Make one of the 54 air-conditioned rooms into your home away from home. Each room features a kitchen, complete with refrigerator and stovetop. This means that you can make use of the fresh produce from the Queen Victoria Market which is only a few blocks away. Not to mention the complimentary wireless Internet access to keep you connected.The suites of Adara Collins have many small conveniences including safes and desks, making it both safe and practical for vacationers and business travellers alike.

Adara Collins

Adara Collins

Daily housekeeping provides everyone with that extra little piece of bliss. If you are the type of person who doesn’t want to let your fitness slip, you can take advantage of the hotel’s fitness center. Concierge can even organise babysitting/childcare, tour/ticket assistance or a continental breakfast. The convenience is well worth the surcharge.

Adara Collins

Adara Collins

If you are travelling for business Adara Collins features a fully equipped business center, limo/town car service and luggage storage. Adara Collins is a top pick among business travelers due to its central location, comfortable rooms and amenities that corporate travelers find essential.

Adara Collins Melbourne

Call +61 3 9639 1811

182 Collins Street, Melbourne, VIC 3000

collins@adaraapartments.com.au

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Mazzitelli

Mazzitelli inspired something in me, maybe it was the warmth of spirit that good pinot gives you. Or the sense of comfort, you get from good food.

It is 7pm on a Tuesday Night and the western end of Bridge Road, Richmond is quiet. The area, like Chapel Street, is in the midst of rebirth. You have to wonder, is it the over indulgence of greedy landlords that has lead to empty shops? Have times been too good for too long and the importance of culture forgotten in rental values?

I paint a grim scene, so its a surprise when you walk through the door and discover Mazzitelli for the first time. She is beautiful, belonging in Venice or Rome, an alleyway where you jostle people to navigate your way into the entrance. Her wax rendered walls, which I learn were aged using coffee. Venetian chandeliers, art works and installations all add to the atmosphere. You can’t help but notice the warm marble polished floors.

Mazzitelli is a place to sit and eat, talk and drink. Whether you are at the bar, or seated in the restaurant. You have a sense that time has been standing still, so when you leave, you question where the hours went.

Address	144 Bridge Road Richmond
Open Hours	Tuesday ’til Saturday 8am – Midnight, Sunday & Monday 8am-4pm
Phone	(03) 94271887
Website	http://ift.tt/1uFrUnO

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Mazzitelli by Jeremy Christopher Bray

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The Stables of Como

An elegant fusion of past and present, ‘The STABLES of COMO’ is a refuge from the hectic Melbourne city lifestyle. A place within the city fringe, so close to everything, yet is so far removed.

Set against the 160 year old Como House and Gardens in South Yarra, there is plenty of room to wander, surrounded by a touch of the romantic.

The menu features timeless dishes – even making the classic ‘Quiche Lorraine’ seem cool again.

As with most amazing spaces the ‘heart’ of the beautiful space is the 6 meter long timber counter.

Despite its beauty of the counter, this is not its best feature. You will love it, like thousands before you, for its contents. Brimming with goodies like homemade wagon wheels, musk sticks and giant meringue clouds. Oh and dont forget the bountiful pastries.

You can even order a Picnics and any event can become an excuse for a party in the incredible grounds or Grand Ballroom…

Breakfast at the Stables of Como by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Sweets at the Stables of Como by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Sweets at the Stables of Como by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Breakfast at the Stables of Como by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Breakfast at the Stables of Como by Jeremy Christopher Bray

Address	Cnr Williams Road & Lechlade Ave, South Yarra Victoria
Open Hours	Monday to Saturday 9am to 5pm, Sunday 10am to 5pm
Phone	(03) 9827 6886
Website	http://ift.tt/14I95ns

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