Wedding Invitations

Alright, so last week I talked about our save the dates, which we sent a year in advance. We decided to send out the formal invitations at the six month mark.

Keeping with the dessert theme, I knew I wanted to do another piece based on photography. Something bright and cheery and related to the wedding venue a bit. And what's a French restaurant without macarons? We picked these ones up from Butter Avenue and started the project when we returned home.

I took out some of my favourite props: a cake stand, a cocotte, ramekins, a beautiful teal plate, and our marble lazy Susan. I laid them out on a sheet of parchment paper on the floor and played around the the arrangement.

Then, positioned the macarons on the edge and filled the containers with sprinkles. I left our two heart sprinkles on the plate thinking that it would be super cute to go along with the text.

Time to take shots from above. The bird-eye view works really well and I was able to try different heights by standing on the floor and the chair. The one above is pulled back so you can see behind-the-scenes.

A close up worked best because it gave me more room to include all the information on that small plate and the rest of the cake stand and marble platter wouldn't look too sparse.

There you have it! After fiddling with PicMonkey again to test out the text placement, we had our final invitation. I had about five versions of it until Howard and I both agreed on this one.

Again, we sent these out electronically instead of having them printed and mailed. We used the free wedding website that The Knot offers to create ours and e-mailed it to all the guests. It was a great way to share all of the information in once place!

Afternoon Tea at Butter Avenue

So we returned. Didn't I say we would?

So more about the Afternoon Tea at Butter Avenue. We were greeted by the friendly staff, most of whom remembered us from our first visit. Our table was reserved and we were given the choice from two sets: Lumière and De Luxe. Since we grabbed lunch at The Burger's Priest nearby, we went with the Lumière set. We were a bit nervous that we would be too full, as you get a bit more desserts and drink choices if you go with the De Luxe one.

The fun part was being able to smell and read the description of all the available tea choices. I went with one of the more popular teas (as our hostess informed us). A tea with sweet, roasted, and caramelized almonds with sweet apple pieces. The red colour comes from adding beetroot.

From the samples of tea, Howard picked Darjeeling, one that he was comfortable and familiar with.

Our amuse-bouche arrived! A mini croissant with smoked salmon and dill, brioche, and two mini bacon and cheese quiches. Anything with smoked salmon wins over Howard's heart. The brioche was delicious. The quiches had the texture of a light and airy egg sponge, also very tasty.

Along with our tray of tarts and cakes, we also got to choose a macaron from the display cases.

Our hostess suggested we start from the left to the right. We had a taste of the pistachio cream puff with a white chocolate glaze. A nice and easy way to start off the tasting.

Then, the cassis (blackcurrant) mousse topped with a blueberry.

Their newest cake, cheesecake garnished with a sliver of strawberry. I'm not usually a fan of cheesecake because I find them too dense and heavy (but Howard loves them), this however, I enjoyed! It was very light and soft, just the right texture for a bite size.

Raspberry mousse, deliciously tart and light!

Their terre et neige cake, a matcha mousse, chocolate sponge cake, and vanilla mousse.

Finally, we finished with the nutty dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate mousse, chocolate sponge cake,  and a chocolate rice crispy base.

I have to say, everything was delicious and delightful, but I was a little bit disappointed with the macarons this time around. I had purchased some extra ones to take home and some of my macaron shells were too hard and hollow inside.

Butter Avenue

Butter Avenue

Pâtisserie and Café

3467 Yonge Street

Toronto, ON M4N 2N3

(647) 341- 8686

They're on Facebook and Twitter too!

Oh I am so excited to share this with you! Although, it's most likely that you've already paid Butter Avenue a visit and you're rolling your eyes at my ridiculously late arrival. Friends have raved about this place, but it wasn't until I saw that they serve Afternoon Tea that I asked Howard to take me there for a date.

The Afternoon Tea menu includes an amuse-bouche, macarons, mini tarts, cakes, and specialty teas. Take a look at Kitchen Frolic's blog here.

So you would think this post would be about our Afternoon Tea experience... but no, I screwed up. I didn't realize we had to make reservations first. But, this means we're making a return trip, because we made the reservation right then and there!

I wasn't going to leave without trying something, I mean, you try looking at the display cases and walking out. Howard and I shared the St. Honoré aux Macarons, consisting of crème chantilly pistachio, fresh raspberries, and raspberry macarons.

Macarons on a tart? Fresh fruit? Light crème? Yes, please!

I ... uh ... also got six macarons to snack on. Howard did scold me and said I should have gotten these to go and that I wouldn't be able to finish them.

Well, I showed him! And he had to eat his words because he ate the halves of five of those macarons!

I picked out the white chocolate strawberry, cream cheese passion fruit, matcha chestnut, earl grey, oolong, and the sea salt caramel macarons to try.

Our top favourite favourites? It's hard to choose, but we really enjoyed the sea salt caramel, oolong, passion fruit, matcha chestnut, white chocolate strawberry, and the earl grey. Yeah, I just listed them all again. Like I said, it's hard to choose!

They were very kind to let me snap some more photos of the lovely treats we'll be coming back to try! The above is the St. Honoré aux Fraises: strawberry chantilly, pâte sucrée, candy cane macarons, and fresh strawberries. Now that I think about it, I should have ordered this one, because it looks like a seasonal one. Fingers crossed that it'll still be there in January.

St. Honoré Cassis: crème chantilly cassis, fresh blueberries, and Secret Garden macarons. What are Secret Garden macarons?!?

I didn't get a photo of the lovely treat behind, but it's the Château De Framboise: chocolate, almond, and raspberry.

Terre Et Neige: matcha and dark chocolate.

Nutty Dark Chocolate.

Mini macarons! In a bubble tea cup? Cute!

The next few photos are just rows and rows of beautiful macarons. Enjoy!

Dreamy isn't it? Do you think they'd let me work there part-time? ;)