Long post alert.
If anyone knows me at all, they'd know that I'm a bit of an obsessed lunatic when it comes to discovering new places for coffee or cake or pie or a signature macaron offered by the artisans of a crazily minimalist, hipster bakery open to visitors only twice a week. I obsess over creative spaces too because being able to experience a cafe that was renovated or built from scratch by a passionate artist/baker/architect/barista is (for me at least) something very personal and inspiring. You think to yourself, "Wow. If this person can express their imagination in this manner, then why can't I?".
If anyone knows me at all, they'd know that I'm a bit of an obsessed lunatic when it comes to discovering new places for coffee or cake or pie or a signature macaron offered by the artisans of a crazily minimalist, hipster bakery open to visitors only twice a week. I obsess over creative spaces too because being able to experience a cafe that was renovated or built from scratch by a passionate artist/baker/architect/barista is (for me at least) something very personal and inspiring. You think to yourself, "Wow. If this person can express their imagination in this manner, then why can't I?".
This obsession started from the day my friends and I entered Burps and Giggles in Ipoh. I wondered, "Dude. This is design, architecture and food combined! This is my dream!". No really, I swear I thought of that the whole time! I've always wanted to build things and spaces that are as captivating and beautiful (makes me reminisce about that sensation you experience while making installations with my friends and while painting murals. I get the same feeling of joy while cooking too! :]).
Right now, I have a confession ... I honestly joined Yelp ... by accident ... but in the hopes of expanding my knowledge for food and cafes/restaurants in Glasgow (of course). We didn't have something like Yelp in Malaysia (I think now there's a thing called Burpple??) so I wasn't too use to the concept! I use it to find all the hidden gems in Glasgow (and I have yet to visit many that are hidden far away from where I live!).
I wasn't an active member until late last (last?) year when I discovered that, "Oh hey Yelp is a thing all over Europe. I can utilize it for travel". I used it to plan a lot of my cafe visits in Amsterdam, Dublin, Berlin etc. And then I started writing reviews, checking out gigs and posting pictures, and then I was invited to events and now ... well ... I'm a legit Yelp Elite member! Which for me is both an accomplishment and a privilege. Who knew doing something fun, with really no intentions of receiving anything in return, could bring me so much joy, opportunities and food!
I wasn't an active member until late last (last?) year when I discovered that, "Oh hey Yelp is a thing all over Europe. I can utilize it for travel". I used it to plan a lot of my cafe visits in Amsterdam, Dublin, Berlin etc. And then I started writing reviews, checking out gigs and posting pictures, and then I was invited to events and now ... well ... I'm a legit Yelp Elite member! Which for me is both an accomplishment and a privilege. Who knew doing something fun, with really no intentions of receiving anything in return, could bring me so much joy, opportunities and food!
I know, some people might think that it's weird or lame to be a Yelper, but guuuuurl, you missin' out! So far, I've tried so many lovely cafes, bakeries and restaurants that I wouldn't be able to find just on my own two feet. I can confidently say that about 75% of the places I've tried here, I tried because of Yelp. Not only do you discover new places, but there are also events you can attend, solely dedicated to Yelpers, and of course, meeting new people who share the same passion I have for food. Who doesn't love food I mean c'mon?!
Anyway, here are some events that I got to attend while being a new active member of Yelp! :) All photos (except from the Tennent's tour) are by Alasdair Watson and videos are by Stephen Lister.
This was my first ever Yelp event! I was invited by the Community Manager, Briony, via the Yelp app. At first I was like, "Whoah" because I thought these things were only for specific people like extremely loyal Yelpers (VVVIPs ya know) and then I was like "Okay let's give it a try". I told Briony "Yes!", the night came and there I was at Hotel Chocolat at St Enoch. The small event was happening after the shops in the shopping centre closed, which made me totally feel like a VIP to be honest (haha).
They closed (or locked us) up in the store and started serving champagne and some chocolates to try before the host/manager appeared. When everyone was seated comfortably, we were given some Hotel Chocolat merchandise and notepads, to keep track of certain things the host will mention along the night.
So anyway, basically we were taught about how Hotel Chocolat makes their chocolate, how you differentiate the quality of chocolates, distinguish flavours and smells ... it was all very new and interesting! Very similar to wine-tasting, but for chocolate! We tried many types of dark chocolates from 50% to 100% and flavoured chocolates (hazelnut praline PLEASE). It was so coohl to know the differences between how much chocolate is used vs milk vs sugar vs no sugar etc. I was completely sold, obviously.
The host also let us try their chocolate beer, which I loved! I bought a bottle for myself too (safely stored away for a better occasion) and some chocolate gin (which I will wait patiently to try on a very special occasion, which very high quality tonic water)!
This was my first Yelp event, and I was pleasantly surprised by how welcoming the other Yelpers were and how much perks you get from being an active member of the community. I mean, you get to try such interesting food, visit new businesses and learn new things like literally all the time! This was free by the way (the chocolates and drinks provided too!), so basically I was invited to an exclusive event that didn't burn a hole in my wallet (even though I couldn't resist getting some Hotel Chocolat stuff for myself ;)).
I became even more active on Yelp ever since, just to see what other events I could attend (there's A LOT on Yelp!). Why wouldn't I right? Soon after, I was nominated to be an Elite member! Woohoo! So now, I'm extremely active! I don't even Facebook as much anymore, I just Yelp.
So this was my first Elite event ever! Briony invited me to participate in the Escape game thing that's been so popular everywhere lately. I've seen so many pictures of people in KL doing it too and I always wondered what it was all about but never bothered actually finding out (haha). Luckily I could try it out here with other Yelpers too!
Basically, you're put into a locked room with a team of 6 other people and you have to solve all the puzzles in the room to set yourselves freeeeee! There were about 6-8 puzzles? It was suppose to last 45 minutes but my team finished in at 36 minutes woohoo (even though Briony's team beat us by 3 minutes D:)!
It was super fun! I didn't know what to expect but when actually playing the game and solving the puzzles, was awesome! I'm not too intelligent but I did contribute like 30% to the puzzle solving (hahahaha not bad whaaart). After that, we had pints provided by the folk from Heverlee and food (and desserts) from the Blue Chair!
This night was a tiring one for me because I opened up and made new friends! Chatted for quite a bit over some beer and it was great.
For team building or just general fun with a group of friends, I'd really recommend trying out Escape Glasgow. It's so fun! Some puzzles were so challenging, but you feel like royalty after solving everything!
Anyway, here are some events that I got to attend while being a new active member of Yelp! :) All photos (except from the Tennent's tour) are by Alasdair Watson and videos are by Stephen Lister.
***
Yelp Chocolate-tasting; Hotel Chocolat
This was my first ever Yelp event! I was invited by the Community Manager, Briony, via the Yelp app. At first I was like, "Whoah" because I thought these things were only for specific people like extremely loyal Yelpers (VVVIPs ya know) and then I was like "Okay let's give it a try". I told Briony "Yes!", the night came and there I was at Hotel Chocolat at St Enoch. The small event was happening after the shops in the shopping centre closed, which made me totally feel like a VIP to be honest (haha).
They closed (or locked us) up in the store and started serving champagne and some chocolates to try before the host/manager appeared. When everyone was seated comfortably, we were given some Hotel Chocolat merchandise and notepads, to keep track of certain things the host will mention along the night.
So anyway, basically we were taught about how Hotel Chocolat makes their chocolate, how you differentiate the quality of chocolates, distinguish flavours and smells ... it was all very new and interesting! Very similar to wine-tasting, but for chocolate! We tried many types of dark chocolates from 50% to 100% and flavoured chocolates (hazelnut praline PLEASE). It was so coohl to know the differences between how much chocolate is used vs milk vs sugar vs no sugar etc. I was completely sold, obviously.
The host also let us try their chocolate beer, which I loved! I bought a bottle for myself too (safely stored away for a better occasion) and some chocolate gin (which I will wait patiently to try on a very special occasion, which very high quality tonic water)!
This was my first Yelp event, and I was pleasantly surprised by how welcoming the other Yelpers were and how much perks you get from being an active member of the community. I mean, you get to try such interesting food, visit new businesses and learn new things like literally all the time! This was free by the way (the chocolates and drinks provided too!), so basically I was invited to an exclusive event that didn't burn a hole in my wallet (even though I couldn't resist getting some Hotel Chocolat stuff for myself ;)).
I became even more active on Yelp ever since, just to see what other events I could attend (there's A LOT on Yelp!). Why wouldn't I right? Soon after, I was nominated to be an Elite member! Woohoo! So now, I'm extremely active! I don't even Facebook as much anymore, I just Yelp.
This is Hotel Chocolat! Really need to go back and get more chocolate (mooooooooore).
They have SO MANY selection of chocolates. I swear I spent like 20 minutes staring blindly at the shelves, hoping a decision of which I should buy for myself would be made somehow. I ended up buying the Hazelnut Pralines (which were the ones they offered us to try during the night).
Listening intensely to the manager, explaining about the history and makings of chocolate.
Give me more!
This was the Tasting Tree diagram that helped us identify the scent, textures and flavours of the chocolates that we tasted.
These at my favourite! Really need to go back to get some more chocolates!
***
Yelp Elite Event; Escape Glasgow
So this was my first Elite event ever! Briony invited me to participate in the Escape game thing that's been so popular everywhere lately. I've seen so many pictures of people in KL doing it too and I always wondered what it was all about but never bothered actually finding out (haha). Luckily I could try it out here with other Yelpers too!
Basically, you're put into a locked room with a team of 6 other people and you have to solve all the puzzles in the room to set yourselves freeeeee! There were about 6-8 puzzles? It was suppose to last 45 minutes but my team finished in at 36 minutes woohoo (even though Briony's team beat us by 3 minutes D:)!
It was super fun! I didn't know what to expect but when actually playing the game and solving the puzzles, was awesome! I'm not too intelligent but I did contribute like 30% to the puzzle solving (hahahaha not bad whaaart). After that, we had pints provided by the folk from Heverlee and food (and desserts) from the Blue Chair!
This night was a tiring one for me because I opened up and made new friends! Chatted for quite a bit over some beer and it was great.
For team building or just general fun with a group of friends, I'd really recommend trying out Escape Glasgow. It's so fun! Some puzzles were so challenging, but you feel like royalty after solving everything!
Chit chat over a pint.
The winners of the night! 33 minutes in the Escape room!
We took over Escape Glasgow on Tuesday night with Heverlee Beer and The Blue Chair – check out the video to see what our events are all about!Read about it on Yelp: http://bit.ly/YelpEscapeGlasgowTunes are "Blueacide" by Graphiqs Groove (http://graphiqsgroove.blog46.fc2.com/), video by Stephen Lister.
Posted by Yelp Glasgow on Friday, March 20, 2015
***
Yelper's go for a Tennents Tour!
The other day, Gian and I joined a group of other Yelpers at the Tennents Caledonian Brewery for a tour! Tennents is the most famous beer brand in Scotland and it's quite popular internationally too. This was my first time in a brewery for beer (and it was pretty damn massive), it was so exciting!
We were brought around the visitor centre, distribution area, filtration; where they actually make the beer, the Tennent's Training Academy; where you join classes to learn how to make cocktails, coffee, etc (a lot of professional standard classes) and lastly, to have some beer tasting SLURP.
Gian, lookin' like a gent.
Why aren't cans like this anymore? So pretty!
At one point in time, Tennent's had a collection of beer cans with pictures of female models. These are now valuable collector's items!
The Yelpers with their hair nets/shower caps haha
Lookin' classy.
This was our tour guide! He was pretty good and friendly. We had problems hearing him at some points of the tour though because at times, the workers or huge lorries would make noise while we're walking outside the brewery, but over all it was great! He knew quite a lot about the Tennent's history and different types of beers!
Why doesn't this car still exist?
Apparently, this brewery can hold up to 1.7 million (++) of pints at a time! I think that's much more than the actual population of Glasgow ... cray.
These are the seeds that they use to make the beer. The filtration room smelled like a pet shop, seriously, and the hops smelled like rabbit food! Can't believe actual beer smells so much sweeter than this. Like magic!
This is the packaging and distribution area! Doesn't look like much but a ton of things happen in this space alone!
Here's the Tennent's Training Academy! They were having a Tapas and Sangria night! Wish I could join.
At the end of the tour, we were served beer beer beer! A lot of delicious beer! I'm not particularly a beer person (more of a cocktail and wine lady), but everything I had was sweet, refreshing and tasty! My favourite was the summer edition called Lemon T! Give the tour a try if you love beer!
***
Yelp Elite Event; Cubatas Tapas Bar
Last week, I attended an Elite dinner party at the Cubatas Tapas Bar here in Glasgow. This time, I could bring Gian along (since he's been missing out on all the fun haha). We were there to try out the restaurant's new spring menu! They wanted us to be the Yelping guinea pigs (and I'm not complaining at all about it! Use me as your guinea pig as much as you want!).
While there, we were served a lot of tapas dishes (that I really wish I could have right now because I'm super hungry while typing this), lovely house wine and Brockman's Gin cocktails (which were superb). Again, it was a lovely night! Nice to see all the Elite members there! So many in the community, and look forward to our next dinner together!
I have one of those rad shades. B)
Slurp.
Gian was very happy with his cocktail.
Briony is the Queen of Yelp Glasgow!
We teamed up with Cubatas and Brockmans Gin to bring Glasgow Yelpers a delicious evening of tapas and gin! Check out the video and get involved on Yelp if you want exclusive invites to these parties and more.(Video by Stephen Lister, music by Los Campesinos "You! Me! Dancing!")
Posted by Yelp Glasgow on Friday, April 10, 2015
Abrupt end to this post. Truly happy to be a part of this community and I hope I can continue for many years to come! Also, can't wait to join more Yelp events! :)
K bye.
K bye.
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