NEFF Event: Behind oven doors

NEFF, the company behind the only ovens in the world with the slide and hide doors, held a blogger event on Friday and I was lucky enough to attend.

I was actually attending the event on behalf of The High Tea Cast (I'll link back to the post once I've fact checked) but I couldn't let it pass by without a mention on here too because: 1. It was the first event I have attended that involved other food/lifestyle bloggers, and 2. Because it involved spending the day under the watchful gaze of Lynn, the Home Economist that advises for the Great British Bake Off. That's right people, I spent the day in the presence of someone who has been inside the tent. 

After a short 2 hour jaunt down the M1 (have blog will travel) I arrived characteristically early and had to wait for everyone else to arrive. 

Waiting for other people to arrive at an event by yourself is one of the most nerve racking things you will ever do, first of all you get the "Oh god, am I even in the right place?!" - cue friendly event organiser to arrive with a smile and a point in the right direction, then you get the "I haven't met anybody before, am I going to spend the whole day alone like a total plank?!" - cue an army of gorgeous, lovely bloggers, before you finally settle into  "THIS EVENT IS TOTALLY AWESOME!". 

The event itself was broken down into sections: Talk, Play, Eat, Repeat. To kick things off we were introduced to the team that would be looking after us for the day, before being given a little run down of the ovens. I'm not currently in the market for a new oven, what with having just moved to a house with a gas range (the excitement over this oven is slowly ebbing away after yet another baking disaster over the weekend), however, the Slide and Hide ovens are fantastic and a definite must for a gadget chef.

These things have settings for everything. You don't need to know how to cook, you don't need to pull the door properly, you won't even need to know how to clean next year (they'll be releasing self cleaning Slide and Hides next year....hello lazy cooking!). 

After the talk we then moved onto cooking what would end up being our lunch and playing with the ovens. Poor Haydy got stuck with me and we got stuck into making the worlds best ever Cous Cous salad.

It may or may not have had a slight crust on the bottom by the time we'd done but it still tasted pretty damn fine and we soon had spare time to have a nosey at what other people were making:

Flatbreads and wild boar patties, goats cheese and ccaramelised onion tarts, salmon tarts, vegetable tart,

All served with grilled vegetables and a little Cous Cous salad

Topped off with a chocolate fondue. 

Nothing brings people together like food and all of this did just the trick. Lunching with other bloggers is possibly my favourite thing in the blogging world, as we all sat down the cameras came out without being met with complaint, it was a real revelation! Before long the silence that comes with good food was completely destroyed by chatter and loud laughter as we all swapped blogging stories and advice.

Having completed talk, play, and eat it was time for repeat. This time the talk came in the form of a baking demonstration. Lynn talked us through a demo on using the ovens to bake bread. Showing us how to make tear and share we saw the proving setting for the oven in action.

Bloggers gonna blog!

While we waited for the bread to bake to complete our Afternoon tea we had time to play with the ovens which resulted in a lot of bloggers opening oven doors. 

Talk. Play. EAT. We rounded the day off with an Afternoon tea comprised of scones (the Cornish - and correct - way) and the freshly baked tear and share. 

The whole event was brilliant and I definitely learned a lot about these ovens - they're not just a slightly famous face. If I was in the market for a new oven these would be a mighty contender to beat for me, although saying that I may decide to upgrade sooner if my range doesn't start playing ball (any advice on how to use one of these god forsaken things would be great!) it might be sooner than you'd think. 

A massive thank you to Joe Blogs and The High Tea Cast for inviting me to the event, to the fabulous staff at NEFF for such a fantastic day - prominently Austin, Jo and Lynn, and thank you all the amazing bloggers I spent the day with, you're all total legends. 

You should get these blogs in your life: Haydy, Sophie, Emma, Claire, Katie, and check out Curry's post on the event and @_bakeityourself on Twitter and Instagram for inspiration too.