Peace, Love & Giraffes

I was over the moon when my friend Mandy, who lives in our complex, invited me over for a ladies Valentine’s Day tea. First of all, it gave me an excuse to wear my bright red JCrew pants (not pictured, unfortunately) and I’ve never celebrated Valentine’s Day with my girlfriends before!

Mrs. McGrady, Mandy and Sian did such an amazing job decorating the table and making all of the amazing food. We sat outside on the veranda and ate, drank and talked for hours! Because it is summer here in South Africa, the weather was PERECT.

As far as the food goes, there were sweet and savory scones, tea sandwiches and of course, sweets! We also drank my recipe for a wine spritzer: half white wine + half flavoured sparkling water of your choice (we tried strawberry and passionfruit) and threw in raspberries & strawberries to make it pretty. Trust me, it is amazing! Everyone was drinking it. Next year I’m going to try a Rose wine (more festive!)

Mandy made Red Velvet cupcakes that I just about died over. The recipe is Nigella Lawson’s and you can get it here. There isn’t much more that says Valentine’s Day than Red Velvet cupcakes. I mean, sure there’s chocolate, red roses and champagne, but lets be honest, what every girl really wants for V-Day is a dozen Red Velvet cupcakes. Now that says love (take note, Jono).

I also found a healthy version of the cupcakes on Chocolate Covered Katie’s blog. She uses beet juice for the coloring and subs xylitol for the sugar. If you follow a GF diet, she also suggests a gluten-free flour you can use.

Now that I have celebrated with my girls, I want to make Valentines tea (and red velvet cupcakes) a yearly tradition! It was so much fun and really Valentines Day should be about all kinds of love, not just the love you have for your significant other.

How was your Valentines Day? Have you had a ladies’ only celebration before?