In My Kitchen - March 2013

In my kitchen tonight is a cool breeze that is such a relief after a 9 day heatwave!  The cool change was such a relief that I baked bread and roasted pumpkin.  I am looking forward to using the oven more.  However what I have to show you today in my kitchen is mostly kid's parties, craft and summer food.  Not much cooking!

I will start with the heart biscuit above.  Isn't it the most gorgeous bikkie you have ever seen!  Sylvia was given it as a party favour after a kid's party.  It surprised me by tasting as good as it looked.  Soft and buttery.  Not that I was given much of a taste.

I always have 100s and 1000s sprinkles in my kitchen.  I have included a picture because I bought a new packet to celebrate Sylvia's birthday.  She loves fairy bread so I made her some for her party.  For the uninitiated, it is fresh white bread, spread with margarine and sprinkled with sugary 100s and 1000s that are probably filled with unnatural flavours and colourings.  It fills me with nostalgia for my childhood.

We have also been eating lots of fruit in our kitchen.  Peaches, nectarines, plums, grapes, apricots, watermelon, passionfruit.  Above are sugar plums.  Little cloudy purple plums with sweet yellow flesh.  I bought a carton of these for Sylvia's party and was eating them for days afterwards.  At least I felt better about these leftovers than all the chocolate cake.  (The cake is still in the freezer but we are slowly making our way through it.)

 

A cute fork that Sylvia was given as a birthday present.  She is enjoying using this set.  (Thanks Susie and girls.)

Another birthday present for Sylvia that isn't actually in my kitchen but is worth sharing.  It is a kitchen set for her dolls house.  Glasses, cups cutlery, saucepans and even a coffee maker.  So so cute.  (Thanks Chris, Fergal and Dash)  I must confess that they are still unopened.  They are so tiny I am worried they will disappear into a black hole.  I hope the delayed gratification will make them seem more precious to Sylvia.

As well as presents we have had quite a bit of craft happening.  Today we found poppit beads in a craft store.  Boy, they brought back memories.  Sylvia took to them with glee.  We also made button bracelets once we finally found some thin elastic (not as easy to find as you might think, especially when it involved finding that the Brunswick Spotlight had closed).

Last week the kitchen table was covered in painting after Sylvia suggested she paint in a spare 15 minutes.  It took far longer and we forgot about whatever we had planned to do after 15 minutes had elapsed.

Sylvia and E have been eating lots of Yoplait Petit Miam.  Each pot gets washed and seconded by Sylvia.  (Yes, she even washes some of them if given the chance!)  They get filled with little and tiny things to go into Sylvia's shop.  Then they get knocked over and make a mess.  Sigh!

Sushi is not easy to find in our local shopping strip.  A week or two back they were selling sushi at our local pool.  I told Sylvia I would buy her some.  There were no vegetarian options.  Sylvia was unfazed.  She suggested we make some at home.  We have been making it regularly ever since.  I have tried it filled with leftover pate and uncooked tofu bacon.  As I haven't been that great as sushi in the past, here are my learnings:

• It works best if the rice is spread thinly (with the back of a spoon) across most of the nori sheet leaving just enough at the end to seal it.
• If there is no filling (Sylvia's preference), it works quite well to roll up the sushi in a spiral.
• I love it with avocado, carrot, cucumber and tofu bacon.
• It doesn't roll very well if you spread the rice on the shiny side (as I tried today)
• The rice always sticks to the bottom of the saucepan - but less so if simmered on smallest gas flame.
• Leftover rice in a bear mould comes out fantastically if kept in the fridge overnight

I bought this novelty dish brush at the supermarket recently.  A great way to amuse Sylvia while out shopping.  I am not sure it had cheered up E about doing the dishes.

Some time back I complained about my water bottles.  We are still searching for the perfect water bottle in my household.  The green plastic bottle has been our favourite.  It seems leakproof if you keep the lid down but Safeway seems to have stopped selling them.  The blue one was ok.  E is quite fond of the green metal one lately but says it leaks slightly so he has to carry it in a plastic bag.

I have been buying fabrics for food photography props.  Very few have made it into photos but I love their pretty daintiness.  They came from (left to right) a market, an op shop, a vintage shop and a fabric shop.   (The creases are almost enough to make me want to buy an iron but who wants that sort of clutter!)

So there ends a peek around some foodie and not-so-foodie bits and bobs in my kitchen.  I am sending them to Celia for her In My Kitchen series.