In My Kitchen - February 2019

The January holidays are over!  School's back!  Work's back!  No more sleeping in and swimming.  January was both busy and relaxing.  We were either out all day and exhausted or sitting around at home doing nothing but watching Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events tv series on Netflix.  Sylvia enjoyed some cooking over the holidays and we have eaten lots of easy summer meals like the hummus platters above.  I am just back to work after 5 weeks off work and still getting my head around being in the office.  And getting back to riding to work again which was not fun when I got a puncture on my second day on my bike.

Sylvia dropped her ipad while taking it to my mum's.  We were wringing our hands at getting it fixed until I remembered we had put a screen protector on it.  So when I peeled off the screen protector and found the actual screen was indeed protected and fine I was very relieved.  It cost us another $40 for a screen protector instead of a new ipad.

We had the Australia Day weekend recently.  We didn't celebrate because there are so many conversations about how hurtful this day is to our Indigenous people.  But we have been enjoying some patriotic Vegemite and Cheese Shapes.  They don't just taste good but they look so cute in the shape of Australia.  And they were great snack food when wandering around Sydney!

There was a lot of slime making over the holidays.  Sylvia went through a lot of activator and glue, has added shaving cream to lots of slime, and now has her own play tray to protect some her clothes and our furniture.

Slime is messy enough but Sylvia had a day when she mixed shaving cream and yoghurt and corn flour to make snow.  It was the messiest I have ever seen the kitchen.  Which is a big call to make.  It gave me the motivation I needed to mop the floor, wipe the cupboards and generally have a big clean up in the kitchen.  Because it needed it desperately once covered in this muck.  I have told her, never again!  Slime is much preferable.

We bought these camembert and fig Kettle chips for a bargain $1.50 at our local $2 shop.  Where many things aren't actually $2.  The cirsps were pretty good.  I am not sure the flavour was really as amazing as it looked on the packet but we felt fancy eating them.

I was given this soda stream for Christmas by my parents and just love it.  When I started to look at how many plastic bottles we were using in soda water it seemed wrong.  The soda stream is a great alternative.  I am unsure if it is quite as cheap because we aren't monitoring how many bottles we fizz up.  But it is great to have soda water on tap.  Worth sacrificing a little valuable kitchen bench real estate!

We gave Sylvia this three part plate from Muji for Christmas.  It is great for serving her food because she loves it all separate.  I even went to buy another at Muji but it was sold out.  I quite like it for dinner with chopped vegies.  I tried buying some blue cheese to have with seedy crackers (see above) and ended up putting it in some fritters as it was too strong on crackers.

We came back from our holiday in Sydney with a small amount of souvenirs.  A tea towel and fridge magnet from Manly.

A Sydney Luna Park tea towel.  Just for fun!

And some spoons with Indigenous artwork.

We haven't been at the farmers market much over summer but have had a few visits.  Berries and stone fruit have been magnificent.  I bought nice sourdough bread because it has been either too hot or too busy to bake sourdough.  And I bought some yellow beetroot on a whim but have only used some.

However my sourdough starter has been kept healthy by baking pizza and flatbreads.  The most amazing pizza I made was pretty simple with some leftover mac and cheese on a tomato sauce with some cheese on top.  Mmmm crispy crunchy carb on carb comfort!

Sylvia has been loving pouring over her copy of Jolly Good Food: a cookbook inspired by the stories of Enid Blyton.  So over the holidays she made some recipes from it.  Above is the Perfect Porridge with blueberries and cream.  Not pictured is the tropical smoothie.

And the biggest hit of the book so far has been the Smashing potato salad.  We have adjusted it to suit us.  No radish or spring onion or other but Sylvia loves to cut up herbs from the garden.  We add a drizzle of maple syrup to the dressing.  And it has been made quite a few times because we all love it. 

Sylvia has developed a love of the We Bare Bears over summer.  Her favourite bear is Ice Bear who likes to hang out in his fridge knitting and watching tv.  When his brothers have a drink he has a glass of ice.  So here is Sylvia's Ice Bear hanging out in our very crowded fridge with his cup of ice.

Our garden has been interesting over summer.  Our tomato plant has done well and producing some lovely sweet cherry tomatoes.  The plant just keeps growing taller.  It used to be as high as my hip but is now as high as my shoulder.  Before I know it will tower over me.  Sadly the raspberry plant we bought at the same time is dying and has never produced fruit.  I think maybe it has not liked all the heat.

Our lemon and lime trees went through a bad patch last year when they stopped fruiting but this summer they are promising a great yield.  I have been giving quite a bit of attention and lots of worm juice.

Back at work it is busy.  We have had quite a few German visitors arrive bearing gifts.  I have had gifts from them 3 of the 4 days I have been back at work!  Above are some lovely spice mixes: butterbrot gewurz (sandwich spice salt) and Romergewurz (Italian spices).  I had to check the internet for what was in them and was impressed.  On Friday we all were treated to lots of packets of Ritter chocolates.  Then today I was given a box of chocolate that were really pretty and most were generously spiked with alcohol but very delicious (but it took a while to work out the German names).  I think it will quieten at work with new visitors for a few days and then next week will bring more visitors. 

A friend of Sylvia's came on Friday night for a sleepover.  They woke early and baked cake!  Sylvia has started to make mini cakes that she makes up without a recipe.  They actually turn out ok.  This cake was a birthday cake for a Beanie Boo dolphin named Echo.  Just to make it a real party atmosphere there was a candle, some little cakes (chopped nak'd bars and muesli bars) and some little cups of salad.

We went to the farmers market on the weekend and visited a new stall by a business called Small Numbers, a small batch bakery.  The baking was amazing.  I tried the peanut butter and chocolate chunk biscuits and swooned.  I was so tempted by the miso caramel shortbread but went for the Scandanavian style cinnamon rolls.  They smelled so so so good and tasted every bit as good.  Soft and aromatic and full of spice.  I hope to see them again at the farmers market.

I am sending this post to Sherry of Sherry's Pickings for the In My Kitchen event, that was started by Celia of Fig Jam and Lime Cordial,  If you would like to join in, send your post to Sherry by 13th of the month.  Or just head over to her blog to peek into more kitchens.