Gnocchi with broccoli pesto

Today I bring you a gorgeous green meal.  It is also quick to put together.  As I seem to spend my life looking for green meals and easy dinners, this is just my sort of dinner.  It suits all seasons but I liked it for the change of season because it has the bright colours and flavours of summer and the stodgy comfort of winter.  A meal of looking back and looking forward.

This was a meal to make after work when energy is low.  I blended the broccoli pesto in the a jug with a hand held blender.  This was quicker than the high speed blender but I also think it was preferable to have a bit of texture in the pesto.  I added lemon which weren't in the original recipe on taste.com.au because it needed brightening.

The first time we made the gnocchi was when there was no baby spinach in the supermarket.  I was shocked to find the refridgerated section with the packaged greens was empty.  The packaged spinach I was after had been recalled due to due to a contamination recall.  Fortunately this is a pretty flexible recipe.  We used edamame instead of the spinach.  (See above and below photos.)

The pesto was great no matter which vegies get used.  It is so good with the gnocchi.  With the broccoli I find it more substantial than most pesto.  I had lots of pesto left over both times.  It was great to add to stews and sandwiches but the broccoli meant it didn't last too long without that overwhelming brassica smell.  I think it could probably be frozen if you are not going to use it within days, but i have not tried it. 

The taste.com.au recipe called for mint in the pesto.  I really wanted to try it.  Mint grows like a weed in our garden.  It is one of the plants that seeds easily and can be found cosying up to other pot plants.  Unfortunately Sylvia does not like mint in her meals so it is hard to find an opportunity to use it.  Mint and peas go together so well that I hope to try this dish with mint some day.  She preferred the pesto with basil but it does not grow so abundantly in the garden nor is it great quality in the shops outside its season.  When we could not get basil, we made the pesto with parsley which grows well in our garden and is easy to buy in the shops.  There are many options.  I would also love to try this pesto with some nuts but I will need to do this when Sylvia is not about. 

This dish is so flexible.  As well as options for the pesto, there are many serving options.  We tried it with goats cheese and also with our favourite tofu bacon.  There are many options: parmesan, pinenuts, nutritional yeast flakes and fresh herbs.  And while I love all these, I really love how it looks with all that green vegies and herbs.  This is set to become one of our favourite recipes in regular rotation.

More gnocchi recipes on Green Gourmet Giraffe:

Baked gnocchi with radicchio, gorgonzola and walnuts
Beetroot Gnocchi with Pea Pesto
Cauliflower, zucchini and butter bean gnocchi
Gnocchi with Mexican corn (v)
Gnocchi with pesto and asparagus (v)
Panfried Gnocchi with Cauliflower and Peas
Truffle gnocchi (v)
Walnut and tomato pesto with gnocchi, broccoli and feta  

Gnocchi with broccoli pesto
Adapted from taste.com.au
Serves 4

500g potato gnocchi
1 cup (120g) frozen peas or edamame
60g baby spinach leaves

Broccoli pesto:

200g broccoli florets
1/3 cup (25g) finely grated parmesan
3 spring onions, sliced
1 garlic clove
1/4 cup (60ml) olive oil
1/2 cup basil, parsley or mint
juice of 1/2 a medium lemon
seasoning

Serving options: parmesan, goats cheese, tofu bacon

Make the broccoli pesto: Chop and cook the broccoli until al dente for about 1 min in the microwave.  Add remaining ingredients and blend.  I used a tall jug and a hand held blender.  Check seasoning.

Bring salted water to the boil in a large saucepan.  Add peas and gnocchi, cover and heat on high heat until the water boils.  Drain and mix with pesto.   Serve with parmesan, goats cheese or tofu bacon if desired.

On the Stereo:
Being the first female rabbi of Australia's largest Jewish congregation, featuring Jacki Ninio on Soul Search, ABC National radio podcast.

My Monthly Chronicles: April 2025

April was a month of public holidays, school holidays and annual leave.  Time for outings, catching up with family and friends, and so much to do around the home.  It was also a big month of politics with Australia's federal election campaign.  We enjoyed some Easter themed fun, fancy cafe meals and shopping trips.  It is a sign of how busy we were that we booked to see a taping of Charlie Pickering's The Weekly at the ABC studios and forgot to go there (sorry Charlie).  There was plenty else to entertain us but I would have loved to see the satirical current affairs show live.

I have written more about the month in In My Kitchen: April 2025.  In addition I spent time in April writing longer blog posts on our favourite places Tylers Milkbar in Preston and Coburg Farmers Market.  We have been to both places so many times that there was a lot to share.

The above photo is of our Shadow and a couple of neighbourhood cats hanging out in our back lane.  Shadow loves spending time there, especially when I take my bike out that way.   The cobblestones really shake my bones when I ride along the lane but I appreciate that they are a nod to the history of the suburb.

Guard cat

On a trip to Fitzroy we saw a house with a sign on the gate saying: attention: chat de guarde.  It amused us to watch the "guard cat" at the window with his watchful eyes on the neighbourhood.

Lune Bakery, Fitzroy

We were in Fitzroy to try the Easter specials at Lune Bakery (119 Rose Street).  Sylvia had the Hot cross cruffin with mixed spices, dried fruit and candied peel.  It was topped with a traditional cross and filled with brown mousseline, which seems to be a fancy sort of custard.  You can see in the photo all the croissant layers and the creamy filling.  Mine was the Chocolate hot cross cruffin which had cocoa choc chip croissant pastry with a chocolate mousseline and topped with a cocoa cross.  These were amazingly delicious riffs on the traditional hot cross bun that showcased the croissant baking and flavours that we love at this popular bakery.

Hot cross bun turtle pendant

Easter was a great opportunity for Sylvia to wear her hot cross bun turtle pendant that she bought a year or two ago.  She loves to wear lots of jewellery and often added in this pendant into the mix in April.

 Political advertising

This was the most memorable political advertisement of all those I saw on walls.  It was not in the best of taste but it was clever.  For anyone who does not know Australian political history, Harold Holt was a prime minster who went for a swim in the 1960s and was never found again.  To tell anyone to "make like Harold Holt and take a swim" is a veiled insult.

Brotherhood of St Lawrence op shop, Brunswick

I was sad when the Brunswick Brotherhood of St Lawrence op shop moved from a sprawling warehouse on Barkly Street to its current site at 145 Lygon Street.  The old place was the sort of op shop I went to in my student days.  Actually I think I did go there in my student days.  Although it had a glam corner, it was mostly no frills and lots of furniture.  I loved looking through all the old furniture and imagining the possibilities.  I am sure I could find something in my house from that place. 

Then they moved to a smaller place without half a warehouse of old tatty furniture.  It was a shock to see the new digs when they moved but now some time has passed I can cope with it.  You can see in the photo that it is a bit more glam with the fancy archway and cool clothes and guitars hanging from the ceiling and there is a fancy round display table when you come in the door.  My favourite area is the bookshelves with the comfy couch.  We were there recently and I found myself a giraffe plate to use as a key holder.  (You can glimpse it in the background of a baked goods  photo in this month's In My Kitchen.)

Centre Place, CBD

Centre Place in the city is such a cool lane to walk down in the city.  It has changed since I used to go there and check out Kinki Gerlinki (such a good name for a clothes store) and have brunch at Cafe Issus and head upstairs for a meal at Hell's Kitchen.  

Yet it has a similar vibe with the light streaming down the narrow bustling street.  Though Kinki Gerlinki and Hell's Kitchen are still there they are not my sort of places any more and the street art is no longer so impressive by the entrance of the Centre for Adult Education (which is no longer there), on a recent stroll I was quite taken by the chocolate baking at Mork and that ShanDong MaMa has a mini restaurant there.

Seedling, CBD

While in the city, I had lunch at Seedling (275 Flinders Lane).  I had a vegan fritatta with Cowboy Style Rice Salad and Broccoli Quinoa Salad with Maple Mustard Dressing and Pomegranate.  I was surprised to see that the menu boasted it was a 100% gluten free kitchen.  I don't remember that last time I visited.  But it certainly is a good place to get healthy vegan and gluten free food.  I really loved the vegan fritatta - it was warm and squidgy with vegetables through it.  I had a relaxing solo meal reading about Tim Rodgers from You Am I in the Big Issue.

Easter chocolates

Not long before Easter, I went shopping for a birthday present.  I decided to look for chocolates and at this time of year, it is hard to avoid all the Easter specials.  It was a surprise to see how much chocolate prices have risen since I last looked at fancy chocolate shops.  A more pleasant discovery was how gorgeous the chocolate were.  Koko Black had a wonderful range of chocolate Aussie creatures.  The hollow Pip Platypus was so adorable but at $44 for 210g of sculpted milk chocolate left me gobsmacked!  Whereas I was delighted by the painted shop window at the corner of Degraves Street with Australian gum trees at the top and bunnies and eggs down the bottom.  A lovely blend of old world tradition and celebrating our local culture.

Fisherman's Beach, Mornington

I ended up buying some Haighs chocolate to take to the birthday party at o take to a party at The Royal Hotel in Mornington.  After the party, Sylvia wanted to go to a Mornington op shop.  I dropped her off to shop with her dad while I went to walk along Fisherman's Beach and admire the coloured beach huts.

Kerry Greenwood died in April.  She was best known for her 1920s Phrynne Fisher mystery novels that were made into a television series.  Many years ago I remember seeing her talk on the historical research that went into her writing.  It made me all the more impressed when I read her novels and watched the tv show.  She made a great contribution to Australian historical fiction with a strong female heroine.

Flowers at Joe's Market Garden, Coburg

April brought some lovely mild Autumn weather for riding my bike along the Merri Creek Bike Track.  I often ride past Joe's Market Garden and was vaguely aware it was an organic farm linked to CERES in Brunswick.  I found myself admiring rows of flowers in the field.  I stopped and had a walk to look at them up close.  When I spoke to someone working there I found that there was a pick your own bunch of flowers for purchase on weekends.  I meant to return for this but was busy.

Mile End Bagels, Brunswick

After hearing Sylvia rave about Mile End Bagels (1 Wilkinson Street, Brunswick) after her two visits I was keen to try it.  When she told me about having the Easter special hot cross bun bagel with a spiced cream cheese filling, we made a time to go.  I was very sad that by the time we arrived, they have sold out of the Hot Cross Bun bagels.  Instead I had the number 11:  Beetroot, avocado, cashew cream cheese & rocket. and Sylvia had the number 4: Avocado, chive cream cheese, tomato, pink salt & chilli oil with an a iced strawberry matcha.  They were excellent.  They weren't the chewiest bagels but really nice especially the everything bagel seasoning.  

It was a popular little hole-in-the wall lunch spot in an industrial laneway off Albert St.  We had our bagels on the small seating space and then went on our way with Pulp's Mile End (from the Trainspotting soundtrack) playing in my head.  

Tylers Milkbar, Preston

We had an Easter visit to Tylers Milkbar (656 Plenty Rd) for their Easter egg hunt and brunch.  It was quite busy and I just wanted something light.  After all we had won a brownie each after finding a couple of the Easter egg picture on the local egg hunt.  I had a small breakfast quiche with a puffed pastry shell and a buttered hot cross bun.  My HCB was vegan so it had a pink cross to differentiate it from the regular hot cross buns.  As always we had great food and enjoyed the vibes of the place. 

Easter Quiz

My dad has been doing Easter egg hunts for his grandkids for many years.  However they are getting older.  He changed tack this year and did an Easter quiz instead.  Every kid that did the quiz got a chocolate Bilby (the pink one in the above photo).  The kids still got a generous amount of Easter chocolate from their aunts and uncles.

Easter Sunday lunch

I had a lovely Easter Sunday lunch with my parents and a smaller family group than usual.  I took along a nut roast to have with salad and roast potatoes.  It was lovely but the nut roast was a bit dry.  (Sylvia was not impressed with the nut roast I left for her Easter lunch with her dad).  For dessert we had a pavolva with peppermint crisp and a berry baked cheesecake made by mum, peanut brownie cupcakes made by my sister Fran and Easter rice crispy nests with mini eggs that I made.  We ate well!

Tin Pot Cafe, Fitzroy North

We took E out for his birthday to the elegant Tin Pot Cafe (248-250 St Georges Rd).  E had the ALT: Avocado, Lettuce and Tomato with mayo, Sylvia had fried eggs on toast with feta, and I had the Grilled Haloumi Plate with tzatziki, sourdough toast, lemon wedges, salad leaves and a tomato mint avocado salsa.  I really loved mine which I ate by piling haloumi, salsa and greens on the toast.  The haloumi was perfectly golden grown and crispy.  We loved gazing around the beautiful room with green walls, a big vase of flowers, old furniture, mirrors and bric-a-brac.

Mini Me Mango cafe, Bundoora

Following a dentist appointment, we had a lovely lunch at Mini Me Mango cafe (24 Scholar Drive).  Sylvia had an iced matcha and the Banana Bread French Toast: Cinnamon banana bread French toast, served with fresh strawberries, apple slaw, crumble crumb, berry sauce, vanilla bean ice cream, whipped matcha & taro mascarpone, maple syrup ($21.50).  This was one of the best dishes in the month.  

My meal was very nice but not as amazing as the French Toast.  I had ordered from the display rather than the menu.  The spinach, sweet potato and feta fritters came as a couple and were much bigger than I expected.  The beetroot, pumpkin, tomato, cucumber, salad greens, quinoa and feta salad went well with the fritters but I was too interested in sneaking mouthfuls of the French Toast and also the lovely haloumi chips that we had on the side.  We were very full and took home leftovers.

 
Remembering Catherine of the Cate Speaks political blog

I was pleased to discover a Tumblr blog called Blatantly partisan party reviews which had more detailed information on parties/candidate's positions.  This led me to finding Something for Cate, which also reviews political parties/candidates.  This latter site made me happy to see that they had taken over where Catherine (of the delightful Cates Cates food blog) wrote her Cates Speaks blog on political parties and candidates.  I discovered these just as I was missing Catherine's political insights since she died a few years ago.  Thanks to these people who help share information about the convoluted world of political parties.

In the news: 

It was an intense month of news with Donald Trump's tariff war in the global media and the Australian federal election closer to home.  One of the interesting moments in the latter campaign was opposition leader Peter Dutton back-pedalling on his policy to end Working from Home when it turned out it was not a vote winner.  Trump was a shadow over our election but his election in 2024 also made us reflect on the difference between our systems.  We have compulsory voting, preferential voting and we vote for a local member to represent us in the federal parliament with the ruling political party electing the leader who will be prime minister.

My list of links below has some very intense articles and some lighter ones.  I hope this is something for you there:

It's Liberation Day - Whoopee!  (a satire on Trump's Liberation Day) by  Terence Mills in The Australian Independent Media Network, 1 April 2025.

What Donald Trump's dramatic US trade war means for global climate action, in The Conversation, 3 April 2025.

Abigail Disney: ‘Every billionaire who can’t live on $999m is kind of a sociopath’ by John Harris in the Guardian, 7 April 2025.

Pulp unveil their first new album in 24 years, BBC News, 10 April 2025.

On doing the same inadequate shit over and over again until the end of democracy by Dave Milner in The Shot, 11 April 2025.

The rise of end times fascism (far right USA), by Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor in The Guardian, 13 April 2025.

Sexy covetable hot cross buns: Australia's obsession with Easter treats: in The Guardian, 15 April 2025.

Albanese claims victory in Vegemite fight as Canada concedes spread poses ‘low’ risk to humans, in The Guardian, 19 April 2025.

As Dutton’s election campaign implodes, Albanese is allowed to coast and voters end up the losers, by Amy Reimikis Substack (Pyjama Politics), 22 April 2025.

Over five decades, here's how the voters have shifted away from the major parties, by Casey Briggs in the ABC News, 24 April 2025.

Street art in Melbourne: Preston

Last year I took quite a few street art photos around Preston.  When I saw a lovely piece of artwork last week, I decided it was time to collate as many of my Preston street art photos as possible, dating back to 2014.  I could not find a few but there is plenty of colour and imagination here.  Above is one of my fave artworks from the walls of Jackson Dodds cafe.  Another bird - a parrot - can seen below.  Enjoy.

 The bike rider on a wall at Northland, 2014.

 An angel at Northland, 2015.

Above and below - a couple and bird art, 2017.

I get a laugh every time I pass this old Real Estate business where someone has painted the words Secret Agents.  It is so Get Smart.  (below)

Below are photos from  2024 (around Gilbert Road, Plenty Road, the Nevoliany Scopia Social Club at 1 Miller Street, Circus Nexus on Chifley Drive)

This last photo was taken just days ago on the wall of Newlands Primary School.  It is so beautiful and immersive.

More posts with street art from the inner North of Melbourne:

• Street Art in Melbourne #2 Ann Street, East Brunswick
• Street Art in Melbourne: Brunswick 2024
• Street Art in Melbourne: Coburg III 
• Street Art in Melbourne: Coburg VI 
• Street Art in Melbourne: Northcote 2023

In My Kitchen: April 2025

April has been a month of big moments: Daylight savings ends, School holidays, birthdays, my annual leave, Easter, ANZAC Day and my blog birthday. And a federal election campaign squeezed in between all of this. (Spoiler: Labour won!)  My bike rides have been much colder in the morning.  In the evenings it is getting dark so early I need my lights on my bike on the way home from work.  At home the garden is enjoying cooler weather with some rain showers.  In the kitchen we've had creative moments, lazy evenings, exciting purchases, a few days without a door on a kitchen cupboard, 

We have had so much furikake sprinkled on our meals that I decided to try making it at home.  The seasoning needed a slight adjustment but it was very good.  As you can see on the label on the jar above it was made with sesame seeds, seaweed, nutritional yeast flakes, salt and sugar.  I will experiment further with roasting nori, adjusting seasoning and the best way to grind the mixture.  Stay tuned...

One of my favourite new recipes in April was Gnocchi with Broccoli Pesto.  It was so good we made it twice.  The first time, we didn't have spinach as there had been a recall of baby spinach in the supermarkets.  I added lemon juice, cooked the broccoli for a minute and substituted basil for mint.  We enjoyed it with tofu bacon.  The second time I had the spinach and peas in the recipe but added edamame and served it with goats cheese.  It is so easy and delicious for a quick meal after work.

This was a sandwich I made with the broccoli pesto that I made for the gnocchi above.  It was a simple sandwich of pesto, cheese tomato and lettuce.  I used Burgen bread which I have been buying quite a bit lately.  I especially love the soy and linseed which was a preferred bread in my student days.  Sylvia is not keen on seeded bread but I love it so I have been eating this bread myself.  When I have too much at the end of the week, it freezes well.  

I wish I had had some leftover tofucado to add to the sandwich.  Check out my Tofucado post this month for this easy dinner that is a cross between a stirfy and a salad.

I was excited to see the Lowland Celery Salad recipe on Joy the Baker recently.  I was enjoying raw celery over summer and loved the sound of this salad with lots of walnuts, dates, cheese and mint with the celery.  I even put in the shallots which I don't usually use.  It was lovely and made some great work lunches.  For fun I put my muppet lemon in the middle.  My lemons have not been great lately but I am hoping they might improve this winter.

We had a great meal of vegies, hummus , falafel and turkish bread.  We bought my favourite local falafel at Half Moon Cafe and the best soft fluffy Turkish bread at Melbourne Kebab Station.

 

A few weeks back I was having a stressful day and decided to make "grubs" which were my childhood fave.  I tweaked the recipe to have black cocoa and chocolate ripple biscuits so the mixture was particularly dark.  I also added 2 tablespoons of white miso.  It made the condensed milk mixture much less sweet but it was also quite sticky.  Instead of rolling into balls I made it into a slice with plenty of coconut sprinkled on the bottom and the top.  It was great comfort food and fun to experiment with a favourite recipe.

We went to a surprise birthday party at the Royal Hotel in Mornington.  Sylvia made a lovely birthday card (that our friend was keeping til his birthday which has now yet occurred.)  She ended up making quite a few cards.  I really loved this lighthouse one that she made (which was not the one that we gave to our friend).

In the week before Easter, I rode to Back Alley Bakes to buy some fancy hot cross buns.  It was busier than usual.  No wonder!  Their traditional hot cross buns were so good.  This was reflected in the prices with a single bun selling for $5.50 and half a dozen for $30. That's more for one bun than a 6 pack but it was worth it to have such good buns and support a local business.

I also enjoyed a vegan Tempeh-stuous Pastrami sandwich made with smoked tempeh coated in pastrami spices topped with dill pickles, sour cream and purple kraut.  The tempeh is from a local business called Wilder Foods.

While I was very happy with the traditional hot cross buns from Back Alley Bakes, Sylvia was delighted with her brulee hot cross buns.  She gathered that the baked hot cross buns had the top scooped out and filled with custard and caramlised on top with a flame.  She loved that it was crisp enough at the top to satisfyingly crack with the tap of a spoon.

On Good Friday I baked my own overnight sourdough hot cross buns that I have been making for years.  For the dried fruit I used currants and dried peach chunks.  As always I made the crosses a bit thicker than most commercial buns because I love thick chewy crosses.  We both loved these hot cross buns.

For Easter Sunday lunch in Geelong, I made these GF snickers nests with gluten free rice bubbles and  mini eggs on top.  The nests were made using Snickers bars in the Mars Bar Slice recipe, dabbing some melted choc chips into the groove and placing mini eggs on it.  Shaping the warm rice bubble mixture as nests in the cupcake holes was challenging.  Once they had cooled in the fridget I was gad I had put circles of baking paper at the bottom of each hole before adding the mixture.   They looked really cute as part of the Easter desserts. 

My parents did not have an Easter egg hunt this year.  Their grandkids are getting too old.  Instead they did an Easter quiz and each kid got a chocolate bilby when they had completed it.  My neighbour has younger grandkids.  We helped my neighbour hide the Easter eggs in the front garden while they were having an early Easter lunch on Good Friday.  Sylvia was very happy to go from being the egg hunter to the egg hider.

I dropped into KFL, our local Asian supermarket, for some supplies that are harder to find at the supermarket and a few temptations.  According to the owners' website, most of the food is from China.  So it is easy to find frozen udon noodles, edamame and dried bean curd.  These bean curd sticks were pretty odd when soaked as they became pretty flaccid but I fried them up so they had crispy edges and we enjoyed them in a stirfry.  The multicoloured chocolate wafer sticks were so cute I could not resist.  

I was disappointed that the furikake only came in sachets and not in larger containers.  Nor was there many vegan choices  The one on offer was almost $5 for 30g.  It was delicious (ingredients: sesame seeds, sugar, seaweed, salt, yeast extract, corn starch syrup, dextrin) but not a regular purchase.  Hence my decision to try home made furikake, as you can see at the top of the post.

During my week of annual leave after Easter, we were going to go to Pentridge Palace cinemas but could not find the right film at the right moment so instead we had lunch at Lucky Little Dumplings.  Afterwards we went to Pentridge IGA and bought a few treats.  Sour blueberry twisties, discount Lindt Easter chocolate, Dubai chocolate cake bar and Honest eggs.  Yes it has come to the point where eggs seem like a treat as they as so scarce in the supermarkets.  

It was great to try Dubai chocolate, which has been a viral sensation and for good reason.  The pistachio kunafa layer was delicious though Sylvia was less enamoured with the cake layer.  I have had the creamy kunafa dessert (aka knafeh) and it was not my thing but I loved how the spun pastry gave a pleasant crunch to the green creamy pistachio layer.  I heard recently that the popularilyt of Dubai chocolate had led to a shortage of pistachios.  I can see why.

The sour blueberry Twisties that we bought at IGA were unsurprisingly on special.  They were really odd and disturbing.  Even the fluoro green glow of them was so unnerving that I had to take a photo.  We decided they were truly alien food.  Sylvia refused to eat them.  I ate them in a car crash fashion - it was bad but I kept having to eat another to tell myself that the sour and sweet flavours were just wrong in what is usually a savoury Twistie.  I would not buy them again but I am glad we tried them, though I could have done without the blue tongue afterwards.

Onto more serious things, a hinge broke on a kitchen cupboard door.  It was just hanging in there on one hinge.  Literally.  I tend to think a 1960s kitchen is a bit retro but not in the vintage-don't-make-them-any-more category.  I thought it would be a quick fix by my dad.  He spent a while mulling over the oddly shaped hinge and then spent a few hours trailing through six different hardware stores before he found similar hinges.  The sixth was a cabinet maker who told him that these sort of hinges were no longer made.  

The last place was a restoration place with lots of old hinges that my dad sorted through to find some we could use.  I had a couple of days without a door on the cupboard and was constantly resisting the urge to shut the door.  Once my dad had done an amazing repair job, we found that there was another type of hinge in the kitchen that was easier to do but that the original hinges were fashioned to be hidden away neatly.  They really don't make kitchens like that any more!

I had a yen to ride to Iris the Baker in Brunswick for bread but by the time I arrived, they were sold out.  I consoled myself with a wonderful cinnamon and citrus Morning bun for Sylvia and I to share.  Then I rode on to the Village Bakery in West Brunswick to buy a Potato, rosemary and honey sourdough loaf.  Once I got home I made fantastic salad sandwiches.  If you have good bread, you can easily make a good sandwich.

A while back, my dad put up a shelf for Sylvia to put pot plants.  Sylvia has so many plants that she is looking at the real estate on the fence for places to put the plants.  You can see she also has some hanging baskets on the fence to plant in.  Once the shelf was up, we had fun painting flowers on it.  Now Sylvia needs to find some low maintenance plants to grow up there.

Lastly is what Sherry calls a curveball.  She hosts the In My Kitchen event (see below) and I am so pleased she continues to host each month with great enthusiasm and generosity.  Sherry's curveballs are something not quite kitchen.  Often her curveballs are fun local works of art.  My curveball is a pottery toadstool house that Sylvia made over a few months at her fortnightly art sessions.  It was so thoughtful of her because she knew that I had been admiring toadstool houses at markets.  Isn't it gorgeous!

I am sending this post to Sherry of Sherry's Pickings for the In My Kitchen event. 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 visit more kitchens and her gorgeous hand drawn header.  Thanks to Sherry for continuing to host this even that brings together some wonderful bloggers who share glimpses into their kitchens.

Note: although I would love to be organised enough to publish my In My Kitchen post on 1st of the month, I am pleased to post on 5 May 2025 which is Square Root Day because 5 x 5 is 25. Yay to days with fun numbers!