Category: Friends + Family
A weekend in Stockholm.
After one and a half years, I finally get to see my lovely friend Stina again. Last I saw her was when I left on this adventure, leaving her in a limousine with the rest of my friends at Melbourne Airport. We meet up in Sweden, with a plan to drive out into the countryside for Midsummer, as is the traditional Swedish way. But first, we all spent the weekend in Stockholm. Holed up in an apartment in Södermalm, a trendy island neighbourhood in central, we whiled away the time exploring design stores, coffee roasters and bakeries.
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Snippets of a London Summer.
I’ve been busy. I’ve finished my book! But in my small amount of spare time I’ve had, I’ve been soaking up the fabulous London summer. We have gone to the pub (a lot.)
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An American Independence Day in London.
As I am not in the USA for the 4th of July, I thought it would be fittingly hilarious to celebrate the 4th here in London – and celebrate the day that America gained independence from the chains of Great Britain – from within Great Britain.
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The Victoria Park Village Big Lunch.
Once a year, one of the main residential streets of our village is shut off to traffic, lined with trestle tables, and decorated with fabric flags. It is the Southborough Rd Big Lunch – and the whole street spends the weekend cooking and putting together menus.
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Victorian Sponge Cake in an Old Peanut Factory, Hackney Wick.
My lovely friend Allie of But First, Cake moved into an awesome converted warehouse space in the Old Peanut Factory in Hackney Wick. The Wick is a converted industrial area that has been relatively recently taken over by creatives who live in studio/warehouse spaces.
We have been meaning to do a housewarming for Allie for a while, and we finally got around to it.
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A Welsh Cake Tea Party.
I am staying with some very good friends and their daughter while I wait to move into my new house in Victoria Park Village – the house is just such a lovely buzzing hive of activity. It’s beautiful in summer, as the house just opens up to the back garden. Somehow, it was decided after we had all been pottering around all day, that we would make welsh cakes for afternoon tea.
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A Shoreditch Sunday.
It’s been a big weekend. I’ve been running myself ragged trying to finish this book, so just needed a few days of fun to reset my jumbled brain. We started on friday with some beers in the park with Banjo. Well, I started 30 minutes earlier when the village kids had come to hang out and decided that I was a human canvas for their masterpieces.
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Taste of London, Summer.
You might remember how ecstatic I get when Taste of Melbourne, the best food festival EVER comes around. Here is my raving hysteria and video from last years event. The Taste Festivals are held all around the world, and are the same the world over: except each is full of each places local chefs and local producers.
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A Venezuelan Brunch, beer in a coffee roasters + a microbrewery in our park.
Every time I go into Central London, I have the option to leave the village by bus & tube, or bike.
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A Scone Adventure in Marylebone + barista training at Climpson & Sons.
The past few months in London have been lovely, because it has been like a revolving door of friends from Melbourne popping in and out. It’s been ridiculous actually – a lot of my spare time has been spent with friends from back home, whether they have moved here or are just passing through. My friend Namita has been on an epic Europe adventure on her own, and has been in and out of London over the past few months. She is heading back to Australia next week so we decided to go on a scone adventure as our last hurrah.
It was her first English scone, so I of course took her to my go-to when downtown, Gails Artisan Bakery. They toaster-press their scones, and they are moist and buttery, just like home. I have an issue with many British scones, in that they are too dry! But not these.
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Moments in Hackney.
So it has been the week leading up to my first deliverable for my book. I don’t know if I have written it specifically on the blog, but I’ve been commissioned to write a book on coffee. It’s been killer fun – I’ve visited coffee labs in Amsterdam, Roasters in London – I love culinary research and learning and I am getting paid to become an expert on coffee.
But it is hard work. I’m never switched off, always thinking about the book and whatever I am doing I am thinking I should be writing. I’m writing from when I wake in the morning until when I go to bed. Every so often I try and have a switch off day, but I still feel a little guilty.
Anyway, as such, I haven’t really had any full days of fun activities to blog about for a while. I’ve done little things here and there, breaking up my work. Sarah + Theo, the owners of the Deli I work at had me over for dinner, and we somehow started talking about iPhoto’s new ‘Moments’ feature. Theo went a small rampage about how it was the most ridiculous thing ever. ‘I’ve had a moment, let me just take a photograph.’ It is ridiculous. But it stuck in my head – that’s how I am organising my life right now. Work, work, work and then a moment of fun. So to perpetuate the ridiculousness, here is a collection of my ‘moments’.
Korean BBQ + haircuts from Korean Hipsters in the Cambridge Heath converted railway arches at Hurwendecki.
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Mackerel + South Australian wine in Bloomsbury.
Husni’s dinner parties are always amazing. We always used to head over to Prahran Market, pick up some amazing ingredients and then go back to his and cook up a feast – our last big dinner party was on Election night, which we soothed tensions with a Beef Wellington and Blood Orange Curd tarts.
So when Husni moved into his new place in Bloomsbury here in London, and all his things arrived from Australia, we knew it was time for another housewarming. His old house in South Yarra in Melbourne had a fabulous housewarming, with waiters and champagne and multiple courses that we slaved away on for a few days. A few musicians from the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra set up in his lounge.
This time it was a lunch, and he cooked us mackerel, steak and a pile of amazing starters and sides. The wine flowed, and as we all met each other we realised Husni has been gathering Aussie friends – while few of us knew each other, we were majority Australians (or at least married to one!).
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A Kinfolk Magazine Gathering: The Spirit of the Sea at Dalston Pier.
Today was bright. Today was perfect.
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Broadway Market, a picnic in Victoria Park + Rhubarb Custard Soda.
So, I’ve been busy. I’ve only a short while to enjoy being an East Londoner, so I’ve been cramming my days with cycling, cafes, working on the book, picnics, dancing, drinks, cakes and working at The Deli Downstairs. I absolutely adore working there, with the most wonderful group of people ever.
I’ve been gazing out the back into our little courtyard at the Deli, pausing to look at the sun filter through the leaves onto our little tomato seedlings.
I’ve been cycling the long way home around Victoria Park – amongst the picnics and families and hipsters on rollerblades.
I’ve been riding to Hackney City Farm just to walk through Woodland Way, lush and green and a little slice of British countryside in the urban sprawl.
I’ve been eating cod and chips with curry sauce in the park, swing dancing at the old English pub on the corner, dancing for hours at a Michael Franti gig in Islington, and walking through the little independent galleries in the artist warehouses in Hackney Wick.
Watching Japanese films at Hackney Picturehouse, talking to yogis in community cafes in Hackney Downs, and writing my book in the whitewashed-stone-and-wood interior of Violet Bakery, the famed East London American bakery owned by Chez Panisse Alumni Claire Ptak.
Or riding to Shoreditch and sitting in cafes in Brick Lane, eating Rose, Raspberry and Pistachio cake while writing. Every so often I look up, and see the other tables and sofas filled with the most quintessential Londoners – girls in Lennon glasses and denim skirt overalls. Blondes with Japanese-style bob-cropped hair and oversized suede vintage store jackets. Flop-haired ringleted young men in denim jackets with iron on patches, reading dog-eared paperbacks.
I had a saturday off work – so I decided to get some friends together, head down to the famous Broadway Market (started for and by the Hackney community in the 1890s) to pick up some bits and pieces and head over for a picnic in Victoria Park.
It was amazingly sunny, even though it had been raining all week. Everyone was out and about, and the streets and waterways and parks were packed with people soaking up the sun.
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A day in Oxford + a Hertford college formal dinner.
Last week, my friend Sarah who is studying Linguistics at the University of Oxford asked Namita (who is holidaying in London at the moment) and I to come to Oxford for a day and attend one of the special formal dinners held by each of the Oxford colleges. It was such a rare, special treat – I was so lucky to get to attend. Just a forewarning: this post is very, very long.
So, you will just have to scroll through and see all the beauty of the town. I just took so, so many photos in Oxford because it was all just so stunningly beautiful. I got up really early today as there was a tube strike in London, and only just made my train in time from Paddington station. It was super foggy, and the train sped through the trees and fields, grey and shrouded in the thick fog. But as soon as I arrived in Oxford and stepped off the train – the sun came out. And it stayed out all day. I couldn’t have asked for better weather.
First things first, breakfast. I head to Vaults & Gardens, housed in the Old Congregation House of the University, built in 1320.
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De Bakkerswinkel, a Starbucks Reserve Tasting class + Dutch Stamppot dinner.
Husni and Hadiah were leaving today, so I had another few days here in Amsterdam to plot out on my own. But to start with we had one last brunch together – I picked De Bakkerswinkel, a cute bakery/cafe that I had been reading about.
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Heineken Brewery tour, canal boats + Dutch Frites.
After a lovely morning eating cake and wandering the canals of Amsterdam, we head down to the Heineken Brewery.
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An Easter Sunday morning in Amsterdam.
I’ve started working at a gorgeous little place in Victoria Park Village. I moved into a lovely flat facing the park, in the middle of my favourite place in London. I love Hackney, it has a wonderful vibe – and Victoria Park Village feels like a little English country town. My first day at work, word got around the village that there was a new girl at the Deli Downstairs, and I started to realise what a tight-knit little community I have chosen to become a part of.
But more on my lovely work and village later. We were closed on Easter Sunday, and quite quiet as many people around the village had gone away for school holidays. I had four days off (as did Husni) so we decided to head over to the Netherlands for a long weekend.
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