Anthropologie, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways..

The first Anthro store to arrive in Europe and I was there on opening day, naturally.

I love your "living wall"..

that's right, a whole wall made up of plants..

I love your deco glasses and how you display them in refurbished cupboards..

I love how you dress your store with vintage clocks..

I love how you've shown the versatility of the grey singlet top with different accessories..

I loved this skirt so much I had to buy it..

I do hope we have an Anthropologie in Sydney by the time I get back.

Anthropologie

158 Regent Street

London

W1B 5SW

www.anthropologie.com

Visiting Oxford

Just as my mum commented upon seeing these photos taken at Oxford, it's like walking around a movie set. The truth is better though, Oxford is where movies film on location! pfft, move over movie set, we've got the real deal here..

We didn't go inside on this occasion, but I will next time.

Christ Church Cathedral

Explorers..

Peeking into Oriel College

House in Oxford.

Oxford Uni is the oldest surviving uni in the english speaking world (according to wikipedia) made up of over 40 colleges and halls that are all responsible for their own admission policies. As such, the grounds are enormous yet well maintained and full of english style.

"Your island? You mean Ireland"

Hello again blog, how I've missed you! September saw the arrival of Mum and Dad O'B and much travelling but no posts. Consequently I've much to catch up on - starting with Ireland!

First trip in September started in Dublin, where we hired a car and drove to Cork with stops on the way.

The whole vibe of Ireland caught me by surprise. People were just friendly - it was so refreshing coming from London. Service people made jokes and strangers stopped to help you if you looked like you needed helping. That said though, there were lots of groups of teenage kids loitering on the streets and loitering kids always seem to make me a little nervous..

Now I thought London was full of pubs, one on every block, but Dublin seems to have around 5 on every block. There's an area called Temple Bar that is just buzzing with food and drink that you must check out if visiting Dublin.

We had lunch at the Temple Bar Food Market, which served up delicious variations of roasted meats on rustic breads ie really yum gourmet sandwiches. It was also here that I tasted Tiffin cake for the first time. Best €2 I've spent so far..

This slice type cake I would say may even rival Rose Smith's chocolate hazelnut slice in taste (and that is saying something huge) but definitely in calories. I think it may be half butter? Since then I've tried numerous other Tiffins (Costa sells its own variety made with Belgian chocolate) but none so far compare to that first one.

After lunch, some sight seeing.

Trinity collage. Mum watching Adam taking a photo of Dad.

Irish Men.

Obviously we visited the Guinness brewery. They have a museum there that covers the making and history of Guinness that's quite interesting if you're into that kind of thing. At the very top there is an amazing view of Dublin and free Guinness to boot!

After Dublin, we hopped into our rented lime green Feista and headed to Wicklow, the ancestral home of the O'Byrnes.

Not an awful lot to do in Wicklow, one local suggested visiting the jail.. I'm serious! They do have some beautiful homes there though and the streets are just charming. So we stopped for lunch at Halpin's Bridge Cafe where the friendly owner was kind enough to share some local history with us. For example Robert Halpin, born in Wicklow, was one of the most important mariners in the 1800s. He captained a ship that laid transoceanic telegraph cables. Howzat?!

We left Wicklow and headed to Kilkenny next.

Oh yes, often on along the way we would get stuck behind tractors. The biggest ones I've ever seen in fact.

There's something about driving down narrow, windy, bumpy country roads that puts Adam in rally car mode. I'll admit I am prone to motion sickness but it was surely exacerbated by "someone's" driving. Quick on the accelerator and hard on the break. I felt like scrambled eggs in the back seat.

Fortunately there were many pretty spots to stop and recover.

See?

Back in the car and passing another tractor.

At the airport we saw a little boy playing a toy tractor. He and his father(?) were discussing whether they preferred round hay bales or square ones. They decided upon round, I quite agree.

Passing through Kilkenny (as in where the beer is from). Stopped for a drink at The Hibernian Hotel. Food looked amazing and would have loved to have tried it, but alas it was a wee bit early for dinner at that time.

After Kilkenny we made our way to Waterford (as in the crystal) where we stayed at a B&B for the night, but not before having generous servings of dinner at the Days Hotel restaurant - just about the only place we could find that was open and serving dinner on a Sunday night.

Next morning we drove to Cork which strangely I have no photos of. It was somewhat cleaner and quieter than Dublin I think and didn't have loitering teens. After a spot of window shopping we were off to the airport and on our way back to London.

Canal Lock in Action

There is a canal that runs quite close to our place and we love taking walks there. On this particular trip we caught one of the locks in action.

Boats sitting in the lock while the water is still raised

What I missed recording were the long boats entering the lock and the top gate being closed at the start. Then in the video clip you can see the lower gate being slightly opened > the boats sinking in the lock as the water drains > the water level in the lock reaching the same level as the water in the lower part of the canal > lower gates being fully opened > boats sailing off into the sunset.. well, not quite..

Kudos to the genius who invented the first lock over 2000 years ago!

Postscript on the Salmon

I don't want to harp on about Wing of St Mawes again, but the smoked salmon was fantastic! Lovely lingering smokey taste. Will definitely be getting some more of this stuff next time I order. And that's all I have to say about that..

Look at my Mussels! *flex*

Had given up on finding fresh seafood to cook at home. All the places that sell fish and other sea faring critters that I have come across have sold either frozen (and sometimes thawed) seafood or smelt really fishy (in a bad fish kinda way) and looked unhygienic.

So what do you do when you really want something but can't seem to source it locally? You buy it online! I am a big fan of buying things online. I don't do it often, but when I do, I am most usually very happy with the result. After perusing a few online fish shops I decided to go with Wing of St Mawes. Why? (I hear you ask..) Because:

1. They had the best selection of seafood. Though they don't stock the elusive razor clams which I have been wanting to have again ever since my first time here.

2. They had the best looking website. This is really an Adam criteria, but in this instance I think a clean, fresh and professional looking website instills more confidence as would a physical fish shop of the same description.

3. They claim to sell fish LANDED DAILY. That's already fresher than fish you could hope to buy in a shop.

4. They sell FRESH, not freshly frozen, fish and other seafood (unlike several other websites). They even sell live crab and lobster, that's how fresh it is!

Being my first purchase and all, I decide to test the waters with some mussels, it seem like middle ground between fish and crab/lobster. They were a great price too and by that I mean they were around Sydney prices - only £4.50/kg, that's about $9AUD. Having put in my order before 10am, I anxiously awaited their arrival the next morning..

They arrive mid morning in this relatively clean and non-smelly styrofoam box..

4kg of mussels and 250g of super awesome looking smoked salmon which they threw in for free as it was my first purchase. You can also see some ice packs in there to keep everything johnny coool..

And they were live! They always say you should cook with live mussels and these babies certainly were.

'Nother freebie - a teatowel

So far so good! Was very happy with the packaging and the product. I'm sure the mussels could have lasted a fair while in that box. They charge £7 delivery for orders under £100 which I find preferable to the alternatives - spending a few £ on public transport getting to and from the fish shop for "not as fresh" fish. Or there's Billings Gate, which I hear is the big fish market that's only open from 4am - 8am or something ludicrously early like that. Considering cost, time and effort, £7 for delivery is worth it don't you think?

I'm happy to report that the mussels were very tasty. Half were done in kind of Provencale style and half in a kind of Thai Green Curry. I say "kind of" as I "kind of" made up the recipe as I went along. Anyway, it doesn't matter as I didn't make them tasty, these guys would've been just as good steamed by themselves and eaten with lemon, salt and pepper.

Now I'm looking forward to trying that smoked salmon!

Wing of St Mawes

http://thecornishfishmonger.co.uk/

Moving House = Ikea

Have been on the lookout for a flat with a bit more space for a while now and am happy to tell you that the look is now over! While it came furnished with the essentials, there were a few bits and pieces we still needed to pick up which meant IKEA TIME! For the real Ikea experience you must:

1) buy some furniture

2) buy kitchen utensils / folding laundry baskets / and similar things that you didn't know you needed until you saw it at Ikea (and it was so cheap anyway so what's the big deal)

3) eat Ikea food! Yes, I'm talking about you Swedish meatballs, Hotdogs, Swedish cake-biscuit things and all of your friends.

After accomplishing 1, 2 & 3 we came home with..

The sheets, pillows, quilt and covers on the bed and the desk & chair 

and the white drawers.

Here's our open plan kitchen

and roast garlic chicken w/ stir-fried asian greens & mashed potato that I made in said kitchen and just wanted to show off.

Living area with small balcony..

firemen doing some training next door.

We'll Always Have Soseki..

Wow, it's kinda hard to start the blogging again after a break. As such I had to dig into the events archive to find something inspiring and what I found was photos of Soseki.. 

About a month ago we had dinner with Michelle and Dylan at a Japanese restaurant called Soseki, situated right next to the Gherkin. I'm talking you look out the window and it is right in your face. You know I think every single pane of glass is curved on that building? Yet there are still windows that open. That's pretty cool right? Anyhow Michelle headed off for some more traveling on the weekend and we didn't get a chance to say goodbye, so I'll just say "Soseki" instead..

"The scallop is really sweet" - Michelle

Sashimi, Tofu Soup, Egg Custard

Sushi, Radish Salad

Caramelised Pork

I'm struggling to remember what flavour sorbet this was, I think it was blood peach. I do remember that it was very good though. Truffles were also very good also, except the green tea one.. but I don't like green tea so it was probably good for green tea lovers.

All these pics were taken with the iPhone 3G which struggles in low light. Hopefully you can still make out the raised hutches in this photo which Michelle tells are are little private dining rooms! You climb a ladder to get into them and then sit on bamboo mats apparently. Cool eh?

Needless to say the food was very artistically presented. Colour and composition was amazing. Food was light and delicate (though possibly a little too light??). We all agreed that £30pp for this 10 or 12 (I can't remember) plate meal was well priced but wouldn't pay £60pp for it which is what it usually costs.

Soseki

20 Bury Street

London

EC3A 5AX

020 7821 9211

Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince!!!!

It rained, it poured, it even hailed.. but we still made it to a fan-filled Leicester Square last night to check out the stars strut their stuff on the red carpet at the premiere of Harry Potter 6. 

Draco Malfoy!

Luna Lovegood!

Nymphadora Tonks!

Dean Thomas!

Fred & George Weasley!

Ron Weasley!!

Harry Potter!!

Helena Bohnam Carter!!! I mean, Bellatrix Lestrange!!!

Crazy-eyed fan!

I'm just so darn excited about this next HP! The HBP was probably my favourite book of the series so I've high expectations for the movie. Have already pre-bought tickets for next Wednesday when it opens in cinemas and am eagerly awaiting......

We Remember The Time

There was a time when I though your name had to be Michael to be a world wide superstar. Think early nineties and recall Michael Jackson and Michael Jordan. A few days ago, one of those giants fell. If I didn't know better, I'd think that Michael Jackson was British from the way that the news of his death was received here. People were dubious that he (or any person) could pull off 50 concerts at the 02, now we won't even see 1. 

On Friday 26th of June, fans gathered at Trafalgar Square to pay tribute to the King of Pop. Some mourned his passing, most celebrated his life, though all were there to Remember The Time..