The week in brief: 26 March – 1 April

This week: Wahhh is it really April already?! Plus watching Adam D’Syvla do a cooking demonstration at the Gaggenau mobile kitchen event, creating “art” while having dinner at Spoonbill at The Olsen Hotel, cooking up a Thai feast for lunch, and brunch at Reading Room cafe.

Another week, another lunch with my friend CC. This week we went to Monk Bodhi Dharma.

I’d eat here more often, but they’re so small it’s hard to get a seat. I had their mushroom dish which is bloody amazing – slow roasted mushrooms on a house made pumpkin, spinach and sun dried tomato polenta bread with goats cheese, thyme and red chile oil. So good.

There was an event to promote the Gaggenau mobile kitchen this week (disclosure – I was invited). Chef Adam D’Syvla from Coda did a cooking demonstration during the night. He is a funny man.

I couldn’t tell you much about Gaggenau though, except for: ooooh shiny!

On Thursday, I headed to the Olsen Hotel for a bloggers’ dinner (disclosure again, I was invited) where we were given an art tour of the hotel. If you haven’t heard of the Olsen, it’s one of a series of art hotels in Melbourne and is named after the artist, John Olsen.

His works are all over the hotel – several originals and lots of prints. The hotel’s in-house art curator, Jane O’Neill, walked us around and chatted to us about John Olsen and his paintings. I really enjoyed the tour. Looking at a painting is one thing, but having someone knowledgeable speak to me about the inspiration and symbolism behind them really enhanced them.

After the art tour, we headed to the restaurant – Spoonbill. Before dinner we had an opportunity to create our own art. Uh oh. I’m so not an artist. I was a bit worried about how it would end up and guess what? I ended up being that person – the one who creates a mess and gets colour all over themselves and the table. Such a special child. AHHHH.

It was really fun though. And you know what they’ve done with our works? They’ve displayed them in the driveway – haha omg. You’ll have to wait for my post if you want to see my finished work. Don’t expect too much though, I don’t want to build your expectations up. :p

Food wise, we ate lots of things – mini burgers, quail, scallops, fish, pork belly, and paella. The food was generally okay. Some things were good, and some not so good. The paella was pretty good though.

Yesterday, I cooked up a Thai feast from my David Thompson books. Can I say that it was awesome? Okay, it was awesome. I made a chicken green curry, a green papaya salad, grilled pork skewers and pickled vegetables. I particularly loved the pork skewers – that’s definitely going into rotation for future bbqs.

And funny, last week I made a red curry that came out green. This week I made a green curry that turned out yellow. Hah. And yes, Kat I know, I know – papaya salad shouldn’t have coriander. Blah blah blah blah blah. 😉 Only kidding – I added it for garnish. I couldn’t help it!

Okay, getting to the end. Today Alastair and I met up with Adrian and Sarah (and partners) for brunch at the Reading Room cafe located at Footscray Uni. Alastair and I ended up sharing the corn, pumpkin and coriander fritters with poached eggs, avocado and tomato chutney (pictured here) and then a serve of their brioche French toast with bacon and maple syrup. Both were really good. Yum ++ according to Alastair. 🙂

For more, have a look at April’s post on the Reading Room cafe until I get around to blogging it.

Now who’s looking forward to next week? It’s Easter, which means: short work week. Yay! Can’t wait. I have big goals – prune our passionfruit vine which is starting to take over our patio furniture, and maybe read some books. How about you? How was your week?