puppies, pimm’s, and popsicles

It’s not quite summer in Australia. However I’ve been hoarding some summer recipes for the last couple months, so when I was in Toronto very unexpectedly last week and it was 30+ degrees outside, I whipped out my warm weather recipes and made it happen.

In the form of popsicles.

and cocktails!

Yum…

What’s better than a Saturday afternoon cocktail? followed by bbq’d corn and a boozey popsicle?

Maybe lounging in the sun with your puppy dog?

lucy

Yeah. Well nothing beats that…

Meet Lucy. The most photographed dog in history.

dog

She enjoys napping on the counter, drinking from my water glass and sharing popsicles. (the non-boozey kind)

She works the camera.

…

Sometimes I wondering if this dog thinks I have a camera for a face.

ANYWAY…cocktails and popsicles!

Pimm’s is best paired with painted toe nails and lounging in muskoka chairs.

If you haven’t tried this cocktail, then you haven’t sipped summer from a glass. It’s a must do.

Pimm’s Cocktail:

Pimm’s

Sparkling lemonade

Cucumber

Strawberries

Orange

Lemon

Mint

Slice all the fruit and veggies and put them in a jug.

Add 1 part Pimm’s and 2 parts lemonade. (although I prefer a 1:1 ratio… haha or maybe 1: 1.5 if you want to make it past 1 cocktail. :P)

Add some mint, stir it up, serve over ice and drink. Crazy straws are also encouraged.

On to the ‘sicles!

Pina Colada Popsicles!?

Ohhhhh my goodness, so delicious.

Put this on your to-do list as well. You should totally make these. You should also check out this food blog, cause her recipes are delightful! Pina Colada Popsicles! The only alteration I made to her recipe was using Maple Syrup instead of sugar. I’m Canandian. This is what I do.

the fam (and our kick ass backyard)

Oh sweet summer. It was nice to have a little bit of sun on my shoulders and ice coffee in my cup.

It was short and very sweet. I miss you Toronto! I’ll try and visit soon. 😦

stay cool doggie.

xxx

ps. MIYOSHI! LOOK! I did it again! (the bee)

bzzz

 

 

 

 

it’s all downhill from here…

If you look at a globe and you find Toronto, Canada, it is pretty much on the top side of the sphere. If you then spin that bad boy around 180 degrees, and look on the bottom end of the sphere, you’ll find Sydney, Australia. It’s totally on the upside down part of the earth. That’s a scientific fact.

And it doesn’t stop there. Everything here is backwards. I swear. Yeah, in fact over here they wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people.

Mmmm not really. But the water does spin in the opposite direction, everyone drives on the wrong sided of the road and winter is in June and July. What. the. WHAT!?

Yes. And if you drive a mere 5 hours south of Sydney to a place they call Thredbo, you will find snow. That’s another fact right there.

This past weekend, that is exactly what we did.

I have to say, I was thoroughly impressed. I know it can be very hit and miss with Australian snow, but we had favourable conditions. We hopped on a bus and got whisked away to Perisher Mountain for a weekend of skiing! I’m going to be honest here, I didn’t know that snow was a thing that existed in Australia until Sean told me shortly after we met. It just doesn’t make ANY sense to me. But there it was. Actually snow. And a fair bit of it… in June.

Weird.

I won’t dwell on this any longer, but I will show you pictures! It was such a lovely weekend. We had perfect conditions. 25cm of fresh powder on Saturday morning and blue skies (at the bottom of the mountain anyway.)

And I tell ya, there is nothing more weird than seeing a eculyptus tree covered in snow. Where are all the evergreens?

Sean tore up the hill on a snowboard and I got back to my roots with some good old skiing. Something I haven’t done in probably 12 or 13 years! It’s almost like riding a bike… except I didn’t have the same desire to conquer the black diamonds hills that my ten year old self did. Man, I used to be such a rock star. haha.

xxx

the best way to spread Christmas cheer… is singing loud for all to hear.

so pretty...

It would seem that Christmas sort of exploded into my life over the last week. Yes, Sam the Snowman himself just waltzed in and puked Christmas cheer all over my apartment… too much? OK well then… Buddy the elf came by and in a matter of hours there were paper snowflakes hanging from my ceiling, white paper garlands on my walls, and a beautiful Christmas tree adorning my living room. (I exaggerate only moderately.)

CHRISTMAS TREE!

The only thing missing, frosty windows and a mulled cider on the stove.

Not only did I complete the apartment re-design for Christmas, but I also donned my new baking gear (the amazing Christmas themed apron courtesy of my mother) and churned out two batches of gingerbread. One of which I constructed into a house, complete with gingerbread men, trees, reindeer, and snowflakes. And after that? A batch of chocolate-orange biscotti.

biscotti and coffee

Note that one of my batches of gingerbread failed to come together in order to make a house or men… however it made the PERFECT dough for smushed up mishapen cookies. As for the biscotti… well, while they were delicious, I think I’ll leave that to my dad. But more on that later.

In the last week and a half I have watched no less than 8 Christmas movies:

1. Robbie the Reindeer

2. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation

3. A Christmas Story

4. Elf

5. Home Alone

6. Home Alone 2: Taking back New York

7. How the Grinch Stole Christmas

8. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer

… and more to come!

Just a few brief pictures today, as I am pooped…

🙂
x

Christmas weather (kind of) and Miso!

miso soup

Not sure what happened to Summer over here in the land down under, but it seems to have made it self very scarce as of late. Yes, it’s actually looking a lot more like Christmas around here than I initially expected. The warm summer breezes have been swapped for cool windy temperatures with lots of rain. And while it isn’t quite the right form of precipitation falling from the sky for a White Christmas, it is consistent and unforgiving. Mostly when you’re walking to and from work and especialllllly when you’re carrying one too many bags, as I normally am for some reason unbeknownst to me.

Anyway, I have a feeling I jinxed things with my complaints about the hot wind. And maybe also when I was writing Christmas cards and declaring how much I missed the winter. Ooops.

No matter, I can deal with a bit of wet weather and a cooler climate for a while. It makes drinking tea SO desirable and it gives me more excuses to bake and also make soup. SOUP!

Miso Soup that is. I only recently acquired a taste for Japanese food. Seaweed used to completely turn me off. The smell still does a bit, but I’m really getting into vegetable sushi and miso soup seemed like a great idea last week. And let me tell you, it was.

miso!

I’ve made it twice now. The second time adding every vegetable in my fridge that was about to go off. It’s a win win. Though I’m not sure if I can call in Miso soup after that. Maybe more like ‘Vegetable soup with some miso in it.’

everything that was in my fridge soup

Either way, I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Miso Soup the Caitlin Way

3 c. of vegetable broth

3 c. of water

6 tbsp. Miso

4 strips of dried wakame

1/2 c. chopped mushrooms

3 stalks of spring onion, chopped

1 carrot, chopped

half block of firm tofu, chopped in cubes

1 head of baby bok choy

Whatever else you have on hand that seems appropriate or not appropriate. Or any vegetable ever.

Bring the broth and water to a boil in a large saucepan and add the wakame. Allow to simmer for 5 minutes or until it is soft. Remove the wakame and chop into much smaller pieces. Add the onion and carrots to the broth and boil until tender. Add the mushrooms, tofu and wakame to the broth and simmer for another 10 minutes. Right before serving, add the bok choy for a couple minutes until just wilted.

Take a spoonful of broth and add 1 tbsp of miso. Whisk it up until combined and then fill the rest of the bowl with soup.

I add the miso to each bowl, as it should not be boiled. You can add it to the pot if you intend to eat all the soup at once, otherwise just add it per bowl. Adjust to your taste.

Delightful.

I used a very light miso in this recipe, so it wasn’t a strong flavour, but I enjoyed it. You can use  whatever type of miso you prefer.

x

Breakfast in Summer Bay…

Today was the day I have been looking forward to since forever. Forever meaning, about a month.

Last summer, while I was living in Australia, my boyfriend and I made a habit of going for brunch once a week, or whenever he had a couple days off of work. We’d pick a part of the city or a suburb that I hadn’t seen yet and make a point of going for a jog, or coastal walk before settling on a delightful cafe for a delicious brunch. It became a tradition very fast and it is definitely one of my favourite things to do on a relaxing day off.

After a couple of weeks of planning and then bailing, we actually got up this morning after only 3 hits of the snooze button and set off on the mini road trip up the coast to Palm Beach. Sean informed me that Palm Beach is actually the shooting location for the very popular soap opera ‘Home & Away.’ Except that in Home & Away Palm Beach is so sweetly named ‘Summer Bay’.

It was about 45 minutes outside of the city, but well-worth the drive on such a beeeeautiful day. We parked along the Beach and decided to jog up to the lighthouse… little did I know that ‘up to the lighthouse’ meant running though soft-sandy foot paths and up about 5 million stairs constructed of tree roots and sandstone. Needless to say, I was damn-hungry by the end of it.

The views from the lighthouse were pretty lovely and along the way I got to see some of the famous Home & Away sights (!) Lifeguard stations with very authentic ‘Summer Bay’ signs and souvenier t-shirts. Ooooooh…

The run back to the car was along the beach… Jogging near the water kept thing interesting as I played tag with the tide. I always win. As soon as we reached the car, I striped off my shoes and running top and ran straight into the ocean… shorts and a sports bra. I hadn’t thought ahead to bring swimmers, but it didn’t matter. No one was really swimming as it was a bone-chilling 18 degrees oot. Oh Winter… better get out my wooly socks.

The water was actually very nice. Not too cold at all. I was able to frolic in and out freely, practicing the perfect gallop into the waves, and a very lady-like and graceful exit. Always tricky with the ocean undertow.

After I had been totalled by a couple waves, swallowed a decent amount of salt and very nearly lost my shorts, we thought it was time to head in. My stomach was definitely craving something delish.

post-run post-swim

We had already decided on going to the Boathouse, a lovely cafe on the other side of the bay.

the boathouse

The coffee was strong and the atmosphere was perfect.

Coloured strings of lights were draped from poles and adorned the jetty. I took a ridiculous amount of pictures as Sean ordered. And then later I took even more.

lights and lines...

why am I so attracted to these?

We sat down on the dock patio and had 3 amazing dishes, since we aren’t exactly the best for making decisions.

brekky

I devoured my Avocado on toast (bacon on the side to give to the boy… cept they didn’t actually put my bacon on the side at all) and Sean had poached eggs and bacon. There sure was a lot of bacon for one man. We also enjoyed the granola with Rhubarb compote. This time they ACTUALLY put the yogurt on the side. This deliciousness definitely made me want to march out to the grocery store and buy some rhubarb. I see a pie or crumble in my near future.

that bacon is just ALL up in my breakfast, not so cool...

One ginormous line-up and two take away coffees later we were back in the car, but not wanting to head home.

... just one more...

We stopped at another Beach on the way, for some wandering and ridiculous photoshoots.

he's a looker...

Sean commandeered the camera…

There are about 40 of these taken in under a minute… It was all very high fashion… and then my mom texted… but I worked the camera…

Finally, back in North Sydney, I spent the afternoon listening to my heart palpitate from that one too many coffees and searching for recipes that might included rhubarb, apples, chocolate, or anything with sugar really. Cause that is exactly what I needed for my palpitating heart.

It was a perfect day off.

xxx