I like them. I take them sometimes. I should take more.

Happy Birthday Emily :)

Just photos this time, walking from Borough Markets over the Millennium Bridge to St Pauls Cathedral, then back through the city to the excellent Milk Bar cafe in Soho, before getting caught in the only rain I saw in London on my entire trip (!!). Then back home to Oval, South London.

And so we walked… and walked…. and walked. I guess that’s what you do on holidays when you actually want to see some of the city. In London it’s pretty easy to get into a rat like mentality. Using the tube system it’s pretty easy to stay underground all day and only pop up in a few places. Super convenient once you get used to where to change lines and how not to get your arm caught in the doors, but not the best way to see the sites.

So we strolled through town, down Regent Street, and Oxford St, though we did not pass go, and did not collect $200 (and there is no such thing as free parking). Then down past the horse guards and over the bridge to the London Eye. Being one of the touristy things I figured I should do, we bit the bullet and got in line. 30 minutes and a couple of cavity searches later we were at the top. Surveying the shabby historic beauty that is London.

With a fierce hunger now brewing but no idea where good food was to be found in Southbank we did a little divining and ended up at Le Pain Quotidien, which looked like a chain, but an up market one. Turns out they are a chain, and in fact have stores in most of the known world… including Australia.

The basic premise at Le Pain Quotidien is quality bread, made on the premises from organic flour, and shareable plates of organic charcuterie and other tastiness. Founder Alain Coumont was apparently a Belgian chef dissatisfied with his choice of bread to serve in his restaurant, so he ended up developing his own loaf and then opening a bakery. From humble beginnings it’s now spread to 10 countries and many stores.

      
So I went for a simple charcuterie plate loaded with hams, prosciutto, sausage, bread, sun dried tomatoes, pickled veges, and olive. Just what I was after, and a lovely way to relax after a long walk, with a delicious glass of Château Couronneau Bordeaux to wash it all down.

Probably highly presumptuous, but this may have been my most enjoyable experience in a franchised establishment to date… which normally exude a cold sterile vibe that makes me want to wash myself with steel wool.

Le Pain Quotidien
Royal Festival Hall
Festival Terrace, Southbank Centre
Belvedere Road
London SE1 8XX
Tel.: 0207 486 6154

Our next destinations were more snapshots of the city. We went to Camden and checked out the infinite row of piercing places and enjoyed the parade of Camden Leisure Pirates swaggering about. A peak through Camden Markets unveiled rows and rows of crap, and then even more crap hidden behind that crap. I did particularly like the “Chinese Food All Mixed Together” sign hanging above a particularly fine example of salmonella fodder, but yes was strong enough to resist the lure of cheap greasy nasty looking food.

We then hopped back on the tube and jumped off at Covent Garden. I forget why, but Amanda said there were some nice places there. Though the only one we actually ended up going into was the Australian Shop, so Amanda could buy twisties… which apparently are no readily available in the UK (the horror).

More walking and now it’s getting late and we pick up another Perth ex-pat, my friend Sam, who proceeds to lead us on another merry dance through the streets once more. Giving the seedy Soho by night tour that every tourist really wants but doesn’t know how to ask for.

A chance to see the London Eye by night as we cross back over the bridge, and then meander our way towards The Cut near Southwark to try our luck with some of Davy’s recommendations. Sadly we couldn’t get in to most of the places on the street as they were completely packed on a Thursday night and not taking bookings meant we were out of luck.

So then, we made our way via Black Cab to Farringdon Road to check out The Eagle, the original gastropub… which is where the story will continue shortly…

There are many. We made it to a few.

                               
Yes, this is a lazy post because I’m too slack to write anything at the moment. But I figure that whole picture is worth a thousand words thing must make up for something. Cheers to Ed for fuelling much of this exploration with the careful eye that only a bad uncle can :)

List of places in these photos, chronologically :

Seamstress
Supper Club
Misty
Croft Institute
Comme
Gin Palace

Dear readers,

Just a quick note to apologise for the recent ups and down on this site, which is having a few growing pains at present while I look for a new server to house it on. So if you’ve had trouble getting onto the site recently I apologise, and hopefully will have it sorted out soon.

In the meantime, here’s a shot of my lovely sister who recently got married.

And here’s the first few experimental shots taken mostly by Sharon with our new Holga camera. Very cool :)

    

Does anyone even remember last year ? It suddenly seems like so long ago… but there are still a few loose ends to tie together. That being the announcement of the winners of DMBLGIT for December 2006 ! (Note: All the photos were taken in November 2006, which is why I was initially calling it the November 2006 competition, but have since corrected it, as the competition always runs one month after the photos were taken).

The judges were asked to score each photo submitted on three categories, edibility, originality, and aesthetics. The combination of these categories has been used in the past, and I think it’s a good idea, as there are points in each category to be won for people with less technologically advanced camera setups as others. The scoring was very close in some categories, but I was very happy with the overall results. This means that there is an overall winner, and then a winner of each individual category (who has not already won something else), which means more people coming away with prizes. We had some excellent entries this year, and overall the standard was very very high…

So with no further ado, here are the winners.

Winner of Edibility

Ilva of Lucullian Delights with Balsamic Vinegar and Pistacchio Truffles

Winner of Originality

Jennifer of Fer Food with her beautiful Bacon Flowers

Winner of Aesthetics

This was so close we actually had a three way tie.

Bea of La Tartine Gourmande with her Fall Medley Vegetable Soup — Soupe automnale de légumes variés

Nicole of Pinch My Salt with her Pumpkin Roll

Riana of For the Love of Baking with her Green Tea Pudding

Which leaves us with the overall winner this month being…. drum roll…

Overall Winner

Jules of Stone Soup with her Stuffed Baby Squid

Many thanks to the judges, Celine of Black Salt, Anthony of Spiceblog, Bron of Bron Marshall, Lara of Cook and Eat and Still Life With, for their time and energy, especially over such a time consuming part of the year. Thanks also to Matt of Matt Bites for letting me hack his lovely graphics up for this months prizes, which are available now to be displayed on the winners sites !

Note: despite my attempt at making gold, silver, and bronze coloured prize logos, there is no first, second, or third per se… All winners are winner, and are entitled to show whichever logo they feel best suits the style of their blog.

Thanks again to everyone and congratulation to the winners !

Looking for the next installment of DMBLGIT ? Look no further than Annie’s great site Bon Appageek ! Head on over now and get your entries in.