st john's donuts

one of the few things that get me outta bed on a saturday morning is the prospect of a vanilla donut. that and maccas. it used to be a mad rush to get across town to maltby street in time because the inflection point was 1230 and donut scoring chances dwindle past that time. dunno if they're making more donuts / less demand but have managed to get donuts into the early afternoon now. which means my perpetual sloth and need for 12h zz is further encouraged. not complaining though :)

also had a grilled cheese sandwich! wanted the stilton but they hadn't made new ones so think ended up with cheddar and chorizo. or maybe just chorizo. should've held out for the stilton. there was someone day dreaming and a stilton made the rounds - i'd told the vendor that if no one claimed it i was happy to swapsies the chorizo but alas stilton-buyer roused in time :( just as well i guess, if not it would've been grilled cheese anarchy. #firstworldproblem much.

zurich

hopped to switzerland for one last burst of fire pre-baby. got clearance to fly (BA flies till week 36!) and it was all systems go. short flight (90min to zurich) and was feeling atypically energetic. flew outta london city which i much prefer to heathrow because it's smaller, more efficient, shorter queues if there's even one at immigration and less hanging about. kinda equidistant by public transport too. zurich is always good, had a bonus night there in august (?) after a missed flight heh so had been recently but jumped at the chance to stay in old town and go to bellvue christmas market.

funny story there - literally walked into A, a travel journalist i'd met in ecuador april 2013! we'd stayed at mashpi lodge in the cloud forest at the same time and hit it off. he was there on assignment writing about the cocoa industry and we tried to meet up when he was in singers but missed each other. hadn't seen him since ecuador nor communicated in years but when i saw him it kinda clicked. then i thought about how he'd said his husband was swiss and they were based in zurich so it suddenly all made sense and i said hello. he was surprised but remembered me (or pretended to at least haha) and we caught up briefly. small world and hm funny what the brain remembers ie a face from years ago vs what i ate for breakfast yesterday.

enjoyed the market so much we went back the next day in daylight for more ethnic goodies

maltby street

one of the few things that gets me out of bed on a saturday morning is the prospect of a st john's vanilla cream donut at maltby street. because, of course, they're gone by 1230 and i've narrowly missed scoring one if i hit snooze. have also been the lucky recipient of the last donut more than once, so i console myself with the thought that it all evens out. although my recent maltby street discovery, and hence newfound life hack, is that the st john's wine bar (oops, bad jo!) also stocks said donut and doesn't sell out as fast. but really, getting the adrenaline rush from scoring the last donut is how i get my kicks over the weekend. 

after the donuts, it's a predictable circuit that involves monty's deli and coffee. tried the grilled cheese sandwiches for the first time, and big green egg steak which was a bit blue for my liking and probably why i needed to be tested for toxo :/

bleecker street burger

have had a bit of a 'mare getting a national insurance number. let's see if i can summarise this without boring you with my #immigrantwoes. so every month 10% of my paltry salary goes into "national insurance" ie a common pot for NHS and benefits. this is non-negotiable, and separate from the 10% that would go into "nhs pension" if i hadn't opted out. however, the tier4 student visa i'm on, despite 1) not being a student 2) being in full-time employment 3) contributing NI every month clearly states that i've "no access to public funds". so in the event i'm in a position to need benefits, i'm ineligible for them. this is doubly unfair because being on a tier4 visa means i'd to pay a £450 (?) "NHS surcharge" when i applied for the visa in june in case i were to access the health services while i was in the UK. if i were a student and not contributing NI, this would be fair and fine. but if i'm already contributing to NI every month, why on earth am i having to pay the surcharge on top of it??? also, don't get me started on not being entitled to statutory maternity benefits despite being forced into NI payments every month. 

did not help that i met a nasty job centre officer who told me i was on the wrong visa and refused to believe there was an exception for foundation doctors to be on a tier4 student visa despite not being a student. she almost didn't want to help me apply for an NI number (which my employers had given me 3 months to get from the day i started work) but i'd to cajole her into submitting the application all the same and letting the powers that be decide if i should get an NI number or not. honestly whether i got one or not makes no difference to me, personally, and i'm just following employer's instructions to get one. because even without a NI number, 10% of my salary vanishes monthly and i'm not entitled to benefits so having a NI number does absolutely nothing for me. did send my employers an email asking if i was on the correct visa and received a reply telling me to inform the job centre manager that their employees are not in a position to offer immigration advice, much less the wrong advice. haha. you're telling me.

the only upside was that the job centre was near old spitalfields market and i finally got to try the burger. done rare, obvs. and sweet potato fries plus milkshake to drown my frustration.

atariya

one of the perks of working near atariya is the odd cheeky lunch i get to sneak. sure beats tea and toast in the mess! raw fish isn't a categorical no no in pregnancy (don't get me started!) but i do avoid tuna, swordfish and shark because of their mercury levels. in fact, not had shark since i was 8 (?), before i learnt of the horrors of sharks' fin and haven't touched the stuff since. aside: proudest moment to date is substituting sharks' fin for a seafood soup when i organised prom at 16, and again at my wedding. so there :) chirashi done well is always a treat and i'm trying not to make a weekly habit of this. bi-weekly, maybe.

and because i'm greedy, after polishing off the chirashi i'd takopatchi too!

weekend in london

i've clinical supervision on friday which means an extra early start. supervisor is stickler for punctuality (rightly so!) and i grew up in a family where 5min early is late. so i got to work early enough to stop for a bacon and egg sandwich en route. at times like this i miss the north east. why is a bap so hard to find??? i just wanted a bacon roll :( but ended up with bacon and egg in crusty bread.

had a hankering for dimsum after work and chanced a place in the city. usually try my darndest to avoid corporate types, having tapped out of that world five year ago but alas my desire for congee was too strong. found ourselves at liverpool street and while everyone else was drinking beer and basking in summer sunshine, i was determined to have my dimsum fix. hit and miss and wouldn't recommend because it's middle-eastern owned and far from authentic but the restaurant was pumping. the party of four at the table next to us kept having whiskey cokes which i found hilarious because i fail to understand cocktails / mixers at a chinese resto. granted, it's not really a chinese resto but pseudo-chinese. all i could think of was if i'd an extra £40 to blow, i'd get the lobster noodles in claypot.

lazy saturday at my local for matcha latte and rosti. didn't have rosti in wengen despite making a mental note to have it and was only too pleased to see it on the ever changing menu.

the weather was good and the markets were calling so traversed london (literally) to broadway market. took a slightly different route (tell a lie, took the tube and bus having sold the car in january) and passed the korean coffee / street food place. despite having just had brunch, i'd never say no to fried glass noodles and chicken wings. then continued to broadway for more food and meandering walks by the canal.

back home Y rang asking if she could come hang for a bit because she'd gotten locked out! well, yes!!!! spontaneous drop ins are the best and it was so good to see her. we've been friends since we were three, rode on the same school bus and went to the same schools till we were 16. our families have travelled together (brunei, bangkok) and then she joined me in valencia on my grad trip v1 on the harrowing night we stupidly left a party late and got flashed on our way to my friend's. i joined her fam for her graduation. this, naturally, triggered massive uni envy. hm in fact it was her brother who planted the thought of going to medsch where i did and i'm so glad that's where i went. she's incredibly low maintenance, we see each other a couple of times a year (when i'm in singers / she's in london) and despite her being jetlagged she very sweetly obliged my pasta craving and we'd a fashionably late home made pasta dins. 

had brunch for the second consecutive day at my local and this time tried their avocado donuts with tomato jam. seemingly strange combination but worked really well :)

maltby street

so i've not been in awhile and suddenly there's a hip new market that's not maltby street?? it's nearby though and i can't remember what it's called now but it seemed like a hipster offshoot with a cluster of stalls including this amazing one that sold oysters. but one can't go to maltby without having monty's pastrami and st john's custard donuts. and i may or may not have fallen in love with a vintage chesterfield in original condition (!!!) which may or may not have been purchased on a whim to remind me to age in a similarly graceful fashion. patina and the like, you know ;)

the plan is to redecorate one i'm done with medsch (and finally earning again haha) so the dear chesterfield is going to be the star my other little tweaks revolve around... exciting!

trento

had the privilege of meeting C on PICU while i was at great*ormond earlier this year. split my time between NICU and PICU and because we're both terribly shy, we only started talking towards the end of my placement, despite us having been on the same ward round for four weeks prior :/ turned out we really got along (at least i think so!) and kept in touch as i moved on to st*mary's as she was doing a six month stint herself. she's lovely and kind and someone i'm so glad to have gotten to know in 2015. both abandoned wives (her husband E was in trieste and the mister was traveling a fair bit!) we explored london together and i like to think i caught her good habits of walking everywhere and eating home-cooked. my takeaway habit was partially kicked, to her credit! we'd been trying to think of how to meet up in person once she went back to trieste to resume her last year of paeds training before becoming a consultant this year (!!!) and when she heard i was going to be in madonna di campiglio in december, twisted her dear husband's arm into driving all that way to rendezvous in trento. 

this photo made me think of camus' quote about how in deep winter one finds an invincible summer within. probably not what he meant and most defo wasn't referring to global warming nor el nino but had a little chuckle all the same.

appreciate everyone's busy and E had had a long few weeks (who hasn't!) but they spent the night in trento and it was wonderful to see them again. they'd been before and sussed out the good restaurants so lunch was amazing, naturally, then as we walked around the markets he plied us with mystical alcohols like flaming parampampoli. it's officially my new favourite word and i say it at random now. had met E in london when he was visiting and he's +1 i've grown fond of. it's lovely when friends are with worthy partners and they're so good to and for each other, you know? makes my heart swell :)

greenwich

the brief was, well, brief. "book nice lunch outside london", she said. we'd done petersham nursery the last time and it was hard to top. chanced upon the telegraph in putney and had considered that but felt it a tiny cop out as it wasn't really "outside london" (then again, what would they've known!) so greenwich it was. passed it on the thames boatride a few weeks ago, and had heard good things from C, an italian friend who'd visited with her husband. also, seemed silly to have been based in london for four years and not ventured that way yet. had a pub lunch then made the most of being in a new place (haha, so desperate for new adventures) and spent the afternoon mosey-ing around. lovely views from the observatory, the maritime museum was cute, as was cutty sark, gelato from black vanilla and greenwich market looked suspiciously like the wannabe ethnic market at brick lane. sort of formulaic stall mix but if you're not discerning it's not half bad.

thames river path

continuing the series of being more active, i've family in putney and sort of wandered past their house without saying hello. oops. being avoidant for the win :/ but there was fulham palace near by and one thing led to another and before i knew it, i was wandering all over the grounds without a soul a sight. perks of being an early bird in search of worms! was a little unnerved by how preternaturally still it all was, although there was some activity in bishops park next door. lovely wisteria and drawing rooms, perfect picnic grounds for summer. will definitely be back with picnic basket and blanket in tow.

left fulham palace and spied a sign for the sunday farmers' market and made a mental note to check it out one sunday. usually at a loss for where to go on sundays (maltby and broadway, my two favourites are saturday places) and it'll be nice to be able to hit up a market on the river this weekend. also chanced upon this cute house and quiet backwater. hidden finds by the thames, loving it!

seafood haul

one of the biggest draws of living in london is the abundance of fresh produce on our doorsteps. while i'm partial to japanese uni and its preparation and presentation, their european counterparts weren't all that bad. lots of work though for what felt like minimal reward, but it was inexpensive from the local fishmonger. who is so techy he sends out texts / email alerts whenever he's got special stuff for sale. was also a little indulgent and treated ourselves to a lobster that was soon turned into bisque. tell a lie, the turning into bisque wasn't quite so fast as it was shaping up to be a social weekend with friends in town and dinner en masse. i had the heebie jeebies listening to mr. lobster scamper around in our spare sink, and felt perhaps he deserved some salt water in the bath tub to while out his last couple of hours. but that's just me being over-sentimental. and soon enough the scampering stopped :( i was just about to get emotionally attached! over dinner, told friends how we had a soon-to-be dead lobster running around the flat and we engaged in heated debated about the most humane way to put it out of its misery (spike through the head or pot o' boiling water, the jury is still out...) and we also talked about the best way to prepare sea urchin. one of my biggest regrets to date is not having had sea urchin pasta at lo scoglio, hands down my best meal of 2014 (even without said pasta) because the sea was choppy that morning and the fishing boats didn't return with uni. which means my new life mission is to return to the coast to finally taste their sea urchin pasta.

also scored some monster scallops that joined the sea urchin for pasta

and the short-lived lobster that was completely pulverised into bisque.

brick lane

it was a funny sunday morning where quite unfortunately i sprung up at the crack of dawn, one of the occupational hazards of early starts in the week. seeing how i can sleep for singapore, this inability to have a lazy lie-in irks me no end. but ever the eternal optimist, figured i'd be strategic and do something that usually requires much planning and organising to score. hadn't been to gr*anger at notting hill in some time. it used to be our go-to when friends from sg arrived on the antisocial 0555h flight. and we'd drag our comatose bodies to breakfast, desperately trying to wake over bloodymarys. here's a little insider tip if you're wanting to try. the inflection point is about 9 so don't bother going after if you're not the sort who enjoys a good queue. another reason we've not been back in some time is because we've discovered somewhere better in the 'hood. granted it's under 10min to get to notting hill, but maybe 5 to get to our local. anyhoos, gr*anger was o-k? either the standard's dropped, i've become more demanding or just wasn't in the mood. it's good enough but meh, wouldn't make the trek nor queue another time. the selection is limited and there wasn't really anything i wanted. need to stop whinging. there were screaming children. perils of going so early is that you're cheek to jowl with the baby brigade and believe you me, after spending a long week with screaming babies, they're the last thing i want on the weekend. 

oh! but this post isn't about gr*anger but more about brick lane. because after the WASP-y overdose, i needed to re-equilibrate. thought it'd be funny to hazard brick lane (oh my it doesn't get more ethnic than that) and i feared for my handbag. twas a giggle nevertheless, the pop up market transported me back to the night markets in the far east, there were malaysian pancakes (?!) that were comforting and familiar, popcorn chicken with gangnam sauce and lots of other yummies to munch my way through.

bagel was good and worth the long but quick moving queue. love how we'd to get our new york hustle on cos once you're in the front row it's free for all and whoever shouts louder gets served first. take that, you clueless tourists! and the cab serving coffee was cute.

homeward bound after brick lane and it was truly such a lovely day. can't get over the houses of parliament, nor the fact that it's london-living for the foreseeable future. more than makes up for the breakfast remorse!