NEW SHOES

I bought these bad boys in a bit of a SPUR OF THE MOMENT shoe shopping incident.

Nike Air Max 1 "Black Smoke"

THEY ARE NICE, but now there are like fiddy other Air Max's I want.

One of them being these: Air Max 1 "Honeycomb"

They are a bit more of an OUT THERE shoe than I have usually been liking/wearing but they look sexayy either way :)

Partagas Serie D No.4

I know we have already made a post about cigars, but the last time we went the guy recommended keep a journal of the cigars you have tried for a year or so, so that you get a better understand of the flavours and what's what. AND YEAH I'm going to do it on here :)

This is the one: Partagas Serie D No.4 
And this is it's nifty label:

As I am fairly new to cigar smoking, I don't have much to compare it to, or know how to describe the flavours.  It was certainly strong though, on the stronger side of cigars I have previously tried and it drew nicely, like not too easy and not too hard.  It was nice, but don't think it will end up as a favourite

The Cool Kids Burgernator Tee

This is a cool Tee regardless of whether you like The Cool Kids or not.

Get it from: Band of Villains

AND ITS PRETTY CHEAP YO

Uni

SOooOoo this year I have chosen a unit, that I wasn't too excited about BUT NOW, after the first lecture I'm actually kind of looking forward to it.

A BIT OF BACK STORY: I'm in my second year of a psychology degree and had to pick a number of psychology electives, and as I do the main psych units as core subjects I don't have them to choose from.  So I get to pick from a number of more specialised or specific subjects.  It gets kind of stressful trying to pick a good one.

EITHER WAY, I ended up picking this one called The Psychology of Music.

To start with I wasn't really eager to do it and kind of just picked it because the workload was tiny and the assignment was easy, but then I went to the lecture (for some reason it's actually called a seminar :S) it was not only made clear how easy the assignments were going to be, but the content sounded kind of cool as well.

so in the end GOOD PICK ME!

Home Made Lip Balm

The other day we made lip balm, SUCCESSFULLY! The recipe came from a book CHRIS' mum (Chris being the other wonderful person who writes on this blog) kindly gave me for Christmas last year. It's called 1001 Natural Remedies. It's very handy and most of the ingredients are attainable and affordable. I also made hair treatment and a main ingredient was honey which went in my hair sticky but all of a sudden felt super soft in there. IT WAS BIZARRE.

The lip balm contained beeswax, melted with almond oil and honey was added at the end. THERE ARE SO MANY OTHER POTENTIAL INGREDIENTS. Like oils and I was thinking pomegranate concentrate. OOOOH. The lip balm is smooth and shiny, not too oily or too hard like I thought it would be.

These are them in little containers

Rooibos infused Cupcakes

So I found this recipe recently for green tea infused sauce and then I went crazy and looked up all these recipes AND CAME up with a million ideas for CERTAIN FLAVOURED TEAS INFUSING CERTAIN FOODS like tofu, chicken, fruits and icing. ANYWAY I got over that and realised on Saturday I had committed myself to making a plate for some rare family gathering I decided to attend. THAT WAS MY CHANCE TO UTILISE A TEA INFUSED FOOD recipe and I did so. ROOIBOS, HONEY & CARAMEL cupcakes. The honey as the sweetener goes so well with the rooibos tea and the rooibos tea really makes the icing. HERE'S a link to the recipe... http://dailydoseoffresh.wordpress.com/2012/02/05/rooibos-honey-caramel-cupcakes/ I don't have any pictures of the cakes I made because they were so good EVERYONE ATE THEM. AKA my phone broke. So I'll just use a piccie from the blog I got it off. Can I do that? OKAY I WON'T. I think mine turned out well because I actually followed the recipe pretty accurately, until I got to the icing and couldn't be bothered waiting for the butter to cool and so it just looked like CELLULITE.

I LIKE MY ROOIBOS TEA STROOOONG

FREE GLASSES

This website, Clearly Contacts, allows you to get your first pair of glasses free from them, and you don't then have to continue buying or subscribe.

You just have to pay for the postage when you enter the code: FIRSTPAIRFREE
I paid like $16 I think for these babies

AND YEAH you just enter in your prescription and you can upgrade the lenses and then they send it to you.  I got mine in under a week :)

CHEAP GLASSES WOO HOO

Red Robyn

SOOOOOOO there is this little cafe on Camberwell Rd in Camberwell called Red Robyn, that has recently opened.  So far we have been there twice, once for breakfast and once for lunch, so we have been able to get a spread of the meals.

A lot of their dishes utilise polenta, which until recently I had not been a fan of, but in the dishes at Red Robyn I have really been enjoying.  It's also cool how, because the cafe is relatively new, the dishes have been changing and improving, which is certainly the case for the polenta :)

These are some of the dishes that had polenta:
This one is the Red Robyn breakfast V NICE

And this one is ... something else, I cant think of the name, but it had these carrots in MOLAESES

We have also tried some of their coffees, a ristretto, soy cappuccino, and regular cappuccino. The lady, who I assume is Robyn actually told us that recently they have started using a ristretto shot in the coffees as opposed to a normal espresso shot, which I think is kind of nifty :P

THIS IS a picture of the menu :P and a coffee:

These are just some other items we have tried:

this was a really nice salad

these were cool fritters because they

weren't oily

I should have mentioned earlier but the main idea of this cafe is the cater for different dietary requirements, like gluten free, vegetarian and vegan. 

IT'S A PRETTY COOL PLACE

Kappaya

I love the Abbotsford Convent AND I love Japanese places that use brown rice so I am pretty excited about that. Anyway, the staff working there were kind and helpful. It was very nice inside the cafe, small but the table and seats are nice and roomy, ENOUGH ROOM for out fat butts and the delicious bento plates that we ordered. You get to choose 2 rice ball flavours and 2 main dishes. There is also a cabbage? salad included. The tofu miso rice balls are DA BEST. We got the tempura and I am not a big fan of tempura but I really enjoyed the flavours of this one. The rice balls were excellente and I loved the tea. I can't remember what it was called, but it was decaffeinated. It was also quite cheap. I'd go back. It's almost a bit romantic too. OOOOOH BABYYYYY. Apparently they have nice coffee too but we didn't try. Overall it was relaxing and flavoursome. Double date LOCATION ALERT.

My New Recipe Book!

Yesterday IN THE early morn I woke up needing to pee and I had a super good idea for a recipe book, to organise and compile all of my recipes into one source. So I got up later on, walked to Office Works and bought some plastic sleeves, dividers and an envelope that can be put into a binder and then I went to the paper shop in Malvern where I did the origami class, and bought some VERY PRETTY paper to put on the binder so it actually looks half attractive. The first step was to write all of the categories on the dividers. AND BY WRITE, I MEAN STAMP. I bought this stamp kit off Etsy and I've finally put it to USE. Then I glued white paper and the pretty paper on top of it on the binder. NOW I'M stressing out about getting all my recipes together. Slow process and I will probably never finish, BUT I'M TRYING.

The best part are the plastic sleeves. When I take my recipe book to the bench and decide to get cake batter all over my recipe, I CAN JUST WIPE IT OFF.

So Many Kittys

This sandy coloured cat is called Sandy and he lives down a fancy lane. The grey blue one is a bully and is dead.

This is one fat mother

CAT BOX

More Sandy, but really I just wanted everyone to see my cool RUNNERS which I did SIX laps in today.  GO ME

Cat groping me

I like the colours and TEXTURES IN THIS PHOTO

Cat squashed. The funniest thing ever is when a cat (not this one) jumped into the corner of its glass pet shop home. JUST SO FUNNY

A really pretty car rolling in car oil.

DRY CAT

Content

Laos KITTY

Bar None

Bar None is a hidden bar across from Camberwell station. It was closed for a while after a fire but recently opened back up again. It's casual and mature.

We were especially impressed by the enthusiastic and friendly staff member who helped us out that night. She had a lot of product knowledge and recommended some very nice beverages.

ALSO the coolest part was the menu. It was a book, a centimetre and a half thick, which explained what the drinks were, the origins, processing and history of spirits and why the flavours worked together.

We enjoyed a cocktail called Mr. Fancy Pants which was apparently a popular pick which contained vanilla vodka which MADE IT. We also enjoyed an ale which was yummmmyyyy, Applejack in a cocktail glass and Rose.

We'd go back I'D SAY.

Dark ale and Mr. Fancy Pants - like a vanilla mojito

Applejack - it looked much brighter and appetising in real life.

Rose

Attempted tofu tuna pocket platter

THE BEST dish at Yong Green Food is the TOFU TUNA POCKET PLATTER. I went on a mega walk the other day and purchased the required ingredients - sweetened tofu pockets and fake tuna. THEN, WE MADE OUR own version. They tasted very similar to Yong's and I ate way too many.

VS.

Ours were missing spring onion which I FEEL IS AN IMPORTANT flavour component.

Whilst I was on my mega walk I walked past Three Bags Full which I had heard about a million times but never planned on going. BUT SINCE I WAS THERE I decided to get a coffee and I wasn't that impressed. LIKE IT was a good coffee but I realise I don't need to travel as far as Abbotsford to get a similar coffee to what I can get down the street. AAAAND the menu wasn't any different to other places like it. If I lived there though, I'd go it.

Doppio/Double Happiness

Just near China Town is a lovely place - Doppio Happiness by day and Double HAPPINESS BY NIGHT. We love this place day and night because it is cosy, CASUAL and comfortable, the oriental theme is fantastico and it's mostly never busy (except for last night, but only because it was Valentine's Day and all the coolest people were there, AND IT WASN'T EVEN that bad anyway)

The barista during the day is great. He probably drinks about one million coffees. The coffees are A BIT OF ALRIGHT. I've also noticed that they have some fancy little cakes and the likes but I've never gone that.

During the evening they have some yummy cocktails, beer, wine and all that jazz. The menu isn't extensive at all, nor is their supply of spirits but we agreed that people come here for the atmosphere more so than the drinks list. However, their cocktails are probably some of my favourites (this list of mine also includes those at Berlin Bar) On a visit prior to last night, I had a cocktail featuring lychee vodka YMUYMUMYMUMUYM and last night a lemony delight with green tea liquer OH BABY. A beer from China was also thoroughly enjoyed.

This place is DA BOMB. 

WOT DA?

Upside down, but it says SEMEN. EEEP