It’s been a whirlwind few weeks since starting university again in Melbourne, and I must admit I’ve really enjoyed being back in routine. A solid routine plus a smidge (ok, a little more than a smidge) of work pressure has equaled productivity levels through the roof – at least as long as I balance that with organisation (a diary + a to-do list, am I right?) and enough sleep (have I already mentioned that you all need to go and read Why We Sleep?)). The only negative is that discretionary reading time has disappeared. This is bad news for my New Year’s resolution, which is to read a book a week in 2019 (so a grand total of 52 over the year). Easy to stick to during the holidays; not so much now. That hour window before bed which can so easily disappear into social media (or Netflix) is what I need to start utilising. Speaking of, I just finished The Bodyguard and LOVED it – would highly recommend if you’re after a new manageable length (6 episodes) series.

On another note, I’ve been struggling with instagram lately. Engagement (the number of people that see and like/comment on posts) has been down the gurgler, which I know is also true for many other people. I know I shouldn’t let something as arbitrary as this bother me, but it DOES. When you put significant time and effort into something, its tough to see an online algorithm decide that it isn’t worth people seeing, or to not compare yourself to other accounts that seem to fare much better. Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated! That’s part of why I maintain this website as well – I don’t want the value of The Brick Kitchen entirely at the mercy of fickle tech giants.

And to the recipe – it’s a fresh tomato and zucchini panzanella, and one of my favourite summer salads. Vibrant tomatoes are important – if you can splash a few extra dollars, this is where it is worth it. They’re thrown together with golden strips of fried zucchini, crunchy olive oil and salt laced croutons, chunks of roasted capsicum, lots of fresh parsley and basil, salty capers and whisper thin shards of parmesan, and creamy torn bocconcini (burrata and mozzarella are also great). The dressing is a simple combination of good quality olive oil and balsamic vinegar. I’ve been serving it with panko-crumbed fresh fish, but you could also use canned sardines or any other kind of protein you have available. Because everything is fresh, it is the kind of salad where quality ingredients DO make a difference if they’re available and affordable.

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Peach & Tomato Salad, two ways – one all Italian with torn burrata and a basil-walnut dressing, the other dressed up fattoush style, diced with cucumber, herbs and za’atar on a bed of hummus. Jump to Recipe 

It’s been a little while since the last recipe over here – a month has flown past since I wrote about wrapping up a summer term in Oxford with a spring lemon & elderflower loaf and boarded a plane to Barcelona. My first European summer  – well, I can see what the fuss is about. Barcelona, Florence, Rome, Cinque Terre, Venice. Certainly the tourist trail, but I’ve never been to Italy so it sort of had to be done, didn’t it? And despite the crowds (of which there were many, but which can be mostly avoided with a bit of planning), and despite the heat (don’t fight it, just enjoy it – sweatiness included), it was absolutely wonderful. 

I am a creature of habit when it comes to exploring a new city. Views, food, coffee and history. Each place is marked by the local produce market, explored early morning before the day’s humidity descends: Barcelona’s La Boqueria filled with racks of serrano jamon and rainbow stacks of blitzed fruit smoothies; mounds of vibrant zucchini flowers, shiny eggplant and tomatoes the size of my fist in Florence’s Mercato di Sant’Ambrogio; silvery sardines, octopus and swordfish fresh from the boat in Venice’s Rialto. The indulgent pastry and coffee ritual in Italy is another I appreciate – cappuccino or double espresso, vanilla custard filled cornetto or flaky sfogliatelle eaten counterside at Roscioli. Traditional Venetian almond crusted pastries (the Sant’Ubaldo) and chocolate twisted krantz cakes at Dal Mas. Post-market Florentine sfloglia filled with pear, chocolate and ricotta at Pasticceria Nencioni. Lots of walking. Lots of stairs – views over Barcelona from the wonderland of Park Guell, a moment of quiet above the bustle of Florence at Palazzo Vecchio, standing in the wind at San Giorgio Maggiore watching the late-afternoon sun bouncing off waves and boat traffic.  

I am planning on uploading photographs and favourite places from the trip in the next few weeks, but for the moment you can find a photo diary and read a bit about that first week in Barcelona here.

This summery peach, tomato & avocado salad was one I made during our time in Monterosso, Cinque Terre. The morning market was just opening when we loaded up brown paper bags full of juicy yellow peaches, fumbled our way through asking for burrata and pinenuts in mangled Italian (mostly english, to be honest) and bought scoops of vibrantly green local genovese pesto. Then it was a day of views, hiking up and down between the five coastal villages. I’ll remember most clearly the olive trees and grape vines, the radiating heat and dripping sweat, the glimpses of colourful houses and ferries leaving white wash streaks across the ocean down below. It was quiet, save for insects, and we were mostly alone – apparently not many tourists walk the high paths. We stopped for ricotta cream filled croissants and double espressos in Vernazza (Il pirata delle 5 terre) before jumping off the rocks to cool off, and devoured scoops of creamy olive oil & almond gelato in Riomaggiore. Thirty kilometres in the legs later and back in our little yellow and stone airbnb kitchen that evening, I put together plates of roughly chopped tomatoes and peaches, dolloped with torn burrata, toasted pine nuts and a lemon pesto dressing, a side of golden grilled zucchini and eggplant. (Pipe dreams of permanently relocating to a small Italian village were entertained.)

I’d never really used peaches in a savoury context until last summer when I made this peach & tomato salad for friends, and now I can’t get enough of it. It’s so simple it hardly needs a recipe, but here’s one for you anyway. The original was all Italian – basil and prosciutto, fresh cheese and olive oil –  but lately I’ve been changing it up a bit with a more Israeli edge, like a fattoush. Dicing through crisp lebanese cucumbers and finely chopped mint and parsley, tangy with lemon juice and za’atar, served up on a bed of creamy hummus with soft pita for all the scooping. It’s infinitely adaptable – next time I want to try grilled corn. Any other ideas? 

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Fast Ricotta Gnocchi with Roast Tomato & Eggplant Sauce – light, fluffy gnocchi that come together in a flash, with a flash oven roasted summer sauce, lots of freshly grated parmesan and torn basil.  Jump to Recipe

I have a big piece of news today! It’s T-10 days until I board a flight to the UK for approximately 7 months (or, maybe more accurately, until both my money and visa run out). It’s a year off medical school, substituted instead for a research project based in Oxford, with the added bonus of Europe travel proximity. To say I’m excited would be an understatement! I’ve only ever spent a week in London, so if any of you have any must-do recommendations, or particularly recommendations for Oxford, I’d love to hear from you. 

I imagined this summer break stretching out long and lazy, with another whole month back in New Zealand compared to the last couple of years. A treat! But it’s somehow almost over and I’m still scrambling, though I know I’d much rather be busy than bored. Trawling the internet for reasonable banking options overseas is currently doing my head in and has stolen way too many hours (why are banking fees so vague, hard to locate and overwhelming complex??). That’s not to mention packing (baggage for 7 months is daunting, ok!), budgeting, visas, insurance, flights, SIM cards, transfers, accommodation…ugh. I’m also staring at a mostly untouched pile of heavy duty lit review textbooks, stacked between the clutter of recipe books and discarded kitchen notes. The plan has been to create a small recipe bank of sorts pre-departure for some extra content to post this year, but between part time work and my knack for procrastination – well, we might get half way there.

I remember as a kid being overwhelmed by the possibilities promised by a weekday at home (mildly sick, *cough cough*) – being stretched out on the couch with a book and the prospect of a cooked lunch, rather than warm plastic wrapped sandwiches. Endless hours to fill! It helped that I was a total bookworm, and could easily dive into various fictional worlds and not emerge until dinner. That concept seems to have flipped on its head now I’m trying to work at home.  Now, a non-structured day means time seems elusive,  slipping away in a haze of internet surfing, a tide of emails, coffee breaks and multiple supermarket trips. I’m not sure I’d make a particularly productive freelancer at this point, let’s say.

Typing this is out is now sounding more complain-y that I intended – between the jobs has been an absolutely stellar summer here in New Zealand. I’ve road-tripped and beach hopped from Auckland down to Mt Maunganui and Wainui in Gisborne, up to Omaha and across the Hauraki Gulf to Waiheke Island. There’s been the freshest roadside corn, grilled up on the barbecue and tossed with pesto, dinners of hours-old snapper finished with bubbling stone-fruit and berry crumbles. Potluck dinners, music festivals and more reading than I’ve done in ages. The other day finished with a surreptitiously swiped ripe fig from an overhanging branch, eaten warm five minutes later with a lick of bush honey (which was more exciting than a fresh fig with honey should be, I’m sure).

Our home tomato and basil patch has been especially abundant, and was part of the incentive behind this gnocchi. I had no idea that ricotta gnocchi could be so easily pulled together, and it’s quickly become a high rotation summer meal. With just three ingredients (ok, 4 if you count the salt) and about 10 minutes, you’ll have gnocchi all cut up and ready to cook. The sauce is my favourite – ripe tomatoes quickly chopped up and tossed in a few flavour enhancers – garlic, tomato paste, olive oil and salt – and then flash roasted for half an hour until they’re collapsed, bubbling and a few charred patches appear. The eggplant roasts at the same time, lightly brushed with oil. All it needs to finish is a generous dose of freshly grated parmesan and torn basil leaves.

The cast iron pan I used to finish up these gnocchi was given to me by Lodge Cookware Australia  – it’s perfect for all manner of dishes, especially for baked eggs and anything requiring those crispy caramelised edges.

Cook’s Notes:

• My only disclaimer is that the gnocchi are ideally made for 2-4 people – much more and it starts getting fairly tricky to cook as you’ll need to boil it in batches, and you might be better off using pasta (if you’re truly committed to gnocchi, go ahead-  just allow yourself enough time!).
• I’ve briefly pan-fried the gnocchi before serving for an extra golden edge, but this is totally optional- you could easily just boil them and stir into the sauce.
• Most ricotta gnocchi recipes used strained ricotta, which is bought from some high quality delis or done by straining regular ricotta through a cheesecloth or similar for at least 4 hours. I usually don’t plan ahead this far, so this recipe uses regular supermarket ricotta and uses a technique from Izy Hossack of pressing it between paper towels to reduce the excess moisture.

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A twist on eggplant caponata, with tangy pomegranate molasses, pine nuts, herbs, capers & anchovies, served on grilled sourdough smeared with labneh. Jump to Recipe 

I’m currently recovering from an enormous weekend spent alternatively eating, walking, shopping, eating and fan-girling over Adele with a few extra coffees and a break between tutorials. (You may already know this, thanks to my instagram story spam!). Mum and Dad visited from Auckland for a few days, and I got to play tourist for a change in a city I’ve grown accustomed to yet still need google-maps frequently, where I have lived for 3+ years but still don’t know like home. It’s funny how you get to see a place in a new light when you’re with people on holiday – you realise how much of the big city you take for granted.

It started with a 20 course (yes, 20 – they were small, okay!) dinner at Attica – it’s a reservation I’ve tried to get for the last few years only to be disappointed by the booking system, but it was worth the wait. Headed by New Zealand head chef Ben Shewry, it absolutely deserves that spot in the Top 50 Restaurants in the world – inspiring and innovative, and exactly not the type of food you’d make at home! We ate the best croissants in the world (according to the NYT, anyway) from Lune Croissanterie, enjoyed a flower-adorned breakfast at The Kettle Black, tried a bubble cup coffee and coffee-caviar topped french toast at specialty roaster Industry Beans, stuck with the long time favourite sticky pork, fried barramundi and green apple salad at Chin Chin, were wowed by the best creamed corn invented at Embla, and finished off with double scoops of salted coconut and mango gelato at Spring Street Grocer. I don’t think you could fit in much more – and if you’re into food, I couldn’t recommend Melbourne as a city to visit enough.

This eggplant caponata is a last ditch attempt to make use of the summer evenings and produce, and combines some of my favourite ingredients: eggplant (if you’re as into it as me, try this eggplant pasta puttanesca, eggplant shakshuka, and eggplant & mango soba noodles), sourdough bread (I just need to learn to make my own) and the concept of toast – isn’t everything better when sat on top of a warm, crusty piece of bread, itself slathered with melting butter, some form of cheese, or avocado? For me this basically applies to any leftovers ever. Plus a poached egg – lunch = sorted.

It is adapted from a Gjelina recipe – a restaurant we visited earlier this year after being recommended it by too many people to count. Their focus on small vegetable based sharing plates, wood-fired pizzas and the best ginger gelato on sticky date cake I could imagine prompted me to order their cookbook that same evening, and it’s a winner. This caponata has become a blend of the Middle East and more Italian flavours, nuanced and rich. Tangy pomegranate molasses, herbs and labneh are in the mix with salty anchovy, grilled capsicum and the brine of capers. A hint of sweetness comes from tiny currants with crunch from toasted pinenuts and those slabs of garlic toasted sourdough. I ended up baking the diced eggplant rather than frying it – much less oil, much less spatter, and the difference was barely noticeable. And it may look like a long list of ingredients, but you might find you already have most in your cupboard, and once your eggplant and capsicum are roasted, the rest comes together very quickly.

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Homemade pappardelle with pesto, zucchini & goats cheese – fresh, easy pappardelle with a basil-parsley herb oil & blistered cherry tomatoes.  Jump to Recipe 

Pasta is one of my great, giant food loves. I can’t even put a finger on why.  Maybe it’s the way it can hold and showcase any number of flavours and produce – from gently roasted autumnal tomatoes to rich, tender winter ragu or light spring herbs and greens.  Maybe it’s the comfort factor – something about a warm, steaming bowl of pasta screams home. A reminder of family weekend dinners and Mum’s classic ‘roast chicken & vegetable pasta’ – a heaving pot of fresh tortellini, oven roasted vegetables and barbecued chicken thighs, drenched with her go-to tomato sauce of slowly sweated onions and garlic. Maybe it’s the convenience, of coming home tired and throwing together a box of dried pasta with whatever ingredients are on hand and always ending up with a satisfying meal.

Despite all this, I’ve barely entered the realm of homemade pasta. We do have a pasta machine, courtesy of my youngest brother’s kindergarten pasta making day. It left him with the sort of obsession only four year olds have – fleeting but intense – and resulted in a pasta machine birthday present. It was used once, an attempt that left a flour coated kitchen and whole afternoon effort from Mum while he got distracted part way through. Let’s just say it was subsequently relegated to the top shelf of the cupboard with other obsolete appliances. A few years later, the same cycle happened with an ice cream churner, culminating in a couple of batches of mint-choc chip (their favourite flavour, for reasons I still do not understand) and even less cupboard space. Fast forward ten years, and I’m now the main user of both machines – I call that a win, thanks brothers!

Thanks to Erin’s quick and mess-free food processor pasta dough recipe, I’m now a pasta making convert. This excludes week nights when the point of making pasta is an extra quick meal, or when I’m feeding my three brothers and don’t want to spend years rolling pasta sheets – simply because they eat a stupid amount of food, and then ask for seconds. Last time I tried it I needed 10 eggs worth of dough to serve us all! The rest of the time, it’s strangely meditative – the process of rolling and folding, rolling and folding, rolling progressively thinner widths and finally cutting noodles to dry. I personally favour thick widths of parpadelle over thin spaghetti strings – all the better for catching your sauce – and there’s nothing as human and homely as slightly uneven handcut noodles.

This pappardelle with pesto, zucchini & goats cheese is made for the long, warm evenings of February. It’s an ode to summer vegetables – vibrant green zucchini and multi-coloured cherry tomatoes with handfuls of garden basil and parsley, brightened up with lemon and briny capers. The tomatoes are quickly blistered whole over a high heat, skin loosened and scorched, while the zucchini takes a few minutes in a hot pan with generous salt and pepper. The herbs are blitzed to make a pesto-like herb oil, and it’s all combined in the cooking pot just before serving. Hints of creamy, tangy goats cheese finish it off.

Unfortunately I don’t have my own vegetable garden here in Melbourne, though back in Auckland my youngest brother’s newest interest is his little vegetable plot. It’s absolutely flourished this summer and produced bags of the biggest tomatoes I’ve ever seen!

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