Sydney noms and Joss Whedon!

This past weekend I went down to Sydney to see Joss Whedon speak at the Sydney Opera House and spend some wonderful time with by Browncoats. And, of course, for eating!

Saturday night was Brendan's birthday party, and he was showing off his new Thermomix by whipping up several vegan-friendly dishes (and one not so vegan friendly meaty chili). Combined with two delicious tarts that Leigh brought along, everyone there, vegan or otherwise, was very well fed!


Here is my dinner plate, loaded up with goodness. What you can see here is a slice of Leigh's two quiches - a sun dried tomato and smoke Sheese quiche and a hummus and vegetable quiche, with lemon and pea risotto, brown rice salad and beetroot salad (those last three all from the Thermomix). It was good, and I went back for some seconds as well! For dessert I tucked into a delicious little treat that Leigh had brought me from the vegan bake sale - but more on those in a later post!

Sunday morning came along and this was Joss day! I started my day with an almond croissant and cherry pie, then had a mini cheezecake snack about an hour later. Again, more on these in the bake sale post! We then headed into Newtown for a late brunch at Naked Espresso.


After my super sweet start to the day, I decided to try something different from new usual, and I had the scrambled tofu feast - scrambled tofu, mushrooms, spinach, pumpkin, hashbrowns, toast and homemade baked beans.


Diana had my usual, which is different from her usual (the BLAT). My usual is the buckwheat pancakes with a side of Redwood bacon and hashbrowns. There must always be potatoes at brunch!


Brendan is contemplating his Pie Floater.

After brunch, Brendan and I headed down for a stroll through Newtown (Diana had to go help set up for the Joss Whedon cocktail party her work was involved in), and we ended up at Buppa's Bakehouse - one of Brendan's favourite places in the world. Buppa's is an American style cake and pie shop. They also have New York style bagels, which are vegan! Even though I had just eaten brunch, I could hardly say no.


Mmmmm.... warm bagel with Nuttelex and sour cherry jam. Buppa's has an excellent grasp on what is required to be vegan. Unfortunately they don't offer a vegan option in their regular daily selection, but they can bake a range of vegan cakes and cupcakes to order.

After the bagel, I was just incredibly full. And a power walk from the bus stop the Sydney Opera House was not helping. But no matter, because it was Joss time! Wow, what an incredible 90 minutes! He is an incredible speaker - funny, articulate and honest. I laughed, I cried, I love it. For a great write up of the event, click here. And if you are going 'Joss who?', well then - get thee to a DVD store and stock up on Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Serenity, Dollhouse and friends stat!

Afterwards, some people went to the after party, and those of us that didn't went to a nearby pub to wait for them. I was still quite full, which was good because the pub had a very uninspired selection on the menu and certainly nothing vegan! But once we were all joined up again, a large group of us headed out for dinner at Wagamamas. Leigh, my fellow Browncoat vegan, was also there. So what do two hungry vegan ladies eat at Wagamama?


Edamame with salt. Always a classic, though we had to add lots more salt!


Sweet potato chips, without the mayo dipping sauce.


Some sort of stir-fry. I don't remember the exact names. We subbed out the soba noodles (which contained egg) for rice noodles.


Again, I don't remember the name of this. But it was fried tofu, vegetables and chillies on rice.


And, of course, pickles! You cannot have Japanese without pickled vegetables. Nom! All washed down with Japanese tea and water. A tasty feast indeed!

I headed back to Brisbane yesterday, thankful for a wonderful weekend with some of my favourite people, my favourite write/director/producer/etc and some delicious food!


This photo isn't from Sydney. Last night, after I got back, I went to Loving Hut with The Jens. I just wanted to share their new starter - French Onion Pouches. Inside these little crispy packets is hot, melty french onion cream cheeze... which sounds wrong, but is oh-so-right! I could become addicted. ;)

Cute kitty photo of the post


This handsome man is Caleb, one of Brendan and Diana's kitties. Here he is being just utterly adorable - his back legs are still sitting on the top platform of his scratching post, but he has his front legs standing on the lower one. He sat like this for ages, looking rather happy and zoned out. He's a gorgeous big cutie. :)