A Tiny Market Stall

There are many things from my childhood I wish I had kept and saved.  Others I am not so fussed about. (My mother recently produced my teenage diaries complete with lock and key which she had kept all this time.  Oh the angst and high emotions in just one day's entry.   I decided after a quick glance not to read them any further).  

When my parents travelled to the UK in the 1970s they made a point of seeking out these little hand crafted market stalls to bring back with them.   Yesterday I got them out of the shoe box and tissue paper they had been residing in for more than 25 years.   I thought I might give them to my daughter for her upcoming birthday.

Apart from the disintegration of some of the glue, they were in remarkably good shape.    They are quite small, only about 20 cm across. 

The quality of the workmanship is quite incredible.  And they are also a little history of traditional English food.   There are pork pies, fresh butter, pigeons, wild rabbit, turkey, Swiss rolls, chocolate eclairs and strings of sausages. 

These apples look the same as they did when I was given them in 1977.

And this wedding cake was always one of my favourites. I found playing with cakes was every bit as satisfying as eating them!

I also have a fish shop, run by Mr Pike the fishmonger, complete with native oysters, Cornish crabs, lobster and salmon. 

These stalls were designed by Caroline Watt, who in 1979 employed 35 people making these crafts, which is quite a sizable business in one sense.   A bit of googling told me the business ceased in 2000.    Her items are catalogued by the British Design Council, and the above photo shows a much newer shop.

What is a cream horn anyway?  I am dying to know. 

I love these little stalls for the same reason I love this book, illustrated by my favourite children's book author, Raymond Briggs, and which tells the story of an elephant and a bad (red-haired) baby who run around an English village stealing various food items from shops, including a pork butcher and a snack bar. 

The illustrations evoke the now gone past world of the specialist food shop.   In our current world of over airconditioned food halls and supermarkets which sell everything, I find that I miss the little local shops.   And I could do with some more East End barrow boys hanging around the place menacingly!   Like this one, who doesn't even notice the elephant behind him. 

After all, it was only in the early 1960s that they stopped delivering milk by horse and cart in Melbourne.  (It's true.  My husband can remember hearing the clip clopping noise of the hoofs).

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Beogram Memories

In this month's Belle, in an interview with designer Jasper Morrison, responsible for items like this:

(chair for Cappellini) 

and this:

(part of the Crate series)

he reveals the following in response to the question about how his uncle's study inspired his design aesthetic:

'Flashback to the year 1964 in a foggy wet England and imagine a young boy, suffocating from the over upholstered interiors of the typical English home, suddenly finding himself in a room with plenty of daylight, wooden floors, white rugs, modern Danish furniture and a record player designed by Dieter Rams and you'll understand why the first experience of that room made such an impression on me.  The atmosphere of that room changed my whole attitude to life, if a 5 year old can have an attitude to life.  I understood that design could bring about these powerful changes of atmosphere that could lift the spirity and make life more rich and that's why I decided to become a designer.' 

(A record player designed by Dieter Rams looks like this:

When I was little I spent a lot of time in my parents library room, which was filled with shelves of books like this:

and this:

but the best thing about that room was this record player owned by my parents:

(Bang and Olufsen Beogram 3400, in production from 1975 - 1979)

This man certainly got a good airing on this record player.  I guess sleepless nights as a 7 year old are okay if you have to listen to Neil. 

The Beogram was the first truly modern thing I can remember seeing.   I couldn't believe its smooth silveryness.  And the turntable was not just black rubber, but an optical illusion of black and silver circles.    It didn't turn me into a world famous designer, but it certainly made me love all things modern and clean lined.   

(Image of Beogram from beophile.com) 

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Restaurant Inspiration - Da Noi and Sardinia

My parents travelled a lot during the 1970s when I was little. They would return with stories of magical places and (most importantly to me I have to confess) little gifts - a knitted poncho from Peru, a cotton Chinese doll from Hong Kong, a little English shop from London.
They even travelled to Libya once (on business but that's another story).

But to me the most exciting place they ever travelled to was to Sardinia to stay at the Cala Di Volpe (translates as Vixen Cove).

My geography lessons had taught me all about the Mediterranean Sea and its islands, and this hotel, sitting squat on the glittering harbour with its adobe style structures and jewell colours evoked pure 1970s disco fun to me and my fertile imagination.






To this day I still want to visit, and stay here in this room:



And eat at this little restaurant:


In Melbourne there is a Sardinian restaurant in South Yarra called Da Noi. My exhaustive 30 second Google search tells me that there are no other Sardinian restaurants in Australia.



There are many things to love about this restaurant:

1. The owner\chef's name (Pietro Porcu)

2. The lack of a menu (well there is a menu but rarely used. You largely just eat what is brought to you)

3. The lack of a website (anyone who sensibly flies in the face of technology should be applauded).

4. This business card (a tawny misty morning shot of three fabulous Italian boar shooters)




On a recent visit we ate pork cheek terrine, eggplant and tomato salad, marinated octopus, oysters, a salty caper, saffron, olive and white fish risotto and lamp shank with smoked potato mash.

Dessert was a tasting plate of mandarin pannacotta, a tiny square of tiramisu, honey and yougurt cake, some kind of fennelly icecream and little pink square of watermelon.

And I especially loved the cannellini mush we had as part of our appetisers.

This is very easy, and healthy (beans are healthy aren't they?).

Method

Drain and rinse a can of Italian cannellini beans.
PIck over and finely chop a sprig of rosemary
Finely chop a large clove of garlic.

Warm a good slosh of olive oil in a saucepan, add the garlic and once its scent rises add the beans and rosemary. Cook slowly for 10 - 20 minutes. Add more oil if needs be. Some of the beans will break down. They are ready when they become a bit creamy. Add lots of sea salt and freshly ground pepper.

Perfect on toasted sourdough or just in greedy spoonfuls.
PS a less overtly lazy search has now revealed at least two other Sardinian restaurants - Cose in Brisbane and Pilu in Sydney. There may be many more, indeed.




(Images (1)-(4) Caladivolpe.com)

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Where have all the colourful kitchens gone?

The other day my kitchen had a moment of looking particularly spick and span, in its own slightly personality free white and stainless steel way.




Look familiar? I thought so. Looks a bit like these kitchens below, the type of kitchen which is today ubiquitous.

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And I found myself fondly remembering the kitchen in which I spent my childhood during the 1970s.

Naturally I have no photos, and it is hard to even find kitchen products out there which remotely approximate it, but these were the key elements:

Shiny green ceramic tiles for the splashback. (I recently learned that in the US a splashback is called a backsplash! I laughed for a good five minutes at that. The same but different).




Bright orange painted walls. The technique used was I think called double glazing and involved painting layers and layers of colour so there was a textured, patchy effect.



Grey slate floor tiles.

And most striking of all, browny black laminate cupboards and countertop. There was also a high island bench opening through to the eating area, which you never see any more.





Let me be clear, this was a not a kitchen where people on entering smiled politely. This was the kitchen my mother chose, an amazing kitchen, quite the height of design. People loved it and commented on it. It was in magazines.

I have many fond memories of my mother cooking us spaghetti bolognese for dinner, and whipping up a cold cherry soup dessert for one of her many dinner parties. And us helping to mix the raspberries into the creme anglaise before it went into the freezer. And eating by the spoonful that malted milk powder which I don't think you can buy anymore (it makes your mouth glue up).

How I wonder have we gone from multi-coloured kitchens to the neutrals and stainless steel which now engulf us. And when will we return to the kitchens of my childhood?

There are examples of the use of colour out there. It is usually pretty selective and edited.

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And don't get me wrong, I love love love our kitchen. But sometimes I miss orange and lime.

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