A new restaurant IN SYDNEY OLD TOWN, AN early Christmas as well as huge OL’ STORMS

Sydney has officially went into full-blown silly season mode! It occurs every Christmas, however it always takes me by surprise. 

Shops are crazy, bars as well as restaurants are to their rafters, as well as everyone’s moving around at an unsustainable pace. To make matters even a lot more complicated, it’s Christina’s birthday tomorrow, which always adds to my own personal brand of panic.

Thankfully there’s a great deal of fun still be had, like the introduce night of Tayim – a gorgeous restaurant ideal in the heart of Sydney’s oldest quarter The Rocks.

We likewise catch up with household as well as old buddies for an early Christmas dinner (how extremely sensible) as well as then Sydney fires up her own type of crazy with some crazy storms.

Enjoy this regular edition as well as great luck with your Christmas shopping!

Cheers – Jim & Christina xx

It’s a sure indication that summer’s well under way: the cruise ship season’s in full flow. From our office window, we get to view these floating hotels are available in as well as out of Sydney. It’s really rather charming to watch. Not sure if I want to be on one though. Still not convinced.

Tonight is quite exciting. We’re at the introduce celebration for Tayim restaurant that’s ideal in the heart of The Rocks, the oldest part of Sydney.

From the outside, Tayim looks beautiful. The old sandstone buildings in this part of town are iconic, as well as the restaurant balcony looks out over nurses walk – one of the quaint alleys that criss cross the suburb.

Tayim is a middle Eastern restaurant serving both standard as well as contemporary style food from the region. interesting dishes like grilled sardine Shakshuka, summertime mushroom Borekas as well as grilled poultry Masahan may requirement a bit explaining, however no encouragement to eat.

Other morsels like roasted figs, radicchio, goats’ cheese as well as chardonnay dressing, or semolina increased pudding with a pistachio meringue as well as summertime berries are just as tempting.

Inside, the long bar is serving up fantastic cocktails, award-winning wines as well as beer from the Lord Nelson Brewery – one of the oldest brew-pubs in the country just round the corner.

It’s fantastic that old buildings such as this one are being utilized like this. It’s charming to be able to see inside them. I like the contrast of this contemporary restaurant in such an historic setting.

The designers as well as architects Welsh & major have done an outstanding task producing this area from what was three seperate venues. The archways at the back of the restaurant as well as the deep doorways at the front show you just exactly how thick these old walls are.

We get a taste of things to find from one of the mezze tables – a location where everybody accumulates. There are likewise delicacies from the fiery grill like charred skewers of spiced kangaroo kebabs as well as lamb kofta that make their method round too.

We’re looking ahead to coming back right here to see the restaurant in full flow. as well as the very best thing is it’s open all the time long. There’s a deli linked to the restaurant that’s open for breakfast as well as lunch, as well as the restaurant itself is open breakfast till as well as dinner too. It’s the best set-up.

This evening, we’re out round an old household friend’s home to celebrate an early Christmas. It’s really extremely practical – it gets progressively a lot more tough to pin people down for Christmas celebrations the better it gets to Dec25, so getting in early works well.

I mean it must feel complete stranger than it does to be eating turkey as well as pulling crackers in mid-December, however why not, right?

Especially when it’s with such charming people.

The dinner table is laden with food (it is still a Christmas celebration after all) however the focus is absolutely on the salads as much as the turkey, potato bake as well as trimmings.

This appeal is a recipe from our buddy Beth from BabyMac. It’s a infant pea as well as fetta salad with fresh mint. Here’s the recipe – it’s fast, perfect as well as foolproof.

I tried to get Christina to make her signature edible Christmas tree too, made from cream cheese as well as olives (check out the recipe here) however it’s a great task she didn’t. There’s so much food right here already!

The other stand-out salad is this one. It’s a mixed bean as well as ancient grain salad with pomegranate as well as almond slivers. Striking as well as delicious.

Of course, no matter exactly how much food there is, there’s always space for a bit of dessert. particularly when there’s a pavlova involved. Christina’s mum makes outstanding pavs – in truth we shared her never-fail pavlova recipe a bit while ago.

There’s likewise a fruit trifle, which goes down well too.

Christmas is such a great time of year for food, isn’t it?

It appears like Sydney’s summertime is going to be a fickle one this year. this week has been peppered with ferocious storms. besides the disruption as well as damage they’ve triggered (my sister-in-law’s neighbour had their home absolutely destroyed by a falling tree), the storms have produced some remarkable skies.

This weather condition front just keeps coming as well as growing. Such a odd cloud.

And with the clouds come lightning – inspect out the shots I got:

There are about 100 a lot more on my phone, however these were a few of the very best ones. crazy days.

It’s clearly set to be a fantastic Christmas though. Our charming neighbours Jack as well as Denese brought this cake over the other day. So sweet.

Best of all, the card states we’re great neighbours, which is reassuring. When you online in an apartment or condo block, you try to keep noise down, however you never understand exactly how much the people next door can hear.

If you haven’t seen this video about upstairs neighbours before, you’ve got to view it. It’s hilarious, however it really makes so much sense!

This evening, I’m just walking with Pyrmont when I come across this outstanding sculpture. There are frequently installations right here ideal by the Maritime museum as well as the Pyrmont Bay ferry wharf. however this one of a shark amazed into a shipping container is amazing.

At very first you can’t see it’s a shipping container, only a shark. however from the side, it’s quite clear. regrettably the artist’s explanation on the plaque is utter bs as well as full of ‘art talk’ that Christina – an Art history trainee – loves. It tells you extremely bit about the artwork, however thankfully it doesn’t requirement as well much of a story to it.

Today we’re back at the web for a game of tennis. I can’t tell if we’re getting any type of better… my suspicions are that we’re not! They state tennis is a fantastic spectator sport… not the method we play it.

But it’s great to get out as well as run around like idiots for an hour. even much better not lots of people understand about this tennis court, so there are never as well lots of people watching.

Photo credit: Esteban La Tessa

We hope you’ve delighted in this regular edition as well as that this final week before Christmas is kind to you.

Cheers – Jim & Christina xx