solo living in the city

I've just finished nearly a month of solo inner-city-Auckland living thanks to some absent friends, and I have loved it. Having friends over for dinner and singing loudly to Beyonce whilst getting ready in the mornings; it's been awesome.

I have done very little cooking. There was the bacony-tomatoey pasta, for which I enlisted help, and then with more help in the chopping department (thanks Laura!) I was able to whip up a creamy mushroom and spinach gnocchi for dinner for 6 last week, followed by a slapdash but totally scrumptious apple crumble. Instead of oats (like this and most recipes) I used a muesli full of quinoa and other goodies in the topping. It added great flavour and even better texture and was gratefully snapped up by all involved.

A solo dinner of champions was indulged in on Wednesday night. Beer, beef rendang (pictured above) and the most delicious roti was had, and the rendang was the best I'd had in a long time. With plenty of cardamom and mopped up with flaky, delicious roti, Sri Pinang on K Rd lived up to the good reviews I'd heard.

I've been out for dinner a bit too. I had a dinner date at Depot with Pete, and then one with my little sister at Mexico (blog posts to follow) and friends have welcomed me with open arms to their homes, including another Laura who whipped up an Aro classic of salmon on a bean salad. This week I had little planned, and with the end in sight I couldn't be bothered with too many dishes. I thought my broken wrist low point came on Monday night when I got home with my beef pho from Mercury Lane food court (a bit average actually) and remembered that left handed chopsticking for one so uncoordinated and hungry is no laughing matter. Likewise the low point didn't come when I left-handedly stabbed myself in the mouth with my toothbrush (have since bought an electric one, life-changing).

No. Last Saturday night I was waiting for friends to come into town, and wanted a drink. Pouring myself a gin, and successfully cutting a lime, the problem came when I was unable to get the lid off the goddam tonic bottle. That lid was tight. Left handed, impossible. Right handed, extremely sore. Jammed up against the bench, everything I had attempting to contort the lid off, a failure. I tried using my teeth to no avail, before hacking a hole out and shamefully pouring the tonic out of the side of the bottle.        

That's right, my broken wrist low point came when I found myself home alone on a Saturday night hacking into the side of a bottle of slightly flat tonic with a knife left handed.

I hopefully won't be shackled to my cast (after two in highlighter pink, now a sleek black thanks very much) for too much longer, and I'm shortly moving to a new home for a while, with new flatties to cook for (woohoo!). And after being a bit antsy about my current life crossroads, I have just had one of the funnest weekends in recent memory back in Wellington, full of ideas, creativity, bacon, friends, oysters, dreamboats, afghans and rain. Details to follow, inspiration is running high, watch this space!