It’s officially the hazy period between Christmas and New Years where I genuinely don’t know what day it is, Christmas leftovers seem to be appearing on our plates in different variations every day and there’s no sign of work in sight. It’s a wonderful feeling.
We spent Christmas and New Years Eve last year in lockdown, so we’ve decided to take full advantage of this years holiday period by both taking 3 and half a weeks off together, with Christmas Day being the first day of our big break.
We celebrated Christmas with my family a couple of weeks ago, so Christmas Day this year was spent at home with a few close friends instead. Despite there only being 5 of us, we still served up a big feast. I love cooking for the people in my life, and what better occasion than Christmas to be able to do this?
Jamie was in charge of starters and he served up summer fruit with fresh whipped cream and caramel, and a savoury platter of cheese, dips and crackers.
Lunch was made up of some of the usual suspects you’d find on Christmas day like maple glazed ham, roasted pumpkin and carrots, garden salad and potato salad, and also some of the not-so-usual suspects too like Korean bbq slow cooked pork ribs, miso roasted eggplant and fried red curry rice balls.
Oh, I almost forgot the most indulgent dish. The banoffee pie. So many layers of goodness in one pie!
There was a lot of eating, a lot of sparkling wine and a lot of laying down in between meals. All the signs of a successful Christmas Day in my opinion.
Boxing Day was spent mostly lazing about, drinking beers at home and watching Netflix. We started The Silent Sea and are absolutely hooked. We’ve been limiting ourselves to a few episodes per day so we don’t finish it all in one day (like we did with the second season of The Witcher).
Yesterday morning, Jamie suggested we go for a spontaneous trip to the Hunter Valley. I love a spontaneous trip. By 10am, we had booked ourselves a ridiculously cheap motel room just outside of Cessnock, our overnight bags were packed and we were on the road.
We spent the day doing a few of favourite touristy things: vodka and liqueur tasting at the Hunter Distillery (we left with a bottle each of the Turkish Delight and Passionfruit), bought chocolates and peanut brittle at the Hunter Valley Chocolate Company and then spent the evening at our motel. It was old, a little creepy and not dissimilar to the setting of many old horror movies I’ve seen. I loved it, of course. And to top it off, there was a pub downstairs. Very convenient!
We had dinner, a few beers and surprisingly the best sleep we’ve both had in a while.
This morning we got up early and stopped in at the Handmade in the Hunter market that’s held just outside Sobels. I ended up picking up some absolutely sensational local honey (it was harvested just 2 days ago!) and a couple of sweet plant babies. I’ve been wanting a String of Pearls for a while now, I was so happy to find a little pot of them for $5!
We also both tried hoagies for the first time from the Mr Hoagies food truck. We halved the beef one and it was incredible. The bun was slathered in butter, and the freshly sautéed beef and vegetables were coated in melted cheese and their delicious secret sauce. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. My only regret is not getting my own hoagie. Where have these been my whole life?
To end our trip we paid a visit to the Smelly Cheese shop so I could pick up a few goodies, one of them being the Binnorie Dairy rosemary, garlic and chilli labna.
Tomorrow we are thinking of doing a day trip to the mountains for a big hike. Neither of us have done much exercise in the weeks leading up to Christmas and god, I could definitely do with some movement and fresh mountain air.
For now though, the only movement that will be happening for me is walking myself to the kitchen to make a cheese platter from today’s Smelly Cheese purchases and bringing it back into the bedroom for today’s Silent Sea marathon.
Have I mentioned yet how much I enjoy the Christmas holidays?
Laura x.