Seems like I put quite a bit of effort into breakfasts this month! Lots of açaí bowls...

Açaí bowls

... some avocado on toast...

Avocado on toast

... yogurty fruit and granola concoctions...

Top left: Açaí smoothie w granola Bottom left: Yogurt, strawberries, banana, cacao-berry granola, matcha Top right: Yogurt, kiwi, strawberries, choc-açaí granola Middle right: Yogurt, matcha granola, strawberries Bottom right: Yogurt, Knusper Schoko & Keks Muesli

... and chia puddings!

Top: Matcha Chia pudding Bottom: Chocolate raspberry chia pudding

Here are a few weekday lunches! one of the benefits of that one-day train strike - no queues at Din Tai Fung! Steamed dumpling deliciousness.

Din Tai Fung

There was also ramen, the Turkish bakery, Pho Nom, some Malaysian food and Thr1ve!

Top left: Ramen, Little Ramen (5/346 Lt Bourke St, Melbourne VIC 3000) Top right: Roast chicken and pork w noodles, Coconut House (449 Elizabeth St, Melbourne VIC 3000) Bottom left: Boreks, The Borek Bakehouse (481 Elizabeth St, Melbourne VIC 3000) Bottom centre: Roast pork bun, Pho Nom, Emporium Bottom right: Thr1ve bowl, Thr1ve, Emporium

Here are some homecooked dinners! (Disclaimer: Most of these were cooked by Sandra while I was at the gym!) I think we did pretty well with a good mixture of healthy and tasty meals.

Clockwise from top left: German lentil soup with wieners; Roast beetroot salad with goats curd and walnuts; Grilled lamb chops with chickpeas and eggplant salad Scrambled eggs with spinach and potatoes

Clockwise from top left: Grilled salmon w roast sweet potato, spinach, chickpeas and avocado; Peppers stuffed with rice, cucumber salad, spicy chicken tenders; Penne with eggplant, chilli and feta; Chicken tacos!

Clockwise from top left: Spicy steak, veggies & mushrooms; Lamb chops, yogurt and salad; Spicy roast chicken with roast carrots, potato and eggplant; Omelette with mushrooms and cheese; Honey-soy chicken with veggies & rice noodles

One weekend afternoon we were shopping at Prahran Market, and saw they were doing a pop-up street food market! I couldn't resist some Brazilian food for lunch from the Tapioca Brazil stall - beef stew, rice, beans, farofa and a salad. I was also very easily upsold to an açaí smoothie.

Beef stew, beans, rice, farofa and salad. Plus an açaí smoothie!

One sunny arvo, our friends Jenni and Jimbo had us over for brunch. Toasted croissants and brioche, asparagus and mushrooms, scrambled eggs and haloumi. Delicious! It was funny, when Jimbo was cooking, he was all like: "I know you guys are going to a barbecue afterwards, so I'll just fry half the haloumi", to which I responded: "No no, you just go ahead and cook all the haloumi". Hehe.

Jenni & Jimbo Brunch!

One night when we were on that side of town, we decided to pop into Mankoushe (323 Lygon St, Brunswick East, VIC 3057) for dinner. They've really changed since our last visit eight years ago - back then they were more of a casual, takeaway kinda place, and now they're a proper sit-down restaurant. I enjoyed my chawirma pizza - a crisp spelt base with slow-cooked spiced lamb, and tahini sauce. We weren't super hungry and just had a (small) pizza each, but I'd love to go back to try more from the menu!

Back: Maglouta - tomato sauce, minced lamb, in-house Turkish sausage, fresh onion & ashawen cheese - $14.50 Front: Chawirma - tomato sauce, marinated lamb shoulder, tahini, fresh onion & parsley - $16

In September, I hit 6000 followers on Instagram! Woo-hoo! (I'm sarahcooksblog, follow me!)

Insta!

We did a pre-theatre dinner one night at Gazi (2 Exhibition Street Melbourne, VIC 3000). Hot tip - the duck souvlakis are seriously delicious! But the cucumber and feta salad, espresso martini and dessert special were also very impressive. I can't remember everything that was in the dessert, but I'm fairly certain there was a banana parfait with popping candy dipped in chocolate glaze (like a Magnum), with biscuit crumbs, a vanilla-bean ice-cream dome dipped in chocolate, and a date-and-chocolate caramel sauce. Ridic!

Clockwise from top left: Souvas! Cucumber salad; fried chicken wings; Dessert special; Cocktails

One night we caught up with some friends for ramen and sake at Mensousai Mugen (11 Blight Place, Melbourne VIC 3000). Woo! This was my first time trying tsukumen-style ramen (i.e. noodles and sauce are served separately), and I really liked it! After you've finished the noodles they come around with stock so you can thin out the remaining sauce and drink it from the bowl. Oishii~!

Goma Tsukemen – Sesame Soy sauce broth, House made thick noodles served with Slow Cooked Pork (Chashu), Bamboo Shoots and Seaweed - $13

We also took a little trip to Sydney for a weekend! This was a birthday gift from our friend An! We had dinner at Quay (and yes, we ate the famous snow egg!) I'll do a full blogpost on the weekend, but for now I wanted to show you the view from our table. Swoon!

View from our table

My lovely friend Jess had a birthday party afternoon tea at her house, catered by her awesome parents. There was more food than I could believe! But the highlight was definitely her mother's homemade cheese blintzes - gluten-free crepes (Jess and her mum are both coeliac) filled with a lemony cheesecakey filling. Just give me the whole tray!

Cheese Blintzes

Last week, we went to Dainty Sichuan Hotpot (2a Cambridge Street, Box Hill VIC 3128) with my parents for a hotpot feast! So much spicy tasty goodness!

Dainty Sichuan

And that was September, woo-hoo! Plans for October are to enjoy the (finally) warmer weather, a couple of events and a few catchups with friends!