We went for a wander one morning...

I know I've been a little quiet over here lately.  There have been one or two sporadic posts every few months, but for the most part my heart hasn't been into blogging.  I think it's because my dietary requirements are so specific now that I didn't think that anyone would want to read about what I was cooking/eating.

Then I realised that I blog for me.  I love everyone who stops by and visits and I thank every one of you, but I blog to share what I love about food and that really hasn't changed even though my diet has.

So, you might be seeing a bit more of me around here.

We moved closer to the city at the beginning of the year and everywhere we go we see a new restaurant/cafe/bar that we want to try.  We are trying to keep a list so that we remember them, but that hasn't been quite as successful as we'd hoped.

D and I were lucky enough to have a leave day on the Friday after ANZAC Day.  We had the (brilliant) idea to walk from Fortitude Valley to West End in the morning and try things along the way.

We started at Sugar Jar Cafe in James Street.  D really enjoyed one of their coffees when he tried it for the first time during the recent James Street Up Late and he wanted to go back again.

I'm so artistic

I am not a big coffee drinker, or even a coffee drinker at all because decaf doesn't count, right?  You should probably take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I enjoyed it.  My (half strength) coffee was smooth and not bitter and I don't really look for much else in a cup of coffee.

Second stop was all the way down the George Street of Brisbane, The Frisky Goat Espresso.  Frisky Goat is my favourite coffee stop in all of Brisbane because they not only have almond milk (Almond Breeze) but also dairy free dark chocolate.  Plus, they do not laugh at my order of a medium dark chocolate decaf mocha on almond milk.  In fact, they even remember it.  They are awesome.  They also have the cutest mascot.

From Frisky Goat we continued our wanderings over the Victoria Bridge and down into West End.  We didn't have a specific destination in mind, so we poked our noses into every cafe we came across scoping out our breakfast options.

I'm quite picky about breakfast.  Technically, most cafes can cater for me by just giving me bacon and eggs, but I don't really like bacon and eggs.  Actually, I'm quite picky about a few other places too.  Technically, most eateries can make me a plain unseasoned steak with no sauces and an undressed green salad but most of the time I want something a little more interesting.

We walked up, down and up Boundary Street a few times until we settled on Atomica Eat Drink.  It was partially because I really wanted to try Calmer Sutra Chai and Atomica is one of only two places in Brisbane which stock it.  It was also because their breakfast menu looked awesome!

Atomica's Calmer Sutra chai is made on soy milk, so I did suffer a little afterwards but it was very nice.  I'm glad I tried it.  

Clearly I'm not quite back into my blogger stride because I seem to have forgotten to take a picture of D's breakfast.  He ordered the free range eggs and bacon on toasted sourdough with roasted tomato jam.  He assures me it was very tasty.

I think D's breakfast would have had to have been pretty darn tasty to top mine.  I had the vego breakfast, garlic roasted Swiss brown mushrooms, spinach, grilled tomato, bubble and squeak and toasted multi-seed gluten free bread (I think it was from Sol Breads).

Sorry, Weetbix, but this was the breakfast of champions.  Everything was cooked perfectly and the seasoning was spot on.  The spinach was incredible, I could have eaten that by the bucketful.  It was filling too, I had to roll myself back into the city. 

D must have enjoyed breakfast because he was mightily patient while I spent far too much money before making our way towards the Valley again.  We made a slight detour on the way home to track down The Bun Mobile.

D and I had our first Bun Mobile experience at James Street Up Late, along with our first Wandering Elephant experience.  D called the Bun Mobile's chicken bun "the best thing [he'd] ever eaten".  He then spent the next few weeks working out when we could track them down again.

We tried the day's special: grilled black angus beef, kewpie mayo, crunchy lettuce, wakame salad, teriyaki glaze and edamame beans.  Now, there is probably every single one of the things I can't eat in that bun but I had a bite or two anyway and I steeled myself for the consequences.  *small voice so my gastroenterologist doesn't hear* I'd do it again too!!  The beef was so tender it melted in your mouth.  D wasn't a fan of the wakame salad but I liked it.

We also had to get the phenomenal chicken bun.  Char grilled teriyaki chicken, slaw with julienne carrot and mint, Japanese mayo and hoisin sauce.  There is nothing wrong with the flavours in this bun.  They all work together in this amazing heaven of complementing textures and flavours.

A few days later when I was feeling well enough to contemplate food again, I decided I had to try to make my own version of the chicken bun so I could enjoy it without knocking myself out for a few days.  They turned out pretty well, so stay tuned for that story.