Bottomless Brunch at Bondi Green, Paddington

Bottomless Brunch at Bondi Green, Paddington

Thursday, 20 May 2021

As someone who is in the habit of waking everyone up early on the weekend and making them come for breakfast with me, I was hiding a big secret. Until recently, I had never been to a bottomless brunch. Gasp.

I don't know, I mean, I know it was becoming a thing a few years back but I was backpacking, and then I was a bit all over the place when I got home, and then COVID, so I didn't really have a whole lot of opportunity; but I didn't wait too long once I did! 

Not being allowed to do anything made me realise that if there's something I want to do, I should make it a priority and just do it.

Bottomless Brunch at Bondi Green

I discovered the Daisy green collective last summer when someone posted a video of a watermelon keg on the side of their table in Mayfair. Less than a week later, I was drinking fruity margaritas out of my own watermelon keg on a sunny Saturday afternoon. This is when I discovered their awesome brunch menu. 

The Heddon street one (Ziggy Green) is really well placed, and the two others (Scarlett and Darcy & May Green) that I visited over the past year were both lovely but their new Paddington venue (Bondi Green) topped them all. Just a few steps away from Darcy & May, Bondi Green is a trendy little suntrap, by the side of the canal rather that on it.

Paddington as a whole was a totally underrated area for me, I guess I was a little late on that since upon leaving the station until I spotted what looked like a pilgrimage. Away from the main road, across the bridge and down the steps; everyone was quite obviously doing what I was doing - heading to the canal for brunch, it was 11.30am on a Saturday morning and scorching hot after all.

I think the reason I was wary of bottomless brunch was because I kept hearing the same thing. It seems that food takes a backseat a lot of the time and whilst unlimited alcohol is great, good food is my main objective. But having frequented the chain for plain old normal brunch over the past year or so, I was confident that wasn't going to be the case here and I was right. Prosecco is prosecco but the food was the star.

Included in the price were two courses which meant that rather than being sensible, we were able to get both a sweet and savoury course along with the two bottles that we got through during our 90 minute slot (and the third one we managed to get after it finished.) 

I started with their sweetcorn fritters which is probably my favourite brunch dish ever. It combines all the brunchy things I love (the avo, the poached eggs, the aesthetic lol) but replaces the bread with delicious sweetcorn fritters. Lots of excitement for one plate of food 

After that, I went for the granola which seemed like a better idea that cake in the almost tropical heat that day - you can see my sun burn developing through out the day if you look at the photos carefully. Regardless of that, it was also very good and made me feel like I was eating breakfast on a balcony somewhere in Greece.

Every table was full and the atmosphere was perfect. Being outside was great, there was a DJ playing music, people walking by along the canal and big groups of friends sailing past us down the river which was really fun to watch.

Somehow, the whole day flew by and it was almost 7pm by the time we left. The weather was ridiculous and they didn't push us to leave so we stayed and drank cocktails in the sun all afternoon. 

Highly recommend and very much looking forward to going back!

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A New Perspective

A New Perspective

Sunday, 9 May 2021

After four months of slow lockdown life, there was no doubt that I was ready to start getting back to my old lifestyle. Pre-COVID, my days were busy. If I wasn't working, I was finding things to get me out of the house and fill every spare moment - whether that was at the gym, the shops, going out for dinner, drinks, meeting friends, getting home late; even the long commute back to Essex was part of my life that I actually enjoyed - assuming I was in the country in the first place. But as little as I like to admit, it seems I am not that person anymore. 

It's been just over three weeks since our lockdown ended in London and I've come to realise that I was using all these things to fill my time because my life had gaps. Although, coming out of 2020, it seems there are less of those which is good. I'm pretty content at the moment.  

I came out of lockdown full steam ahead with multiple bookings for every single day - kinda like what I was used to before all this started, but after just over a week of non-stop activity, I'd had enough. By the end, I was just going out for the sake of it when all I actually wanted to do was go to bed. I was absolutely exhausted and not excited for anything I had in the diary so I just cancelled the rest of my plans.

A few days later, I re-entered post lockdown life with a different mind set. I do enjoy going to the gym but I now go because I want to, not because I have an hour to fill between finishing work and eating dinner - and going out for dinner every single day? It actually isn't that fun when you do it non-stop (there, I said it.) Sometimes I just want to stay in and eat vegetables.

So now my life is about quality over quantity and I'm slowly learning to live accordingly. My diary is still full, with reservations all over London, every single day - old habits die hard I guess, but if I'm not excited for something, I'll cancel it. I've started trying to make a conscious effort to plan something extra nice, once or twice a week, rather than something average most days and I think I've cracked it! I've had some really memorable days in the last week or so, plus lots of time at home and I'm really enjoying the split. 

So with this new perspective, I'm looking forward to each and every outing and that, is a really exciting place to be. 

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My 2020 in Review

My 2020 in Review

Tuesday, 5 January 2021

So I can't quite do a travel roundup this year since I didn't actually leave the country but roundup posts are my favourite to go back to so I'm writing it anyway. 

I know it's been terrible for a lot of people but 2020 was one of the best years of my life. My mental health finally switched, I don't know what happened but I just wasn't depressed anymore; so even with everything that went on, 2020 was a great year for me and so I'm sorry but this post is going to be super self indulgent.

January was miserable. I spent the beginning of the year working through the last of the mess I was in during 2019; but then I left a very depressing, (but kinda well paid) job and everything changed almost overnight. 

By February I had started an amazing month long job placement. I was a membership exec was a beautiful private members club in Mayfair and I enjoyed every single day. I'd get dressed up for work for the first time in my life and spend my days working from a laptop in whichever room of the two clubs I felt like; with fancy coffee and macha lattes on demand. This ended 4 days before lockdown started. 

Three months in countryside isolation were a wonderful step back from the world, it felt like I'd been on a wellness retreat in all honesty. My brothers moved back home and we had family BBQs in the sun every day for the first 2 weeks. I spent my afternoons walking the dog around the forest with my mum, learnt how to knit, made pasta from scratch and even kinda went viral on tiktok (just a live stream with 20k viewers but even so!) I spent a whole lot of time online but with none of the usual time wasting guilt, I ate 19 Easter eggs (even with the supermarket restrictions) and invested myself dearly in caring for my succulent family - one of them even grew a flower!

In June I finally started meeting up with my friends for socially distanced bbq's and such. It was a bit scary but these were great memories, everyone was just so excited to be able to see each other. 

I also went on my only travel adventure around this time with an overnight trip to Kent. We explored a couple of castles and the white cliffs of Dover.

July, August and Sept were packed full of fun. I braved the tube and started cycling around London in the sunshine. Between the odd day at work here and there, I spent time with my friends, went back to the gym, ate at some incredible restaurants, had an awesome birthday week and finally got the meet up with the new people I met online who got me through lockdown. 

October was a bit of a messy one. Whilst all the fun continued in my social life - and it was great, my family life got turned upside down for a few weeks when both my grandparents caught Covid, luckily they were back on track for the festive season. 

November started well. I spent the first week eating out every single night and having an awesome time but soon we were back in lockdown! 

This time was a little different since I had a job which meant I could still go into London so I wasn't stuck in Essex all month, as lovely as it was in the summer. After work, I'd walk through the city for an hour on my way home. I made the most of the lockdown weekends by exercising outside, exploring food markets and spending many afternoons sat in my mums car drinking coffee with her.

And December.. Christmas and New Year were a little quieter than usual but I was very lucky to have it as good as I did considering the situation. 

A few days before Christmas, something strange happened. I got on a bus outside Selfridges and all of a sudden, a wave of; what I can only describe as the opposite of depression, came over me. I was overflowing with joy - it was very odd but so awesome, I've never experienced anything like it before and that, well that's kind of carried me through the month and to where I am now. 

With my newfound state of mind and the positive influence I've had from people I've been surrounding myself with, I'm excited for the year ahead and looking forward to what 2021 brings.

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Drive through NHS covid testing | What to expect

Drive through NHS covid testing | What to expect

Thursday, 26 November 2020

Earlier this year, I got my first Covid test. It was a very simple process but being such a nerve-racking situation made it feel almost impossible so I thought I'd give you a little run down to give you an idea of what to expect and also in the hopes of making it less of a big scary taboo.

You book your appointment online and they tell you where and when. I booked on the Sunday evening for an appointment at 11am the next day. You can book for up to 4 people per car, I went with my mum.

My dad and brother went the day before, to a different center but we both had the same issue; the postcode the NHS website gave got us both completely lost so it's worth checking exactly where you need to go before you set off. It seems to be car parks for local sports clubs and similar so super easy to find for yourself.

Once we arrived, it was quite clear where we were supposed to be, the car park had a little marquee and people wandering around in hi-vis jackets. We drove in and up to the marquee, with our windows tightly shut, someone scanned the QR codes that we got with the booking confirmation the night prior - through the glass and we shouted as the people on the other side tried to explain what to do.

The main jist of the conversation was if you have a problem put your hazard lights on and we'll come and help otherwise take this, follow the instructions and bring it back. They then asked us to wind a window down as little as possible and slid a bag through for each of us.

The instructions in the bag were quite simple but as I said it was just a nerve-racking experience so I had to read them over and over before I went ahead.

You're given one swab, a tube which already has some red liquid in to place it into, a couple of bags, a card and an instruction booklet. It was slightly confusing because the papers looked like they needed filling in as well as space for you to write your details on the bio bag but that was not the case (we also did not have a pen, which caused more panic). Luckily they didn't actually need us to fill it in as everything was done with bar codes which was actually very efficient, just a little unclear.

The same one swab has to go to the back of your throat and then up your nostril as well. It did make us gag and then it did make my eye water but it wasn't painful or hard to do at all just slightly uncomfortable for ten seconds each time.

The swab goes into the liquid in the tube, done up tight, the tube goes in the ziploc bag with a moisture pad, that goes into a bio hazard bag and you're told not to close it until someone can come and watch you do it (so you do it properly I assume.) We put the hazards on, the guy talked us through sealing the bag and then it gets passed back through the window (and taken from you with rubbish pincers lol) before being scanned for your details and put in a box with all the others.

And that was it. The one I visited at least was very simple and well run. I felt safe and I felt like the people working there were safe too so that was reassuring. My dad and brother got their results back, negative, within 48 hours although mine and my mum's took a few days, negative also.

*Accurate as of  September 2020

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Covid Staycation | St Giles London

Covid Staycation | St Giles London

Monday, 2 November 2020

With both of my brothers moving back home at the beginning of lock down, not only did I have a new normal to get used to when it was finally lifted, I had a new home life as well. It wasn't terrible although the house did get a little bit crazy - eight months in; and with the next lock down looming, I was ready for a little escape.

Que: the St Giles hotel and their Stay Safe, Stay St Giles Programme - a great opportunity to just get away from all the family madness at home and just take a night to myself.

Reception was quiet and calm as I arrived on a slow Monday afternoon. Good distancing, protective screens, hand sanitiser and face masks worn by all staff instantly put my mind at rest. Staying somewhere more public than home during the pandemic can be a bit scary but they did a great job at reassuring me that everything was as Covid secure as possible without being invasive and ruining whole experience.

Heading up to my room on the 9th floor however, the hotel seemed a bit old and worn - the lift was super rickety - although opening the door to the room, I was pleasantly surprised. The suite was a really great size and with 5 large windows meaning the room was flooded with mid afternoon natural light - the bathroom was absolutely sparkling in the sun. There was a sofa and coffee table in the main part of the room but also a little cove behind the bed with a dressing table area and also a table and benches to sit on - it was a huge amount of room. From up there I also had great views across London in all directions.

It did smell a little musky but that soon went after I opened the windows. Other than that, everything seemed very clean and the complimentary a hand gel on the bed was very much appreciated. There were also stickers on the front door, the toilet and things like the remote, saying that they had been cleaned properly - these sorts of small touches meant I could relax, as there's no way I would have picked up the TV remote otherwise - that was something that used to freak me out a little even before covid.

The staff also were very accommodating, delivering a pen up to the room so I could fill in the breakfast card and also allowing me a late checkout which was very helpful.

I ate dinner and then breakfast at the hotel but these I would not recommend. Even with the half price deal they currently have on, it seems a huge waste to be staying in such an awesome location - Soho on one side and Fitzrovia on the other - and not make the most of all the amazing bars and restaurants within a couple minutes' walk. What I will say however was how nice it was to not have to go out into the cold, I just threw on a huge jumper over my lounge wear and wandered down to the restaurant in the warmth. I've hardly taken off this knitted cardigan from Femme Luxe since it arrived, its like a dressing gown that's acceptable to wear in public and I love it.

It's not the height of luxury but it doesn't claim to be; for locals looking for an easy escape or business and leisure travelers seeking a safe, central location, St Giles London is perfect. Rooms start at as little as £49

*Gifted Stay

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