Rose's Big Blogger Luncheon.

Yes, I finally met Rose! 

For those of you who don't know, Rose is my favourite London blogger. Her blog is called 'The Londoner' (fitting, I know). If I'm being honest, she's probably 10 years younger than I am, and I'm living vicariously through her and her wonderful social life full of beautiful people. She updates her blog regularly (so it's fun to follow), and it's full of great pictures of her adventures in her fantastic wardrobe. Yes, I'm jealous. Did I mention she's a great cook also? I've made quite a few of her recipes (CW peeps - this is where I found the 'Slutty Brownies' I kept bringing to work).

Long story short, on Saturday, Rose hosted a London blogger meet-up. I had to go. I had an extremely busy day, but I had to fit it in. I got up early and took the train to New Cross (I had to set up for next weekend's exhibition), and then straight into the city. Snow, and a shortage of nails in the gallery space held me up and I was about 40 mins late getting to the luncheon.

Snow at school.

The lunch was held at B-SOHO, a great pizzeria near Oxford Circus, though I wouldn't know as I didn't have any pizza. They also have great cocktails...but I wouldn't know that either, as I never made it all the way to the bar.

It gets worse. Rose organized £4 pizzas (half price) for everyone, but I was so late, the place was packed, and there was no place to sit, let alone carve my way through a Napoli style thin crust.

I was greeted by Rose the second I walked in the door. She was lovely. Phoebe (Rose's best friend, and frequent subject of her blog) was there also, along with a few of the other girls from her crew. It was hilarious to see these cyber faces for the first time face to face (slightly creepy to tell you the truth, as I only knew them from my faithful daily reading).

After a quick chat with Rose I lined up at the bar to get myself a drink. I waited....and I waited...and I waited. As I waited, I had a good chance to survey the crowd. This was probably my downfall. I realized I was surrounded by twenty-somethings flipping their hair about (a huge generalization, but you'll have to trust me on this one). I realized if I waited for a drink, I'd then have to drink my drink, making small talk, and despite trekking across London in a snow storm, this was not something I had any desire to do. This sounds horrifically snobby and ageist, I know, but the longer I stood there eavesdropping on conversations, the worse I felt about my 'blogger self'. Was this really me? What was I doing? As I caught myself doubting all the hard work I've put into this site, I realized I should cut my losses and get the heck out of Dodge.

I grabbed a quick photo with Rose as I scrambled out the door. I'm sorry I don't have a better story. I too wanted it to end with, "....and then we became best friends." Sad face. Part of me wonders what the experience would have been, had I stuck it out, but I figure there's bound to be more blogger events (possibly geared to my demographic) in the months to come. Maybe the European blogger conference in Berlin?

....so, in the mean time, I'll keep the blog going, and try not to think about the fact that I am the only 30-something blogger in the big smoke

....sigh.

Grilled Courgette and Mint Salad with Pesto Fusilli.

Last night was my night for dinner as 'S' is at school all day on Mondays.  I was also a bit of a slacker, playing hookie with a friend, and didn't go into the studio, so it was only fair.

I made Rosie's homemade pesto from my favourite blog, The Londoner.  You'll have to check out her page, and search the blog under recipes to find her quick and easy pesto recipe.

It's very straight forward, you just tear all of the leaves off an unsuspecting basil plant, toss them in a blender, along with 50g of pine nuts, 1 Cup of Parmesan, 2 garlic cloves, a pinch of salt, and half a cup of Olive oil. Blend it up. Done.

I made a pesto Fusilli, along with my favourite Grilled Vegetable Salad. It's usually made with Eggplant and Zucchini, but after hobbling down to Waitrose, I discovered they had sold out of Eggplant. A Zucchini salad it would be.

For the full recipe click here. Trust me, this one is worth it! It's even better in the summer months when you can use the BBQ to grill the veggies properly.

*If you're wondering what the white drizzle is (not in the recipe), I had a taste of a grilled aubergine salad at Ottolenghi this weekend, and my friend and I were convinced it was sour cream. I gave it a try on this salad and it worked nicely. Thanks Otto!