Do you remember English lass Rachel Khoo? She’s one of the young and talented food stylists I’ve featured here in the (blog)house kitchen many moons ago. I met Rachel in Paris in 2008 when she was studying at Le Cordon Bleu. Back then she was flitting around Paris as a food stylist for the likes of Elle à table and Galeries Lafayette,  creating fun workshops in the gorgeous little bookstore La Cocotte, and regularly cooking up a storm of new recipes.

Today, I am very happy to hear she’s coming to Sydney this March to host one of her  fabulous “underground” culinary evenings with her food + design writing friend Frankie…

From penal colony to gold rush eldorado, to sun and surf mecca, British gals Rachel and Frankie interpret the tastes and influences of past and present Australia over a six course dining experience.  Rachel has been hosting a few of these underground dinners in London and Berlin over the past year with great success, and she’s super excited to be coming to Australia.

The edible immigration tales will be told for 3 nights only (Friday 12th, Saturday 13th and Sunday 14th March) in a secret Eastern Suburbs Sydney location. It will be 6 courses paired with wine and a recommended donation of $75 pp will be very appreciated. Seats are limited.  In order to book you can email Rachel and Frankie directly or click here for more details.

In more R.Khooks news (geez I love to hear about my (blog)house guests incredible achievements!), her first and super gorgeous book has just been released today. It’s called muesli et granola maison -which translates as “homemade muesli and granola” – and is published by marabout, with photography by akiko ida and beautiful prop styling by elodie rambaud. Here is a rather exclusive sneak peek inside…

miam, non? I love muesli and making anything muesli related, especially muesli bars. And with that perfect touch of french style, who can resist.

Congratulations Rachel! Have a fab time in Sydney (and try not to get too many colours like I have done, it’s really not so pleasant).

xx

Jen from Nectar & Light has recently released another book of bound beauty.  This one is called little italy and features some of her stunning polaroid photography, notes and stories from her travels to Italy, including a recipe or two. It is independently published by her very own company, Fieryeyed Books. Would you like a little sneak peek inside the book? Take a look…

Jen’s blog Nectar & Light is one of my favourites – it’s a special, intimate insight into her unique life, and her new hardcover book little italy looks like a personal, hand held version of her online work. What a treat.

And what is even more of a treat is that  all book orders placed before 29 october will receive one of her gorgeous  2010 calendars for free -  Jen has kindly extended that offer to 1 november just for (blog)house readers.

Thank you Jen  for giving us a sneak peek of your beautiful new book. Congratulations on your new enterprise and I have no doubt this will be the first of many many books to come published by Fieryeyed Books.

xx

I just bought this gorgeous coloring-in book from Small Magazine for a little someone special back home in Australia. It is her birthday in a month – she will be 5! And she is such a darling, she sends me little gifts all the time, including the most fabulous drawings like this one…

Isn’t it marvellous? I’m quite sure that is supposed to be me, standing on my little boat/home, with the sun shining and the water lapping below.  This little girl is such an inspiration to me – she comes out with the most incredible phrases to describe how she feels (once, she was witnessing a very sad moment when one of her aunties was leaving to go overseas and she turned to her mum and said “Mummy, I have swallowed my heart.”). Also, this special little girl even knows instinctively how to deal with bullies. I am so impressed, and wish I knew this when I was her age and beyond (I’m still learning!).

So, dear little Issabella, I do hope you get lots of enjoyment from your new coloring-in book. Happy early birthday sweetness, with much love from one of your far-away aunties.

…this book. it was on sale in a great art bookstore that i just discovered near the concert gebouw.

it’s monday afternoon, and although i have a list as long as my arm, i’m very tempted to make a cup of tea and sit outside on le petit deck of le petit bateau, leisurely turning the pages of my new treasure until the sun goes down.

somebody stop me.

You may all be well aware by now that as much as I love music (and taking photos, food, nature, art, all things handmade…), I love books. And it just so happens that on one of my favourite wanders in paris: made by hand (that being wander 6) there is one of my favourite bookstores in the world. It is a rather particular bookstore. To be precise, it sells comics…

The French love comics, and it didn’t take me long to understand why – comic books these days are bound pages of incredible hand drawn illustrations by both well-known and lesser-known artists. These books are like short films on paper, storyboards. And for me, they have been the most fabulous way to learn the French language. The first French comic I read with French Boy’s help was Les Schtroumpfs, or as I’ve known them best, The Smurfs. Just to be able to pronounce ’schtroumpf’ is not so easy (its something like schhhhhhtrrrroooompf), and you may recall the stories are filled with such sentences as “the smurfs smurfed this and they smurfed that, and everything is smurfalicious”. It’s bloody hard to say this in French. I persevered.

Today I am rather proud to announce that I can now read such books on my own. And my very first illustrative book which I’ve read on my own in French, I bought at philippe’s during my recent weekend in paris. It is called mon frère nocturne by joanna hellgren, and it is one of the most beautiful stories I’ve ever read…

mon frère nocturne is a little story about a boy who is about to turn ten. and that’s all I will say. Its a very moving story that resonated deeply with me. It also features a piano. Here are a couple of pages from the book which I found on the publisher’s website …

I highly recommend you check out more of Joanna’s work on her extensive online portfolio. And of course, while on wander 6, please go and check out philippe’s fabulous bookstore – it’s just opposite galerie vegetale.

Lilibeth (haven’t we missed her?! Harriet too!) insisted on stopping by this morning -or evening, if you are down under – to let us all know that Paris: Made By Hand will be in the following fabulous bookstores by June 1st (that’s this Monday!)…

IN AUSTRALIA:

Pulp Creative Paper, MANLY
Kinokuniya in the Galeries Victoria, SYDNEY
Oscar & Friends Booksellers, DOUBLE BAY
Sun Bookshop, YARRAVILLE
Better Read Pty Ltd, NEWTOWN
Reader’s Feast RFM Melbourne, MELBOURNE
Abbeys Bookshop Pty Ltd, SYDNEY
Gleebooks Pty Ltd, GLEBE
Collins 941 Floreat, FLOREAT
Dymocks Sydney, SYDNEY
Dymocks Broadway, BROADWAY
Dymocks Nowra, NOWRA

…………………………………………

**updated 29/5, includes the following:

Readings Carlton VIC
Ang & Rob Norwood SA
Dymocks Belconnen ACT
Dust Jacket Inverell NSW
The Hive Braddon ACT
Elliot Collection Essendon VIC
Turner & Lane Malvern VIC

…………………………………………

For my Australian readers, if you don’t see the name of your favourite local bookstore above, I would absolutely love you (yes, LOVE you) if you could ask them to stock the book. I really really want the book to be in your local reading retreat, and the only way I know how to do that is to ask for your help. My local bookstores in Sydney would be Bookoccino in Avalon, and Berkelouw Books in Mona Vale. If anyone from the Northern Beaches could call these stores to ask for them to stock the book, I would be so so thankful. And I think my grandmother might just bellyflip to see them in her local bookstore! I would love my grandmother to bellyflip. I don’t know exactly what it means as I just made it up. But in my head, it’s an air born sommersault of sorts.

IN EUROPE:

American Book Center, AMSTERDAM
Sterling Books, BRUSSELS
Alexia Hollinger, rue Therese, PARIS
Galignani, PARIS
Shakespeare and Company, PARIS
Village Voice, PARIS
WHSmith, PARIS

There will be more stockists throughout France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Greece, still to come. And there should be a number of bookstores in the UK but I haven’t had confirmation of these yet.

I will now go and pop these stockists onto the book’s webpage for your future reference…

This is a new book from The Little Bookroom that was also released a couple of weeks ago. It’s called The Flea Markets of France and is a great guide for finding fabulous brocantes around the country. I was asked to create the cover! That’s my handiwork you see above. I collected things that I had bought at brocantes, and lay them out on an old pretty map of France. The fab book design team at The Little Bookroom made the label for the title. What do you think?

In more exciting news, both my book Paris: Made By Hand and this one, The Flea Markets of France were featured in the latest issue of British House & Garden magazine, with special mention about the covers!

The article reads “The covers of most travel guides are predictably pedestrian…so when you come across jackets as charmingly whimisical as those of Paris: Made By Hand and The Flea Markets of France, you foresee something different, more personal, within them.”

I’m chuffed to bits…