In My Kitchen : October 2026

Trying out the diary method this month with intermittent photos!

1

G's first day at school.  His menu for his first school lunch: 

Entrée : tomatoes with mozzarella 

Main : fish filet (colin d'Alaska) with lemon soufflé rice 

Accompaniment: roasted potatoes with skins on 

Dairy : strawberry ice cream 

(impressive no? for a 2.5yo school lunch) 

2

G's second day of "adaptation" at school, a couple of hours only. Went to my dad's place for lunch and he cooked Chinese "teriyaki" style salmon.

3

Tuna-egg-Boursin-corn sandwiches for us today, picnic outside the Philharmonie de Paris where we heard the Beethoven 5th piano concerto, how a 2.5 year old stayed still and (mostly) silent for all of the first movement and half of the second is incredible to me - it has entered the legends of our family history 

4

a "macaron rose" from the boulangerie near G's school, little treat to celebrate the end of the week..  

 

5 

Chinese lunch at the "wrong" restaurant (not the one I intended to book!), the food was quite tasty but the restaurant was empty - does an empty restaurant affect how we feel about food? 

We made wontons and I made Cyril Lignac's invisible cake for my dad's last dinner in Paris before he headed back to Sydney  

7 

Overnight oats, the last of the bircher muesli from Germany 

Out for dinner with the girls at the local brasserie Oui Mon General!, a huge side of pork with a sauce of pleurotes (a kind of mushroom) and roasted potatoes. so good! 

9 

fresh pesto pasta today! we love cutting the basil from our window planter and making our own pesto. it was combined with the super fancy shell pasta that costs 10x the normal pasta, it was very good though. 

11

we were supposed to go to Italy for the weekend but the flight was cancelled at the very last minute. we went to the park then to Necker to visit the rabbits, with vanilla yoghurt for our goûter, G's special treat. he got his finger stuck in the cage of the rabbit and had a kind of awful degloving injury when he pulled it out. not so much fun! 

12

we went to La Manifattura for dinner today, the pizza was excellent, napolitana style with soft fluffy crusts and great toppings 

13

went to the community garden to do some gardening and we had a good old debate about whether to harvest this pumpkin. finally democracy wons - 5 for, 2 against and 2 abstention. very French! 

we made our chunk into a pumpkin purée with chilli crisp and crispy onions, yum! 

14 

we made our own pasta! G has been listening to Giga Pasta, an audio book about pasta, so he asks me everyday if we can make pasta

15

G helped me to plate out the dinner tonight, and we had some more "healthy cookies" after dinner. also couldn't go past a bottle of cider brut to celebrate the last super hot day (32 deg!) of summer 

16 

which nurse brought in these grapes? amazing 

17 

a long day at work, followed by some gnocchi with sausage chickpea tomato sauce, yum yum 

18 

planted some more things in the balcony garden project! 

19 

everyone comes down with gastro, we have worry for lunch while we go through to almost the last pair of G's undies with diarrhoea... 

22 

I realise that G knows how to describe his meal now, when he describes his dinner in detail to S who is away in Germany : 

I'm like rice! (He says I'm instead of I) 

Edamama no eating when cold, mama cook first, no good cold 

Carrots ! I'm like carrots !

Eggs, lots of eggs 

Tomatoes 

Yum yum rice! 

23 

Random catch up with Tandy of Lavender and Lime, the first IMKer I have met in real life! We went for a long walk and ate sandwiches on a bench overlooking the Seine. Strange how you feel like you "know" the IMKers from following their blogs every month.. 

24

I'm saving some tomato seeds for next year, I got 57 seeds from one single cherry tomato! 

26 

Moon festival time ! I have never seen these black lava truffle mooncakes before, they were a special present from S' colleague from HK 

27 

We have a picnic in the park with my friend from Australia 

as we say Mastercard ad style - 

baguettes : 3 euros  

vegan picnic lunch : 30 euros (dips, olives, muscat grapes, coconut yoghurt) 

having an old friend visit : priceless 

29  

Impromptu lunch at home with S, unfortunately forgot to take a photo ! I've become a huge fan of De Cecci pasta, and the fusilli is just the perfect size / bouncy chew. I had pesto pasta with avocado, rocket and mozzarella, with a generous sprinkle of parmesan and sunflower seeds

30

I end the month at a fashionable rooftop bar with a couple of newfound friends from work.. I don't go to these places anymore now that we are so nuclear in the early toddler years, it was really a blast from the past having a giggly catch up with the girls but this time in French 

Curveball of the month... still food related 

 Here's my little monster with our windowsill basil, I'm so proud of how beautiful they are (both the basil and the monster). 

Sending this to Sherry who hosts the IMK series. Have a great month everyone!