A Sunday morning with Ioana (East of Kitcken)

There is something so beautiful about the slow-paced weekend mornings and the simple things, like making a favorite breakfast, that turn into a sort of rituals, which help us get into a mood of calmness. 

We love that during the weekends life in our busy and loud city feels more relaxed. We can ride the bike to our favorite bakery for some baguettes and be back home quickly for the traditional breakfast with...anything-eggs :)) 

Our weekends are purposely uneventful and with simple activities that usually translate by cooking and eating and spending quality time together. And because I could really write an ode to Sunday mornings, I decided to invite some friends over to the blog and asked them to share their favorite Sunday morning rituals and the pace that makes them feel good. The first to start is Ioana, also known as the wonderful cooking artist from East of Kitchen.

I met Ioana one year ago, when she hosted one of the Ladies, wine and design dinners in her beautiful home. And you know how that say that our homes inspire us and they make us who we are?! Well, I have to say that I fell in love with Ioana’s style from the first moment I stepped into her home. I felt like entering the apartment of an artist in the Paris 7th arrondissement. The wooden floors, the large windows, the mix of vintage and modern furniture, the books, the paintings, the warm light, the stash of MILK magazines, the big dinning table with different kind of chairs - what’s not to love about a dreamy space like this one, right?! And then Ioana came: kind, relaxed, friendly and with the look of an unpretentious Parisienne. So since all this description inspires that sweet calm of the Kinfolk way of life, I was curious to know how this lovely woman spends Sunday mornings with her family:  

“We love our Sundays the same way we like our food: slow; especially when the weather gets colder, we like to hang out around the house in our pyjamas and we almost never make plans that would get us out the door before lunchtime. We are, as my 6 year old very well says, ‘happy to be curled up in our den’. I get up first with the baby and we spend the early morning playing together and afterwards Iancu assists me from his rocker set atop the kitchen counter while I cook breakfast. On weekends, I like to make Zoe’s favourite breakfast dishes, which usually range from Avocado Toast to Dutch Baby (or “Giant Pancake” as she likes to call it) that can only be topped with raspberry jam that my mother makes for her.

Usually by the time I’m halfway through cooking breakfast the whole house is up, which is great news for me, as Vlad, my husband is in charge with making the coffee in our house; he’s very much into specialty coffee and he uses Sundays as an opportunity to test out different Aeropress Champions’ recipes, which is great, since that’s my favourite kind of brew. After we’ve enjoyed our breakfast, Iancu will usually go for his morning nap, which gives me just enough time to finish off my coffee while crafting something with Zoe or doing some kind of activity together, maybe writing a letter to friends who live far away, playing a card game or since she’s started school this Fall, doing math (her idea, not mine:)). 

And I almost forgot: especially on the gloomiest and darkest of Winter mornings, there’s always a candle burning on our table and a record playing with either music or one of the stories I used to listen to as a child and that are now part of Zoe & Iancu’s childhood too. In the rare instances when we do get out of the house on Sunday mornings, we like to walk to Frudisiac , some of us for the coffee, others for the Ricotta & Lemon Pancakes and me for the Avo-Toast & Omelette combo. We also like the breakfast options at Artichoke and Trofic and we’re always up for a good coffee, either within walking distance at Two Minutes, Bob Coffee Lab or Steam or when we venture outside of our neighbourhood, at Beans & Dots .” 

© Photo by Hilde Mork