July, July. Summer's here. Our tomato plants are scorched to death (who knew they needed quite so much water?) and we have eaten more salad-type stuff than you can shake a celery stick at. This is what we have been up to...

1) ADMIRING the insta-feed back. We love it when we get a cheeky post from someone using our products and love the creative ways different items have been put to use. This month's favourites include the absolutely sterling work by @themunchbrunchkids who has been putting the edible flowers on top of almost everything including this sumptuous looking chocolate cake. We are also insanely jealous of @aninayoga's skills, combining a hobo knife and tiffin box for lunchtime nirvana. Please share any pictures using any of our products as we love to see them.

2) OBSESSING over poke-chirashi-sashimi don bowls. Somewhere between sashimi, pke and a sashimi don we have become addicted to these on hot evenings. The exact ingredients have been interchangeable with the constants being a bed of warm Japanese rice, raw fish - usually salmon or tuna - marinated in some shoyu soy sauce, some tomato and avocado, and lashings and lashings of sesame seeds. So delicious. So easy. And, if you want to follow Saunder's lead, best eaten while relaxing in your jinbei!

3) BAKING: Well, we haven't. Rather we have been reaping the rewards of signing up the the E5 Bakehouse refugee bread course. This helps people who have come to the UK learn some baking and food preparation skills and for £20, we receive four weeks of delicious baked goods. So far bread, butter and jam, and the most delicious seeded loaf that was literally the size of my head. Well worth signing up. 

4) PERFECTING our miso soup recipe. It was a revelation to me that it is far more efficient to just buy a big pot of white miso and some dried wakame rather than keep on forking out for individual miso sachets. The current favourite has extra dashi umami and dried shitake mushrooms.

5) SCOFFING: down this strawberry-scone flavoured yoghurt. Yes, it's gimicky but it really does actually properly taste of scones.

6) CHILLING: out when it gets hot at the market with the best non-alcoholic watermelon mojito from Mocksies and superbly refreshing peach ice tea from ZigZag teas. No more will we be reaching for the lemon squash to beat the heatwave when these alternatives are on offer.