We ate spiced humous, from a deli in Norfolk. I washed the mud off celery sticks, chopped them up into Julienne and dipped them into the humous, catching as much of it in the groves of the celery as possible, letting it run down into my hungry mouth. Mum had also made Smoked Mackerel Pate with quark, a rougher texture than the creamy humous. My husband barbecued sausages and beefburgers with sundried tomatoes in then, lost in a cloud of smoke on the hottest day of the year. We then had Petillant De Syrah 2005, semi sparkling wine, which slipped perfectly into the blood stream. The wine was wrapped in a cooler, which looks like a blood pressure cuff, as it got hotter and hotter my sister took off the cooler and put it on her own arm to keep cool. We all creep closer under the umbrella. I had my eating head on and all restraint was gone as I piled up homegrown potatoes, salad, sausage, burger. Then we had homemade coconut and homemade raspberry icecream with kiddie chocolate sauce on top. The raspberry seeds twinkled back in the sunlight in my bowl. I let it slip down and felt the film of cream, always present in my dad’s homemade ice-cream, stick to the roof of my mouth. The ice-cream was made before my dad’s knee surgery. We ate provisions from his home made larder. A pink sparkling wine kind of birthday on a hot summer’s afternoon.
After we ate, dad had an afternoon nap and then he appeared for a piece of birthday cake, which we ate while still defrosting, my mum being a little too fond of the freezer. This chocolate button cake was made for my nephew’s birthday so we will have to make sure he gets one to replace it. Another birthday squeezed out of the toothpaste tube of time. Heat and homemade ice-cream and my dad, not busy with making food this time but with getting better.
2 comments:
Reading your recipes and memories brought back memories of my childhood and especially the sweeter things that my mother made with such love like Gypsy creams - oaty biscuits filled with rich green peppermint flavoured cream, wonderful victoria sponges, trifle especially toffee trifle made with sugared almonds crushed and madeira cake crumbled, with home made toffee mingled covered with custard. And then there were the recipes that formed our signatures. I particularly remember Gateau Diane - 3 homemade cakes of meringue sandwiched together with chocolate cream and sprinkled with flaked almonds which was such a success with my great aunt that I was asked to make it each birthday she had and now is still occasionally requested by family
The puddings you describe make my mouth water. The toffee trifle is unbelievable. How is the toffee made and the chocolate cream that sandwiches the meringue how do you make that?
thanks for your post
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