Weekend Update

I hope that you have had a great past few days! I know that I have. I started out Friday at a small birthday party for my mother. It’s the first time in my life that we’ve celebrated it with a family party, believe it or not. Our family has attended a caroling party for decades, but the hostess decided that she just couldn’t do it anymore. It was always on Mum’s birthday, so that’s what the celebration was.

Saturday was filled with visiting friends, friends stopping by and cooking. I made the Danish Strudel again. I also made a batch of the infamous Baltimore Eggnog, which was delicious! I attended a lovely dinner party and gave the hostess, who is a great cook, something that I knew she’d love, and actually use! A copper bowl for whipping egg whites!

She gave me the cookbook “A Cook’s Year in a Welsh Farmhouse”, which has the most gorgeous pictures, and lots of recipes for things I got to know and eat when I lived in Wales. Speaking of cooking, I made one of the recipes that my English father was famous for – jam tarts! I filled the tarts with raspberry jam, mincemeat and lemon curd. I think that they brought back a lot of memories for my siblings and my mum.

One of the most popular Christmas presents, at least amongst my circle, was a folio page from Taschen’s Album Vilmorin, The Vegetable Garden. You can read the story of these 19th century garden vegetable prints here. In keeping with the P theme of our presents to each other, my brother gave me the print of the purple cabbage and parsnips! I gave him a periodical publication, plus a pack of pencils, post-it notes, personalized pads of paper, a pound of peanuts, pistachios, Pears soap and a pineapple.

I hope that your Christmas was filled with as much love and warmth from family and friends as mine was!