The birthday lunch....granary and French garlic bread..... green leaves grown by the birthday girl...... roasted veggies and spinach trottole (spiral?) pasta salad tossed in a gorgeous lemon oil ( we brought back from Cromwell, NZ) and a syrupy blood orange balsamic vinegar dressing.....grilled Halloumi cheese, artichokes and olive salad..... emerald green Salsa Verde whizzed up by my niece's boyfriend.....a ginger and coriander brazil nut roast ( vegan, for my brother)..... asparagus ( grown by my husband) and gruyere tart...salmon and watercress quiche .......and an avocado, cherry tomato and fennel salad with a mustard French dressing.
At the end of supper - the Lemon Polenta Drizzle birthday cake....last of the tropical fruit salad from lunch, the pink poached nectarines and my big sister's chocolate coconut squares. Earlier in the day we had another birthday cake - Chocolate Almond decorated with Blue Icing and a ring of Smarties. And three candles on it to blow out by my sweet great-nephew who nearly shares the same birthday as his grandma.
And of course the day wasn't only about the food....
From the early morning my brother kept this fire burning for us, up in the field above the house.
Before the air turned chilly we sat around it on upturned logs and cushions, keeping out of the way of the smoke, poking the red hot logs to bring back the flames,
remembering all the other times we have celebrated special family birthdays around a fire like this on this beautiful and lovingly cared for piece of land deep in the Somerset/Devon borders.
I could have stayed by that evening fire forever, in the circle of my family, watching the flames leap and die....while my husband slept on and on in an upstairs bedroom, with the windows closed against the smoke of life.....too hot for him now in the fire of conversation....better for me to let him slumber in the softness of ashes.....rather than always trying to poke him back out of the embers....
No comments:
Post a Comment