Japan and Jugs, Lunch and Love

We are three for lunch today in honour of our Japanese friend who is visiting from Tokyo - Roasted Root Veggie Frittata from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's fantastic cook book called VEG. In this case all the veggies are from the allotment - beetroots, carrots, potatoes, red onions, yellow pattipan squash and garlic, lots of of fresh herbs chopped into the eggs and parmesan cheese grated on top.

Salad - raw peas ( my sister's) and the first sweetcorn from the market - always reminds me of the first time I learned how to slice the kernels from their cobs - making a salad together with a dear friend in London many years ago.

My most favourite Middle Eastern dish of all time which doesn't look exciting, but I never ever get tired of it, could eat it every day especially made with the short season red and orange Brandy-Wine tomatoes from the market - simply called Green Beans Tomatoes and Garlic.

The sun this evening, lighting up the candle and begonia centrepiece on the table after she left.

 Gift from Tokyo - Japanese cookies - tiny, delicate, beautifully wrapped.

Jugs - just because I love them.

It's three years since I've seen my dear Japanese friend ....... my father was still alive ( he introduced us) .....and our pussy cat.....and it was before my husband's diagnosis. She sits with him at the keyboard in his office and they play a duet - he improvises - she says he's really talented. She says he's still the same and wouldn't  have noticed any difference if I hadn't told her. Except he can't remember the word for duck but he does know that Belfast is in Northern Ireland but not where Tokyo or Japan is....

She says many women  in Japan endure loveless marriages and divorce isn't common. She also works at three different universities  -  long, long hours and at weekends. It makes me so grateful  for everything I have in my life - whatever I've lost.......and how loved I feel....and how bleak and  pointless it would all be without that.