With our 12th wedding anniversary right around the corner, I thought I’d look up 12th year wedding gifts. The traditional gifts are silks and linens. Who came up with those? Does that mean I should expect a linen table cloth? Should Jeff expect silk pajamas? I think not.
In fact, after 12 years together, I want to give Jeff something memorable, something unique. So, I was thinking a potato. Not any potato. (What kind of wife do you think I am?) A jacket potato, as they call it in England, or as we Yanks call it, a stuffed potato. Now, before you consider me the most un-romantic person you’ve ever met, read on.
Our honeymoon had an inauspicious start. Our scheduled non-stop flight from Boston to London was cancelled due to thunderstorms, and consequently our luggage was “misplaced” (the Brits’ genteel word for “lost”). In part due to a choppy ride and part due to just-married-bliss, we did not sleep on the flight over and landed in London late and red-eyed.
When we arrived, we discovered that our inn was just as we anticipated: a Victorian brownstone on a tree lined, thoroughly British street. There was even a consummate Brit, heels clicking on the pavement, with his walking stick swinging in one hand and the Sunday Times in the other.
The woman at the inn greeted us warmly then asked for our name. After Jeff told her, she looked at him, then at me, then back at him and back to me. She said, “Uncanny how much you two look alike. Are you brother and sister?”
Cheddar is one of the most popular cheeses in the world and one of my favorites. It originally came from Somerset, in England but is now produced in many parts of the English speaking world and beyond. But only 14 makers are licensed to use the EU Protected Designation of Origin “West Country Farmhouse Cheddar” which indicates it's still made in the traditional way.
Me and Al, we go way back. However, Al is...ahem...a bit fattening, making it something I don't indulge in all the time. The problem though, I love Alfredo sauce; the creaminess, the richness, it's just good comfort food.
When I asked what I could bring for dessert to a recent gathering, my friend told me that her husband loves “anything pumpkin” - particularly healthy recipes - but also a little decadent.
I subscribe to a lot of magazines, probably at least fifty. I love reading publications about cooking, wine and design. I am never without a large pile of them on the coffee table.