24th June 2012

Last week was the Journee du Patrimoine, its 2012 theme being food. I'd invited five new friends round to chez-nous. As usual, I panicked. It all started when we'd been invited round to lunch in Toulouse one Saturday a few weeks ago. We had a great time, walking through the beautiful Jardin des Plantes near the Esquirol metro, and meeting all these lovely new people. But now it was my turn. First worry: the menu. Our French guests had roots in five different countries, and our veggie son also had to be accommodated, so I didn't want to disappoint. Watching the culinary horrors of  'Come Dine with Me' on TV, I realised the best way was to cook everything in advance, so I prepared chilled fresh tomato soup, slow-cooked goulash (for our friend from Russia) with potato latkes and red onion pie (for our son), followed by fruit compote with cherries and other fruits from our garden. A minor disaster: one fruit compote dish fell over in the fridge directly onto a soup dish below! Fortunately, the tinfoil cover took the damage.  How did it go? T.G.: a resounding success, so much so that our Russian friend wants to buy my cookbook! But, Him indoors nearly ruined everything when they arrived by saying he was on a seafood diet: 'when I see food, I eat it'.....