Last night we had people over for dinner for the first time in simply ages. I think it was me that first vetoed dinner parties, because I always did the cooking and started to feel very stressed about trying to produce great meals in our tiny crowded kitchen. But as the IVF effect has set in, neither of us has felt very sociable, so even though we still seem to have our fair share of going out, it hasn’t included dinner parties at our house. I am hoping that summer will bring good news and with it a desire to share food and our garden more generously with our friends. I’m dreaming of long summer evenings on the deck with cool drinks and the bbq smoking away and conversation roaming widely…
Last night we eased into it, by making it a dinner and TV night (David Attenborough’s Planet Earth – magnificent), and by only inviting two people (a couple). I think we were both really nervous about it, not helped by me somehow managing to sprain my ankle at lunch time, which led to storms of tears and panic about a messy house. But as I’m sure C and M can testify to, we pulled it together – the house looked beautiful and the food was divine. We had Saag Paneer, Dal Fry and Raita with cinnamon rice, all from the World Food Café cookbook. I think that all vegetarians need to own a copy – every single recipe that we have ever made out of it is a winner. Not only was it delicious, it was a great combination of flavours and textures, and we all ate way too much.
For dessert I made Jean’s Prune and Pumpkin Cake, which sounds kind of gross but turned out to be wonderful – light and moist and not too sweet. Jean is Bean’s grandmother, and last year, for a combined birthday present, she gave us a green ring-binder folder full of recipes that she has collected over the years, all lovingly typed out on her computer, slipped into plastic sleeves, and organised by category with matching pictures cut from magazines pasted onto each dividing sheet. It is precious. My favourite recipe so far has been Vegetarian Scones, which despite their wonderful name are simply savoury scones – quick to make and very impressive – but I think this cake is my new favourite.
Jean’s Prune and Pumpkin Cake
250g butter
1 cup castor sugar
1 tsp grated orange rind
3 eggs
1⁄4 cup orange juice
3⁄4 cup cold mashed pumpkin
1⁄2 cup finely chopped prunes
2 cups self raising flour
1⁄4 cup milk or thereabouts
Cream butter, sugar and orange rind. Beat in the eggs one at a time. Stir in the orange juice, prunes and pumpkin, then add the flour alternately with the milk until you get a fairly soft cake batter. Pour into a 20cm round tin lined with baking paper and bake in a moderate oven for 1 – 1 1⁄4 hrs (I thought that seemed really long, but trust me, it’s about right). Rest for five minutes and then turn out onto a rack.
(Well, we should have known that daily posting was setting the bar too high. But at least we are posting again at all!)
