Anticipation

Focaccia warm from the oven and redolent of rosemary; butternut squash hummus drizzled in olive oil; rich chicken liver pâté; mussel salad spiked with Thai chilies, lime and cilantro; rhubarb-custard tartlets. . . . The kitchen is silent and permeated with an air of anticipation as I sit here sketching out a menu for the coming celebration.

It is to be a welcome home party for my great friend Aleah and her boyfriend Reilly. These little shits have spent the last seven or eight months in Europe, first ensconced in a canal cottage in the Netherlands, then wafting dreamily around la ville d’amour and regaling all of us, in less fortunately situated locales, with tales of their gastronomic good fortune. (In Reilly’s case this developed into a seemingly ardent obsession with those proverbially smelly French cheeses.) And so, to hail them home in style we are going to hold a festive evening of tapas and drinks.

This feast also marks the midpoint in my journey with fifty-two feasts. To be honest I have more or less lost track of the precise number of feasts to date, but I know we’re vaguely in to realm of the mid-twenties. Time to take an executive decision and declare this to be feast number 26! As I have mentioned before, exact numbers are not the issue; indeed they are quite contrary to the spirit of the project. Who’s to say we can’t feast forever? 26 is a pleasant enough number and I like the metaphorical symmetry that it invokes. Aleah was there at the birth of this blog, at the inaugural feast, but flew off to Europe soon after. Now she is back and I am looking forward to feasting in her company. There are a further 26 feasts to anticipate—a spring and summer filled with culinary explorations even more delectable than the last!