Saturday - Friends and Food...

Today started dry and fine and bright and Droushia is looking pretty beautiful at the moment or at least it does when the sun shines, in the rain and the rolling mists it is a different matter.  No snow on the Troodos as yet and the golfball was clearly visible.

We had been invited to have coffee down in the village with Simon, Melanie, baby Jasmine and Simon's mum who is over from Cornwall - she lives in Gorran Haven which is not a million miles away from where my Dad lived as a child (East Portholland).  In fact Dad and Simon attended the same school although with quite a few years in between them!

Being a beautiful day we decided to take a walk down into the village and take in our surroundings before the weather closes in and we are forced to stay indoors when the rains come.  We had the added bonus that as it was Saturday we weren't accompanied by the sound of a million gun cartridges being blasted off, although having said that we have heard a lot less shooting going on this year than we did last year - maybe the crisis has affected the cost of hunting which is good news for the birds but probably not such good news for the hunting dogs and we will no doubt begin to see more being abandoned which is such a shame but sadly a fact of Cypriot life.

We arrived Chez Mel and Simon's to find them setting up coffee outside in their garden.  We love their house which externally is very typical of the village houses but inside has been modernised and is warm, cosy and stylish.  They are gradually working on the courtyard garden making it a very pleasant and restful outside space.  The house and garden are both slightly lower than the village road which means that it is private and protected and a right little suntrap

The dogs, Hector and Cleo, were also enjoying the outside space - I think they look like they are posing on their Christmas Blanket!!!  All they need are the addition of a Santa Hat and they could be used as Mel and Simon's Christmas Card in much the same way as we created ours with Chivers and Minnie Mou!  We wouldn't be able to do that with them this year as they rarely sleep anywhere near one another anymore which is a shame.

We enjoyed a chat, coffee and chocolate chip cookies together in the sunshine before returning home to get a spot of lunch before John and Running John went off to football.  This week they were heading off to Ayia Marina as Polis has a break of about four weeks!!!

Running John was driving as I was busying myself getting food ready as he and Running Susan were going to have dinner with us.  We wanted to get together with them before Christmas and this was about our only opportunity.  I had decided to do a stifado because that can be left sorting itself out once prepared and John had made some creme brulee that only needed the sugar caramelised so all I needed was to find a suitable starter and after a lot of searching on the internet I found one for vegetarian fritters using Carrot, Coriander and Haloumi (all of which I had in the fridge) so I decided to give them a go.  Will report back on them in tomorrow's blog.

On John's return from football he set about making sure that the house looked and felt warm and cosy for our visitors - Christmas decorations help plus that fact that the oven had been on for quite a while!  For once I had everything under control so that it was only a matter of warming things through when our guests arrived.

We started out the evening sitting in the conservatory.  Poor photography means that Susan looks like she has a heart growing out of the top of her head!!  Anyway we had a really nice evening.  The food went down well as did the wine and subsequently Susan has told me that she woke the following day with a baggy head!!!!  RESULT!