The end of July. How did that happen?
On a warm night with very low humidity, we sank deep into indulgence with a cheese and saucisson supper. With hunks of crusty sourdough baguette, and an Aronia chutney I made last summer.
The Frenchman had bought roses for me. And a sausage. A dried one, salami-style. To mark a day 15 years ago when I tripped over him on the Internet, in search of a photographic tutorial. Which he gave, using the example of a "backlit saucisson" to illustrate what he was explaining.
So we sat and ate a very delicious, juniper-flavored saucisson in celebration. It's made in Vermont by Walnut Hill Farm, and we buy one as a treat occasionally from the Grand Army Plaza farmers' market. The round cheese is St. Nuage and is wonderful. Also Vermont. The triangle is a creamy St. Angel. Both triple-cream, each with its own personality.
The only thing I made from scratch was the tomato salad, with slivers of red onion marinated in mulberry syrup and white wine vinegar, along with some mulberries from that syrup (foraged and preserved in June) and basil from the terrace. Straight from Olia Hercules' book, Mamushka.
Now August is at the door, and she's impatient.
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Congratulations, what a wonderful celebratory supper. Using a backlit saucisson to illustrate a technical point takes a special kind of person - they would immediately win a place in my heart!
ReplyDeleteThank you x
DeleteI liked the story of your dating frustrations before deciding on the Frenchman (including that first date).
ReplyDeleteYou'll have to elaborate, Anonymous. Or point me to that story!
DeleteIt's Bowstreet Marie! (don't know why I'm Anonymous). I thought I remembered a story you told several years ago about the lack of suitable dates from a dating website and what a surprise the Frenchman was - although I don't think he was a dating website date. Did I dream that? Anyway - however you met he was obviously the winner!
DeleteHello, Bowstreet! He was a very good surprise - although by the time we met there had been very lengthy emails and phone calls and video chats; all that remained to be assessed was chemistry. I never used a dating website, though, so not sure what I might have been referring to. Maybe I wrote about having an unconscious checklist, based on previous relationships and dates, that he aced, quite freakily... Something I only figured out long after we'd met? (I think one of the first things on that list was: No Trust Fund Boys... but it was a lengthy wishlist).
DeleteIt's still a great story - without dating websites. "No Trust Fund Boys"!!! LOL.
DeleteFunny, right? Maybe unfair but in my experience/s they came with baggage: no fire in the belly, and a disconcerting lack of backbone.
Delete