Afternoon tea, VDay style

Yesterday I delivered the various little bags of chox to local friends, who were suitably pleased with them.  I did it a day early because there was a gloomy forecast of an ice storm to happen overnight.  I didn't want to treat the neighborhood to a demonstration of Seniors On Ice Crossing the Street, so I thought yesterday better.  Judging from the reception nobody minded not waiting a day.

And here's today's tea. Because I'm worth it.

I notice that Tuesday is Shrove Tuesday, must think about pancakes, so soon.  With the requisite lemon juice and sprinkled sugar, to be in the traditional mode I grew up with. It's the 16th, which also happens to be my wedding anniversary.  

In 1963, we got married at 3.20 p.m. on February 16, and left for the US, once the doctoral dissertation was all written, typed, bound, and the defense completed, in mid December that year.  So that's how many years it is since I came to live here.

The reason for the weird time and date, no we did not want a Valentine wedding, cringe, goes back to the Reformation.  I know, everything in England goes back to the Reformation.  Anyway, at that time, Catholic priests lost the legal authority to marry people.  They secretly continued to do the religious ceremony, but they to this day, though they don't have to conduct the church ceremony secretly, can not officiate legally.  For that you need the township registrar.

And since the Catholic Church doesn't recognize marriages of Catholics performed in the registry office, you have to somehow get the two working together.  Registrars hate this, because they have to schedule, travel, and traipse out for a brief ceremony and signing in the sacristy of the church.  So after months of back and forth, we had started the previous June hoping for an October wedding. with the priest patiently changing the church times repeatedly to suit, the registrar finally said he would be present at that exact time in that church.  He would give us 10 minutes, and if we were even slightly late, he would leave.  Oh.  

A few years ago a friend from that region commented that it was funny, she thought she'd been at a wedding in a Catholic church a few miles from there on that same day, at some weird time like 2.16 p.m.  We figured she'd been at the wedding before ours.  So now all was clear to her, too.

It was a nice little wedding, though, just a small group of friends, the few pictures the gift of the photographer, the flowers the gift of the student union where we held the reception, the cake the gift of my matron of honor's mother, my dress and veil the something borrowed. Yes, we were pretty broke, every penny going toward paying for the fares to come to the US to get on with our lives.  I had come down with tonsillities a couple of days before and I was not totally up to par, but it was okay anyway.

So there we go.  Pancakes on Tuesday.  Which reminds me that, brilliant as he was, late spouse could never spell Tuesday.  It always came out Teusday.

Mixed blessing, but there's chocolate

This mountain of snow outside my window, which will be there till April probably, looks undesirable, but there's a good side: the birds have seized on it as a shelter from being observed, and are flocking to the feeder undisturbed.  For them it's a lot better than a street view. So there's that. And the Carolina wren started a mating/territory call yesterday.  That, too.

Meanwhile, Valentine's Day is almost here, and I see no reason why everyone is not qualified to celebrate.  So my neighbors are in for a few treats.  If my Indian neighbors are back, they'll be included.  And definitely the people who do such a lot for me and my car, and my cook friend across the street, and maybe even the unfriendly lady whose car went away the other day. Handsome Son, of course. So I made enough to go around.

 One ordinary chocolate cake, that simple recipe, only in a glass pan because I wanted it wider and thinner than usual

Then sliced into cubes, more or less, while I get ready to melt chocolate bits

then proceed to spoon melted chocolate over each cube, adding a  whole almond while the chocolate's still wet.

And now there are supplies in the freezer and the fridge.  I also left half a dozen unchoccied, for myself, not always wanting chocolate, I know, very odd.

 I also have white chocolate chips, but they'll be used another time, for something different.

This constitutes my Valiant Valentine Bit.