Family life is made up of a series of habits that become cemented into our brains and mean that certain smells, tastes and dishes will always take us right back to our childhood. For me, as a child living with my Grandmother, lunch was always a boiled egg at lunch with toast, followed by cheese.
On Thursdays, when my Grandmother had been for her weekly set and blow dry she would return with Cornish pasties and, sometimes, a lardy cake for tea.
Now that I have my own family, Sundays have become soup evenings. I’m not a massive fan of soup (I know I’m weird like that) but it has become so much a family ritual that when Him Outdoors suggested we have something else the other week I was mildly outraged.
The eldest son likes to join in with the soup – always vegetable, always with grains, never, ever mushed up and thick. It has to be broth with bits in if I am to partake. This is then followed by warm bread from the oven (heated through not freshly baked, steady on it’s Sunday) and cheese. The 12-year-old won’t touch the soup; the sight of that many vegetables in one makes makes him slightly panicky, but he likes the bread and cheese and the “familiness” of the occasion.
We used to watch Top Gear. Sometimes The Antiques Roadshow. We always say we will watch a film but we never quite manage to be, as my Grandmother would say, sat sitting in time.
And so we come to these plates. They fit perfectly with the idea of a family ritual. The Ploughman’s lunch, the Sunday night supper. But also for canapes and nibbles when guests come round. Cheese on one, salami on another, nuts on the third with the shells filling up the ridges round the edge. Good for a weekend breakfast too when you’ve got time to make a little more of an occasion out of it.
They cost £48 for six from Rowen and Wren and, given the time of year, I think they would make a good present for anyone who likes food or has a family. Here’s an idea – give two to one person and add some lovely cheese and a jar of quince jelly to the gift. That’s three sorted out in one go.
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