Photo fail

A lively and rewarding day, but this is the only photo I took! As the end of August comes rushing towards us, we decided it was about time we had our annual 4th of July party, marking 24 years of living in France. We wanted to do it in the garden, and the weather forecast said Thursday would be good, so at very short notice we invited nine people, did a big shop at the market on Wednesday morning, and got cooking. We didn't dare risk a barbecue given the number of fires there have been this summer and the dryness of the surrounding garrigue.

We always say we'll keep it simple, but as usual both of us spent part of Wednesday and most of Thursday cooking and preparing (including S hacking down some of the undergrowth in the garden so that people could actually get into it safely). Two people said they would bring starters; nevertheless we cooked:

two loaves of bread (blip)
gazpacho with all the trimmings
onion tart
focaccia (shouldn't have bothered)
roast leg of lamb from Arquettes-en-Val, cooked using the haybox coolbox method
potato gratin
lots of cheese
Prune and Armagnac tart
Bakewell tart

Count 'em, that's three tarts with two different kinds of pastry! We made a salad as well but when both donated starters turned out to be salad, one of them enough to serve 20, we discreetly set ours aside.

For once we had invited only francophones, not deliberately setting out to do so. But actually it was a pleasure to speak only one language and not have to keep chopping and changing, or translating, and the conversation was more general instead of breaking into groups based on language. We also invited a few people we haven't invited before and it was good to have an opportunity to get to know them better, especially Roland's shy Polish wife Regina. At some point I realised I'd left the camera in the car and decided I couldn't be bothered to go and get it. Hence no photos.

All in all it was a perfect evening, one of the best Independence Day parties we've had. It was still hot when we got there at 7, but in the shade, so quite comfortable. It was 25C at midnight, when the bright moon rose over a ragged crowd of people staggering up the steep, pebbly track to the road carrying torches along with crates and coolboxes randomly crammed with stuff. S says this is the part he likes best because it's so chaotic.

The food was lovely too; extra special prize to S's perfectly cooked lamb (it's impossible to overcook it with this method) and the delicious potato gratin, cooked at home and handily kept warm by being in the box with the lamb.

25 years next year -- perhaps we really will have to make a bit of an effort ...