Cooking, reading and taking pictures in the warm sunlight that fills the kitchen on this quiet Sunday morning is as close to worship as my soul currently needs to approach. Bubbling pans and knives on wood combine with muffled snippets of casuistic argument from an annoying radio talk show that is tolerated because the spoken words aren’t processed by my mind that is contentedly elsewhere. I feel as I imagine would a cat on hearing the strings of unintelligible noises that serve as his master’s voice. As long as those noises are not too annoying or threatening I, like the cat, will just keep purring and, oblivious to anything beyond the light aural massage provided by the extraneous sounds, happily get on with what I’m doing. Music would be better if it was music that I liked.. today…at this moment: but exactly what that would be has eluded me so I’m making fishcakes and just about still purring but the vexatious timbre of both presenter and caller is bringing me closer to choosing the silence for which I should have opted in the first place.
Much as I enjoy an expansive Sunday lunch with family and friends, the pleasure for the cook is tempered by the amount of work and preparation that is demanded to ensure that all the components, both people and food, come agreeably and deliciously together at a chosen hour; which hurdle it is essential to clear cleanly if the moment is to be remembered kindly. The corollary is that cooking food on Sunday for two people, who know each other as well as two people can, is without any limits on time or custom. It may well be that no food at all is prepared, yet a very pleasant day is passed. Today we will enjoy the fish cakes, that I made in the sunny peace of this morning, at whatever time those fish cakes are called on to take a final bath in hot butter and oil. They’ll be consumed with a peppery rocket salad which, apparently, is viewed with nasal disapproval by the savvy restaurant going public. It would seem to me that the down the nose view is common to most food at the time of eating but down the nose looking is taken to suggest disapproval….oddly enough, turning one’s nose up at something is not good either. In the case of our supper, noses will only twitch with the comforting aroma created by butter, potatoes, salmon, anchovies and parsley together with notes of apples, cinammon and more butter coming from the crumble warming in the oven. Another day of Sun well lived.
Food, Photography & France 
Ha ha – it was a good one here today too! I even went to the farmers’ market early as it was so nice outside 🙂
I think the arrival of the grey, cold days is imminent…even more need for warming food and drink:)
It’s arrived here – time for Whiskey Macs and mulled wine 😉
A good time:)
Hic!
🙂
It’s cold and very crowded here at the Nürnberg Christkindl market. I love traveling but I also love a quiet day in my sunny kitchen. You made me homesick.
I remember visiting a wonderful Christmas market in Vienna….many years ago…I’m not that crazy about travelling but that snow covered market sticks in my mind:)
Certainly sounds like my kind of Sunday…
Glad to hear it…they’re good when they happen:)
The lunch sounds great, but why not change the station if the call show is an irritation?
That’s a very good point, Andy….to which I have no answer! I shall think on that next time:)
It was good story anyway, and that detail added to it 🙂
Cheers, Andy:)
I often find that wehn cooking for just the two of us, the food is usually better and tastier. I usually try too hard for a crowd and so lose some of that last minute creativity or homeliness.
Radio noises hurt my ears and sadly enter my consciousness.
I know what you mean about cooking for two….we’re far less inhibited or apprehensive when we’re cooking like that:)
You have made me feel very comfortable in somewhat of a daydream in your sunny kitchen . . . to each their own: you naturally block out the noise which does not matter, I simply don’t turn the ‘on’ knob . . . . quiet chamber music on a Sunday morning being another thing . . . .
I think I turn the radio on in the hope of hearing something that will engage me… I can’t hear the radio very clearly from the kitchen ( there is an explanation for this but just trust me ) and even if I could I would be concentrating on something else…chamber music is a nice thought:)
wonderful..
Thanks, Celi:)
Sounds like a tough life, my friend 🙂
It doesn’t get much tougher:)
Zen and the art of fishcakes on Sunday. What a way to wind down the week. Enjoy!
Cheers, Mel:)
Sounds liek a perfect Sunday to me – but I did have to look up the word “casuistic”!
You didn’t go to a Jesuit school…otherwise it would strike terror into your heart:)
What a wonderfully written post about your Sunday musings. The fish is just lovely…the sauce good for sopping no doubt!
Absolutely, Teresa:)
What a beautiful, calming description and a gorgeous piece of fish. 🙂 You make me wistful for a place I’ve never seen.
It was a very good day, Amanda, thanks for the visit:)
Ah, you have me longing for a quiet sunday morning, and some of those fish cakes!
It’s a nice thought, isn’t it. There’s another one on the way…just a matter of making the fishcakes…and hoping for some sun:)
When Sun and Sunday coincide – and you have that easygoing familiarity to share in it – it’s all rather perfect.
Cheers, Ksenia:)
I can smell that gorgeous aroma and feel the sunshine … thanks 😀
Wish I could feel it today:)
It’s nice to know that if the Sun wasn’t here last Sunday morning that it was off shining in your neck of the woods. I’m a bit jealous of all the time it spends in Las Vegas.
I’m glad it’s the sun spending its time in Las Vegas and not me….but I think the sun could share its company a bit more evenly:)
If you were able to package and sell that “day of Sun well lived” even doubters of simple tastes such as peppery rocket salad would be queued credit cards in hand to partake.
That’s very encouraging, Dale:)
Thank you 😉 EllaDee
🙂