We hope you’ve all had a brill Christmas and over indulged with passion. Right I hope your sitting comfortably because this is a bit of a mammoth instalment (aren’t they all). For those of you keeping up to date on our exploits, you may remember in my last lot of witterings, I was gloating about the fact that our contribution for the Christmas day lunch was to be a fruit salad. Well read on bloggers!! My gloating turned to despair about 3 days before Christmas when Captain M came back to the boat asking if I wanted the good news or the bad news first. I opted for the bad (may as well get it over and done with). Our esteemed Captain had only gone and agreed to us cooking a turkey for the Christmas day luncheon as well as preparing the fruit salad! Once I’d picked myself up off the floor, I really needed to hear some good news. The good news was he’d enjoyed his game of tennis, as you can imagine I was very pleased for him!! Luckily the run up to Christmas was very busy so there was no real time for a full on nervous breakdown. Best save that for Christmas day. On Christmas eve we went over to a friends boat (Atoraxia) you remember Eddie’s boat. There were six of us in all Captain Ian, anchorwoman Mandy, Captain Martin, anchorwoman Joanna (Eddie said it would be rude not to invite them as technically it is their boat) Captain M and my good self. We had a positive feast, I lost count after five courses (may as well start as you mean to go on). The piece de la resistance was a beefalicious Boeuf de wellington. I tell you our taste buds our munching the dream! For those of you coming to visit us, don’t panic that we’re getting all fancy dancy with our cooking, oh no shipmates for you I will still whip up the old Pasta de Tuna. We retired around 1am (after we had exhausted ourselves singing Wham’s greatest hits) as the night before we’d had a bit of a late night stroke early morning on old Stella Maris, friends had popped round for a quiet drink and a rendition of ‘five gold rings’ (as you do) and ended up leaving in the wee hours. Pop Idol here we come!! Christmas day Captain M was up at 8.00am as we were under strict instructions that all turkeys needed to go in the oven at this time. To tell the truth ours went in at about 8.20am as we had to connect the gas first!! For once the sun was not shinning in Agios Nikolaos, in fact it was downright cloudy. We emerged from the boat to find that there was no water in the marina (showering alfresco was not appealing). Another concern was that the keys to the yacht club had gone missing. This was to be the venue for our pre-luncheon champagne and canapés and more importantly Christmas lunch itself. I was somewhat nervous about the key situation as I was one of the last people to have the keys and in a flaky moment I could have done anything with them (no they weren’t in our fridge). I’m pleased to say that water was restored to the marina in time for a wash and scrub up before drinks and canapés. Luckily the keys turned up safe and sound (phew that was me off the hook). We uttered a few words of encouragement to our roasting turkey and set off for our pre-luncheon drinks. After a couple of hours everyone returned to their boats, to prepare their bits and bobs for the luncheon. We still had a salade de fruit to make. Did I say make, I meant create, as cooking is art, although I know fruit salad is not technically cooking, oops I digress. Before preparing our fruity dessert, we went on to Moli (Cap Ian & Mandy) to do a little pressie exchange. A freaky thing happened, Mandy and I both bought each other hot water bottles! (get out of my head luvvie). The Captains bought each other Fray Bentos pies (not your conventional Christmas present I’ll grant you). Only when you have been pieless for 6 months can you truly appreciate the significance of such a fine fine gift!! The Captain and myself then returned to Stella to check on our turkey, we are blowing our own trumpets here but, it looked turkeylicious. There then followed a military operation to bring everybody and the food together for 2pm. We wined, we dined, we laughed and it goes without saying that we sang!! Some of the folk in the marina had put together a band that consisted of guitars, accordion and drums, the rest of us provided vocals. The results can only be described as unique!! Secret Santa visited us all, my gift was a Cretan cookery book, could the marina folk be getting tired of my signature dish, Pasta de Tuna fish. Surely not I hear you cry! Captain Miles got a rather interesting set of Greek coasters, that are not for the faint hearted! All agreed it was a fantastic Christmas Day!! Love & sing a longs Captain M and the turkey whisperer XX
Saturday, 30 December 2006