Noël en Belgique

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Opting to spend this Christmas 'at home' in Belgium, we were fortunate to be joined by Ali and Heather who eurostared it over on xmas eve. They brought their own little xmas touches over - Heather with her cool handmade xmas crackers (gags incorporated - hey, good name for a company heath!) and ali brought a much needed angel for our tree, christened Christabelle.

We kicked off chrissy day with a christmas themed (ie red/green vegies) frittata, made by the other Jamie of the kitchen (with assistance from Ms Farquhar). Santa had been rather generous, so we had a rather extended unwrapping session, with many squeels of delight. After unwrapping his first gift we had to stop Jamie from just taking off to go and play with it (a wife has to get her husband some hankies).

The rest of the day was spent walking the dogs in the forest, on xmas calls, chilling and preparing for our Christmas feast. For entrée some goats cheese and cranberry parcels, with a (local) chicory salad. Mains, a warm avocado salad and Tortelli di Zucca. The pasta idea came from a mortgage broker we had seen. She's married to an Italian, and after he whinged about her cooking last year, this year he was told to make his mum's usual xmas pasta. We were interested so she printed off the recipe. Its basically pumpkin with the hard-to-come-by and unusual Mostarda di Cremona (fruit in mustard). Definite team effort, with Jamie and I cranking out the pasta and Heather and Ali playing the role of the old Italian women gnattering and filling and pressing in the next room.

Even though full, we managed to squeeze in some Buche de Nôel. Jamie had had to go and beg for eggs at the local boulangerie as they had somehow been missed on the shopping list!

Boxing Day was spent waking late, wandering around and lunching in Leuven, and getting the girls off to the train station. Heading to the station was the biggest xmas bonus as snow started to fall. Neither Ali or Heather had seen snow before, so it was all rather exciting, and necessitated a pull over so we could dance around in the snow (and in Jamie's case, the dog shit). Was definitely a highlight. Having only had my first proper dose of snow a couple of weeks ago, I could share in their experience. I think we are really fortunate in not having seen it before. Its like saving yourself a special treat till your 30 (odd)!

We hope everyone had as enjoyable a christmas as we were fortunate to!