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Strawberry Tea in the Gar…. Just Strawberry Tea, perhaps
How do you write about your own Strawberry Tea? Oh well, here goes…..
First, it HAD been advertised as a Strawberry TEA with no mention of GARDEN so two very early mornings in the garden before it got too hot sufficed for a bit of a tidy-up. (Reader, please note, NEXT year will be my Year Of The Garden.)
The TEA part was obviously important. Armed with what is becoming my Baking Bible, Mary Berry’s ‘Ultimate Cake Book’, my sister and I set about baking. She made a cherry cake, previously untried. We cut it to see if the cherries had sunk. The family helped us to eat it. She made another, and a fruit cake. We made a carrot cake and so it went on……
The house was cleaned against the possibility of rain stopping outdoor eating and prayers were continuously muttered for a fine day.
On the day, dawn saw the start of the scone-making which meant we had ‘Cook’s Perks’ for breakfast. The final jobs were done by lunchtime, including putting out garden chairs under a non-committal sky.
The prayers were heard: at three o’clock, the sun was shining and Wimbledon had been forsaken as friends arrived, ranks swelled by neighbours and family. A fine time was had by all of us, raising the welcome sum of £148.00 for the Restoration Fund. Thank you to all who shared the day with us. As a matter of interest, the cherry cake will hereafter be known as ‘cherry- bottom cake’.
Post Script: the excuse is that the family had no time to eat Strawberry Tea; the fact is that the extended Marchant family indulged in an alfresco Chinese takeaway washed down by several bottles of wine as the sun went down. The clearing away of the garden chairs was an extremely interesting experience, and the next day was spent VERY quietly . . . . . . perhaps we’ll sell tickets for the ‘Après- Tea’ party next time!
Elizabeth Marchant
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