‘If you don’t eat your dinner …’

Threading Together

Throughout my childhood my Dad’s work meant we moved to new locations fairly frequently. There were some constants in our lives though – eating together at the weekends. Saturdays tended to be macaroni cheese, baked in a huge Le Creuset pot to brown the cheese on top; that, or Spaghetti Bolognese… the length of the spaghetti never failed to impress… was it much longer back then? Sundays was always a roast dinner, followed by pudding. The mantra was ‘If you don’t eat your dinner you can’t have any pudding’. In my memory, puddings never changed. It was the only day of the week when we had one and it always felt like a treat. Strawberry flavoured Angel Delight, with tinned peaches and occasionally a dash of Tip Top. Over the years, my memory has conflated this pudding with the patterned Denby dinner service that my parents used for high days and holidays. I loved the patterns, colours and shapes of the design; in my young head it had a sophistication and coolness that really struck me. I have since inherited what’s left of the dinner service and the big Le Creuset pot. Whilst these still make a regular appearance, the Angel Delight and tinned peaches have remained in the distant past, which I occasionally look back on with bemused affection.

(Petra Matthews-Crow)