Everything we ate and drank was from Alsace or just over the border in Germany. I popped the pumpkin for the next day's escapades into the oven as I began to prepare a dinner of Potato Pancakes, Salmonised Trout,* Roquette leaves with Fromage Blanc Sauce & Jenny's Own Apple Butter. Even the sugar and the butter were locally made! & on the liquid side, our boys had organic Raspberry Drink and we had half of one of the last bottles of Alsatian Tokay Pinot Gris on the market (since Hungary won their case, and got the name Tokaj (or Tokay) back. It'll all come from the same vines, so it really doesn't matter. Except that it does. To some. It's a long story). * The boys ate their portion of trout while we were waiting for Dally's return, then dipped into their knacks (Alsatian hot dogs, in a way) when we were all together at the table. But they didn't like them half as much as the trout, so they helped themselves to our portions of the "fiss," too.
The next morning, I wheeled out in a rush before the males of the household had even got their socks on, in order to get to school in time and get everything set up and ironed out for... Muffin Making! Leo & Tomi's class was learning about taste this week, and Hallowe'en was creeping up. So their teacher, Muriel, and I got our heads together and came up with the idea (pure folly) of making Pumpkin Muffins with 24 three/four year olds. And we did it! With the help of Christine, without whom I'm not sure we'd have done half so well. The only thing I forgot was my camera, and I've only got a couple photos from Muriel so far, but these should give you an idea of the scene:
(That's Leo, stirring. The boy in the picture with me is neither of my children...)
