Liberia, 16th October 2021

 It should be good practice to write a blog post about a dinner one has hosted, shortly after such dinner so that the details aren't forgotten.  Waiting 6 months, as is the case with the meal from Liberia I hosted in October 2021 is not a good idea as: one I couldn't remember what I made, two I can't remember what anyone did or said, three I cannot even remember the dinner at all.  There is photographic evidence and there are notes about the dishes from both Eric and Kristiane who attended the event, so it did happen.

I am not the only one who says this, in fact there are multiple people, famous or otherwise, who have stated that really 2020 and 2021 were one long year that lasted 24 months.  I, like most people I know, am guilty of confusing when events happened.  Was it last summer, was it the summer before? Was it Spring or Autumn?  Unfortunately, the weather in England is often quite the same over the four seasons (even though there are more warmer days now on account of climate change) so trying to recall whether it was a particularly hot day or a very cold one, doesn't help.  For example, last week, it was lovely here... last week of March, and we had 20 degrees weather, sunshine... then this week it snowed.  Last night it was so cold out it took me ages to warm up when I came home.  

And a special mention about home:  we are currently residing in West London, thanks to a friend who kindly offered us her empty flat while we are renovating our old home in South West London.  So far the renovations are going way better than what we have experienced in Italy but, frankly, things would have to be really bad (sort of the entire place fell down, someone was injured, we had to rebuild 2 flats, etc.) in order to have gone as bad as in Italy.   It's not like we have no experience in leaving in different places though so we made it home within a couple of days.  I admit I still use google maps when I go anywhere but the roads are becoming more familiar and I'm sure by the time we are moving back (by end of May) I'll be an expert of the area.

We had a good start of 2022... We even made it back to the USA and this time we traveled in style on the Queen Mary 2 across the ocean.  It was quite an experience.  We didn't hit any icebergs (are there any left in the Atlantic anyway) but did have quite a few storms which made it for an interesting passage at time.  It was a good experience and would recommend it to people but we wouldn't do it again.  It is rather expensive and we found that we didn't really manage to socialize much with people... perhaps we should have had more interest in playing bridge or taking dance lessons but that was out of the question given that Eric had a little accident a few days before we left and so ended up with stitches on his ankle.  I won't even bother with explaining what happened as it was really stupid (I probably should say, he was really stupid).  We arrived in NYC and spent a couple of days there then went to Atlanta, met friends, ate a lot and flew back to the UK just in time to move from our flat and get the renovations going.

I thought that once I retired, I would have had more alphabetical dinners but it didn't happen.  Perhaps in part the pandemic is to blame but also my heart hasn't been in it.  I have friends who ask about coming to my dinners so I really must do better.

As I mentioned already, I can barely remember hosting this dinner so it's going to be difficult to talk about the dishes.  All I can do is relate what Kristiane and Eric said in their scoring cards... 

As a starter I made eggplant fritters which sound good (I love aubergines and I like fried food) but unfortunately turned out to be "tasteless and stodgy" (don't hold back Kristiane) and despite Eric liking the light texture, he also found them to be bland.

The main course was what is a very popular dish in Liberia, Liberian Chicken Gravy (which I'm sure they simply call chicken gravy in the country)  which I served with fufu which is a staple made of yam in many African countries.  Kristiane liked it enough and said the chicken was tender and went nicely with the fufu.  Eric really liked it!  Maybe I should do it again at some point... perhaps try to make it a bit less oily (you can tell from the picture!). 

I also served the chicken with collards and cabbage as one must eat some vegetables... they were made with bacon which really pleased both Eric and Kristiane although she also commented that it had a bit of a western taste.  

As a dessert I made Liberian Cake (not sure if they would simply call it "cake" that would be confusing, wouldn't it).  It had quite a few spices as well as syrup and sugar so it might have been a tad too sweet.  Eric didn't like it because it had coconut.  

As you probably can tell, I really wasn't in it that evening... the pictures seem like an afterthought, sort of like, damn, I forgot to take a photo, quick pass the phone.  

Kristiane also took home a goody bag with Kanyah (some peanuts based sweets) and cornbread which she then told me was quite good actually.  

In conclusion, here are the final scores and the full menu:

Eggplant Fritters                3.9

Liberian Chicken Gravy     7.9

Fufu                                    7.6

Collards and Cabbage        6.5

Liberian Cake                    3.5

Overall Dinner                   7.7

Problem with having only 2 people at dinner is that if one of them really doesn't like something, the score is really skewed (e.g. Kristiane didn't really like the fritters and Eric didn't really like the cake).  So I suppose the answer is to have more people over.  Now that the UK government has decided that they really don't care about covid infections and we can do what we damn please when we damn please and without wearing a mask, I suppose it's just a matter of sending out those invites, isn't it.

Next up is Maldives.

Stay tuned.