The past few weeks have been strange (and extremely frightening for anyone faced with Covid-19 symptoms) and, for everyone, a steep learning curve, doing our best to stay safe and well and adapt to a different, albeit hopefully temporary, way of life in lockdown. We've had so many lovely messages from Home Base Holidays members letting us know what they have been up to and even just to check that we're safe and well. It's been genuinely heartwarming, and it's been so lovely to see the generosity shown by so many members that have offered free holiday stays in their homes to healthcare / frontline workers via the My Travel Pledge campaign - thank you so much!
Membership extensions: inevitably, many planned home exchanges have had to be cancelled or postponed. Therefore, we've been very happy to offer membership extensions, giving members more time to rearrange postponed home swaps and look ahead to a time when it’s safe to travel and we can all start planning our home exchanges.
We love hearing what members have been up to and so we were delighted to receive this post from long-time Home Base Holidays member, Judith Stafford. We hope Judith’s article brings a smile!
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I never ever do chain letters. I’m still haunted by sinister tales from schooldays about how, if you succumbed to one, three weeks later you’d be smothered in the night under a mountain of hate mail, traumatised for life and your whole family would have to go into witness protection. But I did partake recently. Well, only because it was concerning food, which is really the sole focus these days. It started off by wanging on about the spirit of the war and sharing recipes in times of hardship. Anyway, the chain letter got me at a vulnerable moment - though every moment feels vulnerable these days - and I signed up. After all, we’re finding ourselves doing a myriad manner of things we wouldn’t normally do aren’t we? • Nurturing jars of mouldy slime in our knicker drawer - otherwise known as sourdough starters. Newly risen bakers could do something creative with their sourdoughs and the sit upon ends of a Zoom orchestra. “I’ve used lockdown to teach myself how to play the Euphonium.” No you haven’t, love. Zoom orchestras and Zoom choirs....enough already. SO the crux of this chain letter was, that if I contributed a "go to" recipe, two weeks later I would be inundated with hundreds of other fabulously inventive instructions for wholesome lockdown lunches. Then I could collate them into a book entitled “Cough Up For This”, make a fortune and bugger off to Mustique, pretending this was all a horrid dream, like Boris did. So I followed the instructions - wrote my recipe, sent it to the first person on the list, moved the second person up to be the first person, put my name as the third person, swapped the first person for the fourth person, sent it all to 20 other people, made up a name for the fifth person and swapped them all round again. No I didn’t understand it either. I soon started getting messages back though. “I hate cooking.” That kind of thing. But then recipes did start pinging in. I say recipes....if you count mashing a leftover sweet potato on a bit of toast (and YES it was bloody sourdough) ..... or spam casserole (queasy emoji required). Thus far it’s been a huge disappointment. But then, maybe our standards are just too high. The once unpronounceable “yottamottolenghi” just rolls off the tongue nowadays, in a casual conversation about your favourite sandwich. You can’t load a disinfected trolley without sumac, za’atar and pomegranate molasses. We are making our own pasta with one hand tied behind our backs, whistling La Traviata. We grind our own garam masala, churn our own beetroot sorbet, spin our own salted caramel. We watch Masterchef. We collect glossy cook books just for the photos. We stalk sexy, tattooed chefs on the internet. Oh - is that just me? So what the hell was I thinking? I really don’t need a recipe for a soggy carrot slice. And don’t even get me started on banana bread. If I see one more variation on banana bread! Is banana bread sponsoring Corona Virus or something? Now, it’s coming up to 9.00am so I must dash. I’ve got a busy day ahead. Joe Wicks is starting and if I’m late I’ll get lines. Then I’ve only got 10 hours until dinner and that sweet potato won’t mash itself. PS: In case you’re wondering... and who could blame you... my recipe contribution was for a delicious Aubergine Parmigiana. Here it is:
- Judith |
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Paul and his wife Judith are early retiree art & design lecturers and very experienced home exchangers. The couple have a beautiful French home in Olonzac, right in the middle of the wine producing area of the Minervois in Languedoc Roussillon. Their home has a lovely courtyard planted with figs, grapes, lemons, olives, bougainvillea, oleander, hibiscus and lavender, as well as herbs and tomatoes, where you can dine al fresco. |
