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How To Make Grazing Platters

Christmas entertaining needs to be easy and relaxing for everyone, so I like to make Grazing Platters, also known as Grazing Plates, with a variety of tidbits to appeal to all tastes. Sometimes I use a wooden board but recently I have been using platters, which are smaller and allow me to place them at regular intervals along the table, so everyone can reach easily.

I select at least three cheeses, a blue vein, a Camembert and a sharp cheddar plus a selection of crackers. Then some cold meats, such as ham off the bone, salami, spicy sausage and pastrami. I roll up or fold the meats into quarters. Next, some grapes cut into small bunches and strawberries, a separate bowl of mixed olives, plates of dips with carrots, celery and crackers and  a few bowls of cherry tomatoes, cashews and pretzels or potato chips. I put bread sticks in tall mugs to add some height, along with glasses and sometimes flowers. You can add artichoke hearts which taste lovely but make the platter messy! This feast was for my husband’s bookclub and they needed room for books and their notes so I set the platters down the middle of the table on woven placemats with matching coasters.

Set the table with dinner plates, napkins and forks, as everything should be bite sized, easy to pick up and easy to eat. Put out serving tongs and spoons. Add salt and pepper, plus a jug or two of cold water, then water and wine glasses and you can sit down and enjoy the company, too.

FELT CASES

I like my handbag to be organized with things in pockets, slots or zippered compartments.  The mirror did have a little fabric cover but it is long gone and the emery boards were in a fold of cardboard and annoyingly, kept sliding out. I needed replacement covers.

I made the length of felt some time ago. I embedded the silk threads into it to add interest. It was intended to be a scarf but as pretty as it was, it was too hot for me!

So I cut a folded rectangle just longer than the emery boards and another rectangle, just bigger than my closed mirror case. I pinned each piece together and using embroidery floss, blanket stitched the pieces to make two covers.

Using pink card I cut a narrower, folded rectangle to make a pull out lining for the emery board cover. I cut out a thumb pull, slid the folded pink card into the cover and it was done! I lined the emery board cover with card to stop them from catching or tearing the felt. Just pull the pink card up a little and the boards come out smoothly.

So now these two covers are in a side pocket in my handbag. I am glad they have the silk threads in bright colours as the inside of my bag is black and gloomy, but I can see and easily find these in their pockets.

Quick, easy and effective.

READING

The latest Ann Cleeves thriller introduces a new character, Detective Inspector Matthew Venn, in a series called Two Rivers. This book, published in 2019, is set in North Devon where the rivers Taw and Torridge converge and run into the sea. This is a typical Ann Cleeves murder story with complex twists and turns.

If you enjoyed the Shetland and Vera Stanhope series, you’ll enjoy this new book, too. Apparently, the film rights have already been secured for this story. It was a good read and I finished it in two long sessions.

Are you an Elena Ferrante fan? Her books were very popular in recent years and I’ve read them all. They have been made into a HBO series, too. This book is different. Ferrante, a pseudonym, was approached by The Guardian to write a weekly column for their paper. This book is the collection of her columns from January 2018 until January 2019, arranged in chronological order.

I loved the Neopolitan Novels, for which she is most famous and eagerly began this collection. Her description of how she approached writing the 52 columns was interesting, but her nervy, anxious state of mind and resulting edgy, uncomfortable writing eventually exhausted me and I gave up at the last week of April. Her internal tension is reflected in her books but amplified in her columns. And the final comment is about Andrea Ucini’s whimsical illustrations at the beginning of each column. They are delightful.

If you like peeking into lavishly decorated English houses ( the author’s father is David Hicks, the famous decorator) rambling around fabulous gardens and visiting very old houses through to the newly built, you’ll enjoy the very stylish India Hick’s “A Slice of England”. Related to the Royal family and grand daughter of Louis, Earl Mountbatten of India, she has access to amazing homes, beautiful furniture and century old crockery and cutlery and masses of decorator items.

She also details how she and her partner designed, built and decorated their new home. This is a gorgeous book, and I enjoyed the tidbits of history and fabulous houses with their treasures, although none of it really relates to my life in suburban Perth!

December the 4th is the birthdate of St Barbara, the patron saint of miners. December the 6th is MINERS DAY, recognizing the men and women who spend their days working, often underground, to provide the coal, steel and copper among other metals we demand to sustain our  way of life.

So take a look around you and acknowledge the products dependent on mining, from your phone to your transport, your pots and pans and devices. All require products dug from the Earth.

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