I think we all know the weather’s changing; that this damp summer may be a sign Britain now has a rainy season – one that apparently begins in June. But still, we must try to keep things in perspective, too. Turning to a beloved kitchen companion, Cooking for Occasions by Fay Maschler and Elizabeth Jane Howard, it’s cheering to read – in the chapter about picnics – of the sandy sandwiches the authors remember eating as girls on a beach in a gale, each of them “aubergine-coloured from a short battle with the sea”. I look out at the garden, where the slugs roam like some miniature brown army, and feel a bit better. I, too, remember the mottled legs of freezing cold childhood. At least now I can choose when – if – I wear a cagoule with a hood that makes me look like a Womble.
The feeling that I’m living in a pan with a lid on it – these grey skies! – is, however, playing havoc with my appetite. Notionally, of course, I register the culinary season. At the greengrocer, the lettuces are luxuriant and frilly. In the garden, the mint is threatening some kind of putsch (though not even it can defeat the molluscs). Everywhere I go, people tell me the strawberries are delicious this year – and who am I to disbelieve them? But my body has other ideas, sullenly insistent it’s still winter, however hard I try to trick it (I wear sunglasses at any opportunity, like some Borough Market Anna Wintour). It craves stew and pasta, and will not give up on thoughts of mashed potato. Show it some poached salmon, a few slices of cucumber or a little pile of broad beans, and it feels, not deprived exactly, but slightly put out that none of these things may easily be served on toast, with butter.
