Mum and Dad's 40th Wedding Anniversary

Mum and Dad 40yrs ago

It was mum and dad's fortieth wedding anniversary yesterday and Ruth and I decided to throw them a party. We didn't think a surprise would go down to well, so they knew about it before the day, but we tried to make it for them as simple as possible by taking on the invites, catering and drinks ourselves.

The night before the party I found some old photos from their wedding day that my mum and brought back from my grandmothers house. It was the first time that I'd seen them and they were great to have a look through.

Mum, Dad, Ruth, Andrew, Becks and I

We were incredibly lucky with the weather having the first decent day of sunshine for the year and were able to have most of the party outside in the garden.

I masterminded most of the cooking and decided to go for an Ottolenghi inspired menu that was going to be easy to put together for a large number of people and would allow most of the work to be done in advance. Basically I was aiming for some Mediterranean flavours with a few eastern spices thrown in.

The centre piece was a Nigella recipe of slow cooked shoulder of lamb with pomegranate. The pomegranate providing ruby jewels fitting for the day. Accompanying the lamb were three salads. A rice salad with chickpeas, currants and herbs, a winter couscous and fresh slaw. The food worked as well as I hoped, both in terms of taste and ease of preparation. The only mistake I made was in the quantities, producing nearly twice as much of the salads than we actually needed.

Those who attended the wedding 40yrs ago as well

For dessert we decided to bake a number of cakes. Ruth baked two of them and I made a Hummingbird Cake. I never usually bother to ice my cakes, but decided that as it was a special occasion I'd give it a go. It looks pretty good in the photo below, but when you look closely it was a long way from perfect. We didn't over cater on the cakes, with all three being eaten and most people having seconds.

After lunch we'd asked dad's best man on the day forty years ago, Andrew, to propose a toast.

The party went on well into the afternoon with lots of people staying on to watch the England vs. Wales rugby game in the six nations.

Group shot

Rice salad, couscous salad, slaw and pulled lamb shouder

A close up of the lamb

Dad's baking awesomeness  - sourdough round and two milk loaves

Hummingbird Cake