Saturday, June 30, 2012

Portugal- Foodstuff Photos- Part 2 of 3

Flowers and hard-cooked eggs enliven a fresh green salad.

 
Our chef, Fernanda, was truly delightful...

...a real artist, she could make even slices of bread look special!
 
She had a great sense of humor, too...

...for instance, this vegetable tart is guarded by an open-mouthed serpent! :)

 
Anna, the assistant chef, sweetly put up with the lot of us...

...running in and out of the kitchen all day for hot water.

 
Peppers, cheese and bechamel sauce baked in a lovely, natural clay dish.

 
One of Eelco's beautiful table arrangements...

...oak leaves and roses!



Whole stuffed squid with herbed rice.
 
I would be remiss, while sharing photos of the amazing food from my trip...

...not to mention the tireless women who did the bulk of the preparation and cooking each day.

As much as we must have tortured them...

...running in and through their (quite tiny) kitchen all day long...

...their smiles were constant and sincere.

Despite our inability to communicate more than a few words...

...I felt buoyed up by their enthusiastic reactions to my felted works...

...and I'm quite sure that they knew how I felt about their cooking...

...since I couldn't stop hugging them, or applauding!!! :)

Posted by Picasa

5 comments:

WonderWhyGal said...

I wonder if I should have waiting to read this post until after breakfast ;-)

Those dishes look delicious.

Rachel said...

It's hard to remain irritated with anyone as appreciative as you seem to have been - any amount of hard work becomes easy when the end result is greeted with such glee!

Heather Woollove said...

Andrea--Hahaha...you make me smile!
Rachel--They were truly lovely, kind and talented women. For them, I believe it's a vocation, not a job.

Voie de Vie said...

Look at all of those great, fresh, local ingredients they have to work with! You were indeed a lucky duck during your stay. :)

Heather Woollove said...

Denise--So lucky!! :)