It is a warm, barmy evening and we have tables out on the deck enjoying the evening air - all in stark contrast to the torrential downpour of last nite.
All tables are in, and orders are underway, and the booking that I had thought was going to be an old chef boyfriend who I haven't caught up with in awhile, turned out to be someone else, so I have come home to my desk and a few jobs that I wanted to get done, now I don't have to check out how he is!

Chris and Ann French were in for dinner tonite- they are extremely good customers who have become personal friends over the many years that they have been coming to the restaurant. Both have a great passion for food and cooking, and Chris sends me many pointers to areas where he thinks my culinary education may be lacking. Internet recipes flow thru on a regular basis!

They very much represent the type of people that the longevity of Somerset has been built on. Customers who go back a long, long way, and who have shared all sorts of ups and downs with us - and who have been unrelenting in their support. For me personally, it is quite simply what this business is all about. Nothing will ever give me quite the same satisfaction as this kind of personal connection.
And given that Chris and I spent the first few years of our acquaintance not liking each other at all, it must say something for the food becos they kept coming back, even though I thought he was extraordinarily rude for a  long time. Even today we warn new staff not to take him at face value - if he seems abrupt, don't take it personally, smile and carry on, cos under all that he really is a sweetie, and that side of him will come to the fore once he's got your measure!

Chris is also the person singularly responsible for dragging me, sometimes kicking and screaming into the 21st century with computors. He is a buff - one of those people who just loves to be challenged by a computor not doing as it aught, and who will sit down and go thru layers and layers of stuff until he finds the problem. I watch the process, kind of mesmorised, but not understanding hardly any of it - even though almost by default, along the way, I have picked up enough skills to cope most of the time. This has been a bad week - and  I had a few glitches that made for a tedious couple of days. Chris has been out and sorted things and I'm back on track with a huge sense of relief, becos the need to resort to my computor is now so basic that when it isn't working properly, it goes beyond frustating!

The conversation between the two of us as he sorts thru what the problem may be is usually reasonably robust, becos my intellectual capabilites are more often then not called into question, and I naturally feel a need to defend myself.  Rick has been known to drop in a comment from the background, calling us to order, but as rude as I may have to be to defend myself, there is no doubt that I simply wouldn't cope with what I want to do in the computer world, if I hadn't had Chris to call on.

So Chris - this blog is a sincerely meant tribute to you, for all your time and energy ( and abuse!). I really do think you are wonderful - and the contribution you make to Somerset is huge.
Many, many thanks!!I

We have lots going on in our lives with the restaurant, the cookschools, the catering that we do, and everything else that happens in the background.

A restaurant is open virtually every day and as a result things have to happen every day, so that all is ready and welcoming for the customers when they walk in the door. That means constant attention to detail - its almost impossible to ignore stuff simply becos you don't feel like attending to it at that particular time, becos everything is co-dependant and something not happening when it should always causes  major problems.

For that reason I consider our lives to be reasonably busy - none of which is meant as a complaint becos I rather like it that way. But below is a link to the latest Ballymaloe cookschool newsletter, which you should read - becos Darina's focus and busyness, makes me feel positively apathetic by comparison.

As I mentioned in the French trip blogs, we went to Ballymaloe in Cork at the end of our French trip last year - becos Darina had extended an invitation to us, and we, and some friends were very keen to have a look at the set up. Suffice to say we were blown away, both by the very special Irish hospitality, but also by the concept of the farm that is attached to the cookschool, and just what it is that they do there.

http://www.cookingisfun.ie/pages/newsletter/pdfs/Spring2008.pdf  gives you a feel for some of what goes on - but doesn't really capture the extraordinary energy and vitality of Darina. Shes an amazing lady, and one we hope to entice out to NZ again - once we get our own cookschool on a more professional footing.

One of the huge advantages of being a long established business, in a smallish town, is that we don't have to spend lots of money on advertising to push the name of the restaurant out there. It already is. And so, to stay in contact with our customers,  rather than advertising in various publications, I've been  instead writing a newsletter since the early nineties, which we send out 4 times a year, which includes the cookschool schedule for the next series, but which usually also includes some general chat about what is going on in our lives.

Most people respond to it warmly ( some don't - but you get that, and is always a useful reminder that you can't please all the people all the time!), and I decided along time ago, that it was a much more effective way of knowing that we are talking to our target market.

The mailing list has grown prodigiously over the years, and is now rather large, and many well intentioned people have told me easier, less time consuming ways that I should be doing things. But for me, the notion of good stationery, hand addressed envelopes, and individually signed letters means that we care about the people we're getting in touch with, and therefore I never resent the time imput that it takes. I  can envisage a very high percentage of the people as I write out their names on the envelopes,  and tend to loose myself in all sorts of quiet reveries as I work thru the list. We go back along way with some , and I really value that sense of connection. 

I usually do the envelope addressing over a 2 or 3 week time span, retreating to the sofa in the bar during evenings when my presence on the floor is no longer required; write the letter - which can happen quickly or extremely labouriously, depending on how the creative juices are flowing; and then sign them all once Simpson Print have worked their magic. That takes about a couple of hours, and then we compile them all, ready for the team that come in the next day,  and help to fold, put in envelopes and put stamps on. As the picture below shows, we sit around the table, drink coffee, gossip and work...

Lunch is almost always served apres, and the boxes of letters delivered to the Post shop with a smug sense of satisfaction. I've just finished off the overseas ones - and divided them into the Australia/Rest of the World piles, and I'll take them down to the Post shop tomorrow.

So this blog is to say thankyou to all those friends who've helped over the years with this compiling - the faces vary slightly from time to time, but we have a core of helpers who we appreciate enormously!! Once, Rick, I and the girls did it from whoa to go, and it was not  a happy experience - so I remain eternally grateful to all those who have donated their time over the years!

And now I'd better go back over to the restaurant and make sure theres some paper in the fax machine, becos it begins to hum with c/school applications once the letter hits peoples letterboxes.

For more years than I can remember Diane Ponzio has been coming to us to do a Sunday lunch concert. Trevor Braunias, who sold Rick his  Martin guitar was our original point of contact, and Trevor still very generously comes out every year to set up the sound system, so that Diane can stand behind her microphone and regale us with her take on life and people, while playing a beautiful Martin guitar.

She is this bright, intense ray of New York energy that fills up the room with her zest and love for humanity. She travels constantly meeting a huge array of people all around the world, and yet engages with each person she encounters, on an intensely individual level. Her songwriting speaks of the human condition and the similarities we all face, regardless of where we may live. It is not unusual to look around the room during her concert and see grown men with tears , as her words evoke an emotional response. Parents dying; the mad freneticness of our pace of life; unhealthy relationships; and the specialness that is in all of us. She covers it all ( plus her love for carbohydrates!) with a succinctness that invariably hits the point perfectly. I don't think her CDs are available in music shops, but you would be able to purchase them from her website,  dianeponzio.com

We have got to the point now where we keep the concert small, and design an easy plated lunch that is served around her breaks.  Tried other formats in the past, but have found that this seems to work the best with Diane.  Bread and spiced macadamia nuts to start, with a fennel and feta dip: roast chicken with garlic and lime, served with potatoes and proscuitto wrapt roasted pumpkin and a simple sauce made from the juices in the roasting pan. John had been experimenting with an orange and chococlate icecream in the week preceding so we decided to serve that in cones, using trays that I had had made many years ago for catering jobs, that always remind me of the trays that you used to see at the movie theatres, back when I was  a child. People loved that idea. We don't seem to eat icecream in the cone as adults with quite the same gay abandon that we observed in Italy -and not quite sure why that should be. Then some panforte and espresso. All washed down with Akarua rose becos it was a beautiful sunny day, and I love the idea of a light rose as a lunchtime wine.

Music is an amazing vehicle for communication, and Diane gives enormously of herself whenever she comes- I marvel at her ability to be so genuinely caring. And her memory for remembering people is extraordinary.

In previous years I'd put her and Lyn ( the Martin importer from Lyn McAllister music in Auckland) up at Frog Cottage, a jewel box of a house that  a wonderful local lady had made into a precious B&B. That wasn't available this year becos its on the market, but Sally decided that she would have Diane and Lyn to stay in her beautiful home instead. Why do I get the feeling that things like this happen to Diane all over the world? We all had a wonderful dinner there that night,  with a free ranging conversation that put the world to right, as you do, and came home feeling replete and totally satiated, on all levels. Its nice when that happens.

Lyn talked about a one only Johnny Cash, all black,  Martin guitar that she had in stock, and I had to nudge Rick under the table to stop him drooling. Johnny Cash gets lots of air time in the car ( now that we finally have a car that we can play CDs in),  - a fact our daughters are far from receptive too, not being able to share in their fathers enthusiasm for songs about Fulsom Prison! Rick has 3 guitars last time I counted, and I'm hoping thats going to be enough for awhile!