Simple fare

Funny how different we are!  My husband loves these little pinwheels coated in white chocolate, or a Kitkat.  Me, I’m happy with a digestive.  I can dunk it, or eat it covered in crumbly cheese.  I really don’t mind.  The one immutable is coffee, when I first get out of bed.

Don’t you love the tiny Portuguese cups?  Ideal size for a bica, but seldom used in my home.  If we have a tradesman at the house I always hesitantly offer coffee.  Often the response is a rueful head shake.  Sometimes a polite request for water.  Leaving me in no doubt that my coffee making skills are far below par.  How do they know?  My reputation appears to have traveled.

The sturdy tray was decoupaged for me by my daughter, as a useful gift to carry my cuppa all the way up to the roof terrace.  I am a bit prone to get two thirds of the way up, a cup in one hand, plate in the other and a book or two under my arm, and trip….  Ribbon cascades of coffee down white walls… not a good look!

So what’s new in the Algarve right now?  Su started Teatime in the blogosphere to nourish and cheer us all up in gloomy times.  I’m happy to say that gradually the gloom is rolling back, here.  With caution.  Our restaurants and cafés have been open for a couple of weeks, and we are becoming more relaxed about meeting in small groups.  Masks are still mandatory in enclosed spaces.  And still no touching, though I find it hard not to lay a sympathetic hand on an arm.  Full blown hugs feel a long way off.  Cake isn’t really a consolation for that, but it’s all I can offer, for now.

Do help yourself!  I hope things are getting better in your part of the world?

102 comments

    1. They live in the cupboard, hon, and only come out if I want to impress. The Portuguese drink their coffee very strong and sweet. Just something to accompany a pastry. I prefer something longer 🤗💕

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  8. Kitkats and digestives for me, Jo. Although that cake looks good. And as for a drink, I prefer tea over coffee.
    Things feel like they’re getting better here, but not by looking at the numbers they aren’t. Still, we can only go off what we’re told, can’t we? Keeping spirits up is more important!

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    1. It’s hard to put much faith in the numbers, Tom. They can be manipulated. Nobody seems to be doing the same thing. There is a sense of blundering along in the UK. I try to stay positive… And eating cake always helps 🤣🍰💕

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  9. Perhaps Portuguese workmen are like the French. They truly didn’t take coffee breaks.and eventually I learnt not even to offer. On the other hand, at lunchtime they’d sit out the back, at a table, which they’d set properly, and get out all their food to share in a deeply civilized fashion. Also, when in France, I couldn’t bear to eat English biscuits, and even though I made marmalade for French friends, I rarely ate it there. It just didn’t seem right. So glad your restrictions are easing. I went to our local bookshop yesterday. Such a treat!

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    1. You’re right. They don’t go much for coffee breaks, Margaret, but they do like their coffee very strong and very sweet so I don’t always get it right. 🤔💕 A bookshop! Better than cake 🤣🍰💕

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  10. Yummy! And those tiny cups and the tray are lovely! So glad to hear that things are easing a little for you, it’s the same here in Germany, shops and restaurants are open but masks are also still mandatory.

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  12. RJo – a digestive with crumbled cheese! I am going to have to try that. It’s a different world right now, isn’t it? It looks like you are adjusting, and that makes me glad. Be careful up those stairs – Susan

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  13. “The one immutable is coffee, when I first get out of bed.”
    That’s a MUST for me, too. And not out of any (tiny) cup, but out of a 12-ounce mug. How much do these little cups contain? Barely enough to fill a hollow tooth, I’d say. 😀
    My morning motto: https://wp.me/p4uPk8-ux

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    1. It’s very strong, Pit, so I wouldn’t start the day with it, but a bica is good with a late morning pastry. A couple of normal sized cups are standard morning fare for me, but the cups are so pretty. 🤗💕

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  14. Pastel de nata with my small black coffee or a Portuguese cappuccino which is not as sickly as an English one bu first thing in the morning it has to be peppermint tea.

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    1. Oh no! I couldn’t manage that, Liz. Cha de menthe is low on my list, and the milk here often doesn’t agree with me, so although I love a meia de leite escura I do moderate my consumption. Unless you’re talking wine, of course. I had a very delicious pear in red wine sauce at lunchtime. Moderation from now on. 🤔🍷💕

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  15. What a lovely cheerful, hopeful post this is, and so nice to read about mundane things like coffee. Mind you, coffee for me in never mundane as I live on the stuff, but I do make a good coffee though I saw so myself. I am lucky to have a friend who has a friend who travels back and forth to Ethiopia and who brings kilos of coffee back. The coffee made for Ethiopian tastes is more to my tastes than the Ethiopian I can buy here. (am I making sense). Otherwise I try for a Swedish or Dutch coffee – any country where they drink it a lot usually has a good blend. I find most men have a very sweet tooth, women less so, although yesterday I had the munchies and couldn’t stop eating. I went through a whole packet of dark choc. Leibniz – but I think there’s only 10 in a packet so not so bad. That’s what I tell myself anyway. I’m beginning to miss my family now, the nephews and great nephews and nieces would have started arriving this month so it will be a quiet year for me – I can’t even fly off to visit them. Still, the garden is looking fabulous as I’ve been forced to work there to keep occupied. Enjoy your cuppa in those lovely cups, or a more sensible mug if that’s what you like.

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    1. Isolation is still a big factor, Mari. Yesterday I went to a ladies gathering in the afternoon. Many are single and it was an opportunity to mingle again. Foolhardy maybe but so nice to see. I can’t put my life on hold indefinitely and then die of the big C. Every day is a treasure at our time of life, and that’s how it should be. I won’t knowingly endanger anyone who needs to stay sheltered. But life is for living. Family and friends all should have been with us in these past months. I’m holding onto hope, albeit tentatively. Take care, darlin 🤗💕

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  17. I’d rather have a pasteis de nara with my coffee, please. Though that cheesecake looks yummy! Just as well I have just got back from the supermarket or I might have been tempted 😊

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  18. The tray is just gorgeous, and I love the tiny cups. I’m an espresso drinker myself. I hope that all of my blogger colleagues are safe and healthy as we emerge very slowly from this exile. I confess to a few hugs, very carefully dispensed with heads turned the other way. I think we all know we are from “out of the woods,” so that caution is still important. Nonetheless, anything even halfway “normal” seems a treasure.

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  19. Those little pinwheels look scrumptious. I am definitely in your husband’s camp. Although I do get the pleasure of dunking something into a cuppa.
    What? No pasteis de nata for breakfast?

    Mexico is at the peak of Corona, but amazingly for us, somehow our little village has not one case (yet). No doubt that will change, but for now, it is still pretty blissful. We do have this feeling though of the imminent oncoming virus as I think plans re to open up in July!! Ouch.

    Love the tray your daughter decoupaged. So pretty.

    Peta

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    1. I have pasteis de nata but rarely these days, and never for breakfast. Warm from the bakery I might just catch the scent, or I’ll have coffee with a friend and it’s the standard treat. Would you believe, I’m a simple soul and cakes aren’t essential to my wellbeing? Don’t try that line on my husband because he’ll take you by the elbow and lead you to the nearest cafe. He won’t actually touch you. It’s a kind of Pied Piper thing 🤣💕

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