So, this is our third year of doing Secret Santa style gift buying for one branch of the family. We set up the web-based Christmas Wish List that first year for everyone to log in to to record gift ideas to help out their Secret Santa. The drawing of who gets to be Santa for whom has been good old scraps of paper in a Tupperware container with the 6 of us taking turns at picking a name, throwing back our own or our spouse’s name.

This year we’re extending it to include the Washington family so the names-in-a-hat has become a bit more difficult. In the end, in manner of builder renovating their own kitchen, the Mister is writing (as we speak) a program that will randomly match a Santa and a recipient from the 8 names available, avoiding spouses or names already drawn and automatically emailing the name of the person you’re playing Santa to to the Santa’s address.

We could package and sell it! International Secret Santa!

So look out family … an email will be coming your way soon with “[NAME], you are Santa for …” (open the email to reveal the name randomly drawn for you).

Another great feast last night – the busiest Sunday so far and one of the other bar regulars sat with us so we chatted to him for a while. A retired chartered accountant … but we didn’t go there!

Sunday 3

Duck rilette with radishes & tangelo dressing
Pasta primavera
Seared herbed tuna with beetroot & green garlic aioli
Spanish cream with rhubarb & strawberry compote

(Rilette was served with chef’s homemade sour dour and was just delicious, like a posh chicken sandwich; pasta was DIVINE; tuna was way to raw for my liking; Spanish cream was very delicate and the strawberry mush with rhubarb bits was a new combo but lovely even though I was absolutely stuffed after the pasta course and really shouldn’t have gone on.)

Oh, and chef was very chuffed with my little jar of Xmas fruit mince – we’d labelled it using a bit of masking tape which is what we’ve seen them do in their kitchen.

When I work in the office at the weekend I pull up the Venetian blinds to let as much light in as possible – kind of makes me feel like I’m not really at work for some reason. I’m always intrigued by how cool the reflection of our building looks in the windows of the building across the road and with the blinds open today I’m getting a really good look at it. The oldness of the bank reflected in a modern building. You can also see some of the city rising up behind our old building.