Happy Solstice

It's the shortest day of the year! Littletree has been waiting for the start of winter for ages.

This year we celebrated by having a dinner party. I invited some friends over and made a special feast following the Chinese tradtion of consuming "yang" foods at the winter solstice.

I made ox kidneys in a mushroom sauce, served with Purple's Arabic spiced rice and dahl with a salad.

Preparing the kidneys was an involved process, starting with making organic stock 8 hours earlier. We bought the kidneys from the local organic butcher, and I followed a recipe from the book Nourishing Traditions.

Starting with cutting the kidneys up and soaking them in lemon juice (fresh lemons from my friend's tree) while the stock was simmering in the pressure cooker. Then I browned them in organic butter, set them aside to keep warm in the oven, sauteed mushrooms and then made the sauce - stock and red wine, reduced by half, creme fraiche added and reduced again, finally the browning juices added and simmered some more.

The whole process took most of the day, but the end result was delicious! It was my first time eating kidneys, and I was surprised how good they were. Though possibly that was also due to the preparation process.

We had a great evening, and enjoyed a bottle of "Bulls Blood" wine with it.

The next morning the local market was cancelled due to rain, so we all went down to the cafe to hang out and it turned into a spontaneous jam with a bunch of my friends.

Here's a video I made of the jam:

I had a fantastic Solstice, and ended up feeling empowered and gorgeous :)