Solstice Feast

Sitting down to brainstorm for my editorial on the top meals I've experienced in recent memory, I realized that I should have posted some time ago on the amazing solstice dinner we enjoyed in December. Our precedent was a solstice dinner we enjoyed at our friends Larry and Pat's house in 2006. The general idea is that we defy the shortest night of the year by having a celebration full of light and summer food, expressing the hopeful conviction that the sun will return. And indeed, the very next day is just a little bit lighter...

I and our friends Jeff and Julie planned a whole evening that included, in addition to ourselves and Rob, five other friends from the Three Rivers community. After enjoying wine, conversation and homemade bread in a separate room of the house while the food preparation was being finished, our guests were guided into the candlelit dining room to enjoy four of the five courses for the evening. Jeff gave a welcome and introduced a desire that throughout the evening, anyone who wished to could light candles of remembrance. Then we started presenting the food, each course (except one) accompanied by one of Jeff's homemade wines.

• Course 1: Larry and Pat's home-canned dilly green beans paired with a cold tomato salad with balsamic vinegar, fresh basil and bleu cheese, apple wine


• Course 2: Spinach salad with toasted walnuts, pears roasted and marinated in riesling, and orange-infused olive oil, lavender wine


• Course 3: Quinoa stuffed peppers with mushrooms, cashews, cinnamon, cumin and various colorful vegetables, homemade beer


• Course 4: Citrus platter with pineapple, grapefruit, oranges and cherries arranged to look like a sun, basil wine

After these four courses, we retired to the basement, where we danced to summertime music. Jeff and our friend Peggy have been taking dance lessons and passing on their knowledge so that the movements ranged from simple and spontaneous to structured. Finally, we closed the evening with pieces of Alexander cake accompanied by one of only three precious bottles of blackberry-gooseberry wine from this summer's winemaking adventures. The traditional Latvian cake was made by the mother of one of Jeff's piano students--small diamonds of layered cake, tart gooseberry filling and frosting arranged in a huge star shape.

Throughout the evening, people did indeed light candles--for sick friends, friends far away, significant achievements--in between the delights of tasting and storytelling. Aglow from the candlelight, aglow from the wine, breathless from the dancing and the laughter and the wonder, we passed the darkest night of the year in rebellious bliss and in wild gratitude to the Light that no darkness can ever overcome.