Summer foods and Sunday teas

During this spell of good weather in early June, my mind goes back to those days when Sunday roasts and afternoon teas were much part of the weekly routine as strawberries and cream on a sun tanned day in July whilst watching Wimbledon. The family meal of the week was a much anticipated event for me as a young teenager, I was, after all, an unrepentant glutton in those days, the days when I welcomed mayonnaise into my regimen and realised the significance of prunes in a healthy typed diet. In the summer months it was , of course, much hotter and therefore less need for stuffing my face with carbohydrates of every description, but the one thing I do remember was the inordinate supply of quiches and pastries, the start of my rather unhealthy desire for such foods and then buffet food came into the picture and the varying different meats and cold cuts of so many unusual products became a fascination for me. No wonder in later years my middle aged spread became more middle aged than I had hoped for or expected. It taught me one thing though, that having some discipline even with something as great as food promoted a better lifestyle and more ability to become immune to less frightening illnesses and complaints. It was a sobering thought, and one that I could identify with, much later on in my life.
     You only realise how deadly food can be when you see what people put in their mouths regularly. It also made me realise in a strange way that eating plenty of yummy buffet food in the summer months can be as deadly as eating far too many fish and chips, kebabs and takeaway foods to wile away the winter months in front of a box!! Strange how at the time, we never think in those terms, only to regret it later in our lives when we pay for our profligacy and stupidity in a much greater way from a health point of view.