Sir Thomas Beecham conducts Messiah!

There are many recordings of Messiah by Georg Friedrich Haendel,  a man who spoke little English being German serving a British King George II who disliked the English and England, spoke next to no English being the Prince of Hannover. They probably spoke German to each other, though the King had learned French as a first language.

 King George II (1683-1760)

Georg Friedrich Haendel (1685-1759)

Sir Thomas gives us a rendition of the Messiah unlike any other, in my opinion the best one you can hear.
Unless our friend and music expert David N. can point me to a better rendition, will see what he has to say.

The recording in question is from 1959 with Jennifer Vyvyan, Soprano, Monica Sinclair, Mezzo-Soprano, the great Canadian Tenor John Vickers and equally great Bass, Giorgio Tozzi. Beecham gave this recording a tempo and he feels the words of the text which he manages to translate into a
dynamic recording.

I love hearing this recording while we are decorating the Christmas tree.

Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961)

Phase one is polishing all the Christmas Tree balls, we have 30 of them and then we also have to polish the medallions of various seasonal flowers. Then put up the tree and select the ornaments to go on, there is quite the collection all very different and from various parts of the world we have visited.

What is terribly nice is that each ball has the word Christmas and the year and it always brings back memories of where we were on that year starting with 1979 in Ottawa, 1986 Mexico City, 1989 Cairo, 1993 Chicago, 1999 Warsaw, 2007 Rome.

This year the tree went up on 8 December the Immaculate Conception on the Catholic Calendar, a great spectacle we attended each year in Rome at Piazza di Spagna where the column to the Virgin stands, a column taken from a temple from antiquity and the statue itself is Venus. The Pope comes from the Vatican crosses the City in a great parade escorted by the Carabinieri and all the congregations gather in the Piazza in their various uniforms and banners. The clue of the spectacle is when the Rome Firemen (Vigili) get into their cherry picker to hoist the great garland of flowers blessed by the Holy Father to the arms of the Venus turned Virgin and Mother of God.

The monument is in front of the Royal Embassy of Spain to the Holy See on the Piazza and the Ambassador of His Most Catholic Majesty the King of Spain waives from the balcony.

We have also decided this year that for Christmas day we will go to the Café at the National Arts Centre, they have a very nice set menu. Christmas Eve will be quiet at home and have a nice dinner with our Xmas Dachshunds.

Here are some pictures.

This year Will decided to put up this paper cut model of St-Nick. We got this in Dresden or Munich many years ago but never used it, very traditional and European. I cannot remember being in Dresden for the Christmas Market, the one in Munich is fantastic.

our Nutcracker from East Germany c.1979, they do not make ones like this anymore.

The tree is up now remains to decorate it.

Here are some traditional Austrian lead decoration hand painted, a decorated tree and St-Nick on his horse made by the Wilhelm Schweizer company.

More of the W. Schweizer company work, very typical of what you see in Austria and Bavaria at Christmas time.

A fraction of what has to be polished before it is put up on the tree. Neiman Marcus still sells them.

Christmas 1979 always put at the top of the tree.

A Winter Bouquet for Will's Birthday, the white flowers are called Nerine, there is some Heather and Boronia.

A simple recipe for now

I receive daily messages from Canadian Living Magazine, they have all kinds of ideas about cooking, living, health, decorating, etc... I also get messages from Gourmet magazine, remember Gourmet years ago with the impossible recipes. I say impossible because I had to shop for the ingredients so the great one could cook marvellous dishes to dazzle our guests, and he did, not to mention that he also sang and told jokes, ah, the Irish, so talented, that is why I married him.

The magazine is no longer printed but now exist in the internet format. This recipe first appeared in December of 2008. A simple dish recipe which I tried out today. It is quite easy to do, in fact they suggest you put it together and throw it in the oven and go shower, when you are done the dish is ready. It is also delicious and has a classy European look about it, if you read the ingredients.

I do not make pastry and have no idea how to make pastry, but thanks to modern shopping, I bought puff pastry frozen and simply thaw it for an hour. Got my dish out and put all the ingredients together, simple really you only need an onion or two, prosciutto, one potato and some eggs. We all have those ingredients in our Emergency Shelf, right?

Here is the recipe for Egg, Potato and Prosciutto Pie.

1 package of frozen Puff Pastry, thawed.
2 medium onions, finely chopped (2 cups)
1.5 table spoons of good olive oil
5 oz of thinly sliced Prosciutto
1 large potato (10 oz weight)
6 large eggs

Put in a baking sheet in middle of oven and preheat at 375 F or 190 C.

Roll out 12 inch dough into a square dish, the dough should drape on the edges.
Stir in a bowl finely chopped onions and olive oil, add black pepper to taste. and then spread evenly
on the dough in the pan.
Top with Prosciutto.
Peeled potato must be sliced thin, then arrange as one layer over the prosciutto, covering it all.
Crack eggs on top of potatoes, arranging gently the yokes so they do not touch one another.
Season eggs with black pepper to taste.
Then cover it all with remaining pastry, crimp the edge. Cut several slits
Bake for 50 to 60 minutes until pastry is golden brown and puffed.

You may want to let it cool for 5 minutes before serving.
Will feed 4 adults.

Egg, Potato, Prosciutto Pie

This being the ''Season'' our little Dachshunds also get special dinner treats, tonight we had Venison and some beef in egg yoke all cooked up. They being Wire Hair Dachshunds they are hunting hounds, this is their main function in Italy where they come from. The smell of the Venison gave a glow to their eyes a bit like Count Dracula gets when he smells blood. Obviously the food of their ancestors the giant Dashchunds of Europe.

Here is our little Nicholas at dinner.

This being the eve before Christmas Eve here is a little music with Teddy Tahu Rhodes. Beautiful voice, clear pronunciation, which is a must for Georg Fredrich Handel's Oratorio The Messiah, originally an Easter offering. This passage, The Trumpets shall sound, more an Easter piece than a Christmas piece given the topic of Resurrection. My favourite of the Messiah. Strange how it now is so closely associated with Christmas.