The delicious New Year lunch my brother made

I love the Christmas and New Year season in New Zealand. Our family go to each others houses to enjoy celebratory get togethers and share delicious meals. My brothers and sister are amazing cooks and I love good food....what could be a better combination!

Our Christmas celebrations started at home with my parents. Christmas Day was spent with my younger brother and his fiancee and my little nephew. Then a few days later my sister held a lunch at her house for my nephew's 3rd birthday. (I will show some photos in another post).

For Christmas lunch my younger brother made a mouth-watering meal. The entree he made included little hors d'oeuvres, BBQ'd king prawns (both garlic and chilli), Gravad lax coated with dill and some more fish platters. Then for the main course he made a glazed roast ham, studded with cloves, plus barbequed pork belly. This was served with a yummy red cabbage dish and the tiniest Brussels sprouts I have ever seen, cooked with cream and pancetta.

After lunch we gathered round to share presents. My little 3 year old nephew had a great time and delighted in telling me that he saw Santa's reindeer in the night. My brother had jingled some bells outside and told him that the reindeer were there, but that Santa couldn't deliver his presents until he was asleep!

Yesterday we went to my older brother and his wife's house for lunch to celebrate the New Year...

When we arrived my brother was completing the final preparations for lunch in his beautiful Victorian style kitchen. I interrupted him and asked if he minded me taking photos for my new blog. He couldn't understand why on earth I would want to do a blog and put photos of food on it lol...he doesn't know what fun he is missing out on!

So I took all the covers off the plates, arranged things slightly to be a little more photogenic. Trying to do it without him noticing, and started clicking away hehe. I had a great time. I ignored his perplexed stares lol.

In the first photo you can see the focaccia bread that my brother made. He used a bread maker to prepare the dough and then baked it in the oven. It was sprinkled with sea salt...yuuum! I will have to give this a try with our breadmaker.

The second photo, above, shows his aubergine and feta cheese tart.

Click, click, click went my camera!

We were treated to such a variety of foods accompanied with pickles, gherkins, garlic, olives and sauces.

Gravad lax which he made from fresh salmon. I had a couple of servings of this!

A lovely selection of cold sliced meats (one very spicy hot) and a Tunisian tagine.

He also made sauteed asparagus, a Spanish rice salad, Turkish bean salad, and...

...a pork terrine. So much tasty food!

We helped ourselves, filling our plates up in the kitchen. Then ate sitting around the table in his pretty dining room.

It was such a lovely sunny day that after lunch we sat out on the veranda with our drinks to chat. The men decided to have a game of Petanque on the lawn and had a great time. Dad, who has never joined in any sport, had a great time and had a big grin on his face :) I must get our Petanque set out and brush the cobwebs off. Maybe dad will join me in playing.

I also took a few photos more of my brothers house and garden and their new foal that was born at the beginning of December...more things to post about :)

I hope that you had a great time bringing the New Year in too! xxx