Our Queen had said that she wanted Sunday, 3rd June, to be the day when we all had “the big lunch” to celebrate her Diamond Jubilee. For some reason our village is holding its Jubilee party on June 5th (nice of them to have a party for my birthday!) so that means that we decided to have our own private celebration on Sunday as the Queen requested.
I don’t profess to be a wonderful cook or flower arranger but this is my Diamond Jubilee celebration. I managed to find the original recipe for the official Coronation Lunch, Coronation Chicken, which is supposed to be served cold. Due to the British weather not behaving itself, cooler and drizzly, just like the Coronation 59 yrs ago, we decided to have it hot. Basically it is a very mild chicken curry, with mixed herbs and peas in with the rice, we also had a mixed salad with it. I was 10 at the time of the Coronation and remember going to a neighbours to watch it on their very new, tiny, black and white TV set. Of course the Coronation wasn’t until June 2nd, 1953, even though she became Queen in February 1952, so will we have all these celebrations again next year I wonder?!
For sweet, I made a pavlova in the shape of our flag, the pattern was made with strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, sitting in lashings of cream. No, we didn’t eat all the food today, plenty for tomorrow, will start the diet the day after!
I don’t usually cut flowers from the garden, but just for this occasion, I made an exception. The red colour was provided by two varieties of roses, as was the white with the addition of Hesperis matronalis. Iris, catmint and Geranium magnificum provided the blue, then just round the base is Alchemilla mollis, to provide a bit of foliage.
We thoroughly enjoyed our lunch with our glass of bubbly, hope the Queen enjoyed hers as much! Will leave you with a rather grainy photo I took of the Queen from the TV when we were watching the fantastic Jubilee River Pageant this afternoon.
Pauline, your Jubilee spread looks gorgeous. Mmmm the food looks so tasty and those flowers are beautiful. The weather is disappointingly typical for a bank holiday weekend but the flotilla still looked stunning. Enjoy the rest of the weekend and ‘Happy Birthday’ for 5th June.
Thank you WW, we did enjoy it! Thought the Queen looked rather cold by the time the pageant finished, wasn’t she amazing, standing for all that time. Hoping to go Hosta hunting for my birthday!
happy jubilee, Pauline, and happy birthday too. The food looks superb, and you have been very creative incorporating the colours of the flag in the pavlova and in the floral arrangement. I have a funny association with the Queens Jubilee. My daughter was born in a large London teaching hospital on June 6, 1977, during a similar celebration with street parties and a national holiday. What that meant for me was that there was a skeleton staff and the hospital ran out of linen and baby clothes. We had to make do with operating theatre gowns to wrap the babies in as well as for them to lie on! cheers, catmint
What amazing memories you have Catmint, of the Silver Jubilee! While watching the river pageant on TV yesterday, they interviewed new Mums that had just had their babies in a hospital overlooking the Thames, no shortage of baby clothes this time round!
Happy Birthday Pauline and thanks for sharing the celebration day. The food looked delicious and the flowers beautiful. I still make Coronation chicken for buffet lunches sometimes. I serve it cold as my recipe has mayonaise so couldn’t be hot, I imagine your recipe was different, but whatever I would have loved to have tasted some. Have a great time hosta hunting! Christina
Thanks Christina, the Coronation Chicken should have been served cold, but I tried heating up a tiny bit of the sauce, which did include a lot of mayonaise, to see if it would split, it was fine, so we had it hot as it was such a cold day! Have my list of Hostas ready for our visit to Bowden Hostas which is only about an hour away on Dartmoor.
Love the Union Jack Pavlova!!
Thanks Rachael, we both thoroughly enjoyed it with all its fruit and it was so easy to do!
Can I come to Sunday lunch at your place? 🙂 The food looks great, but the flowers stole my heart. Such a beautiful grouping.
Too late Lyn, we’ve now eaten it all, but you are welcome any time! Flowers are still looking good, wasn’t sure how long the Geranium would last as a cut flower, but it is doing ok. More rose buds have opened and the perfume from them and the hesperis when I come down in the morning is amazing.
Hi Pauline! It’s been so amusing to read this post of yours! The pavlova flag (delicious I guess) really made me fall over the chair laughing! I am so in love with England and its weird and funny things altogether! So happy Coronation Day to the Queen and a very happy birthday to you, as today’s the 5th, right? I promise I won’t calculate your age… 🙂
Feel free to calculate away Alberto, I’ve given up, not enough fingers and toes!! So glad my pavlova flag amused you, I can assure you it tasted better than it looked!
I remember being in Bermuda in 1977 during the jubilee for 25 years–quite the celebration. I wish I could come to your house for lunch.
Anytime Carolyn, you can come with Alberto!! The celebrations were really amazing, lasting 4 days this time, Queen Victoria is the only other monarch that has had a Diamond Jubilee and there probably won’t be another for quite some time to come, it was good!
What an elegant looking and delicious sounding celebration Pauline. Hope that your own special day was filled with fun and flowers 🙂
Thank you Anna, we did enjoy it all, it was an amazing four days wasn’t it.