Yum!

I've spent a lot of time here talking about the struggles we are having. I've done that somewhat on purpose. It would be very easy to "Facebook" this experience and make it seem completely amazing all of the time since we are getting to see and do some pretty amazing things. But I wanted to have an honest record of what we are experiencing, and that means writing about the struggles as well as the cool stuff.

Tonight, I want to talk about an aspect of England we are all enjoying – the food.

Yep, we like the food here. I'd even say I love it, although Steve won't go that far. We have only eaten macaroni and cheese once, and it was from a can. It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't nearly as good as some of the other things we are eating.

First up, the sausages. There is a complete section in every grocery store dedicated to sausages. Steve cooks them up in a pan on the stove, we make a little mashed potato and veggies, and it's a dinner we all love. They even make sausages in flakey pastry rolls. We had to try two different brands of those to find ones we liked, but they make for a great breakfast!

Not only are the sausages great, but all of the meats here have been good (save one package of chicken that did not cook up well). My boys are particular fans of the meatballs. Again, we just cook them up in a pan, then simmer them in sauce and eat over pasta. Fantastic. To be fair, the pasta sauces here would not pass for pasta sauce at home. Papa Pete and Vita would be appalled. But once we are in our house, we'l be able to make our own great sauces from all of the fresh vegetables available here.

The fruits and vegetables are wonderful here. We ate an entire container of grapes today just because they tasted so good. The apples, blueberries, pears, bananas are all the same.

I think the difference is that the food here seems to be fresher. And you would expect that since most of it comes from local producers. The ice cream Reid had yesterday was made on a farm only 8 miles away from the park where we bought it. And it tasted homemade, and I dare say better than the Cadbury DairyMilk bar that I had (which is similar to a Haagen Dazs ice cream bar).

The boys have also become pretty big fans of Nutella (or as Reid calls it, Tella). They have it on bread for breakfast along with yogurt. And we've had Nutella and peanut butter sandwiches for lunch,

The only bummer about the food (and it really isn't much of a bummer) is that is does spoil quickly. But I think that's a sign that it's not chock full of preservatives. So we shop every few days, which isn't that hard since the grocery stores are quite convenient.

Now I mentioned earlier that Steve isn't in love with the food here. That's because everything is fairly bland. He ordered a burrito from the only Mexican restaurant in the country (presumably) and ordered it medium spicy. He should have gone hot, he said. But this lack of spicy hotness is probably why Jack and I like it so much. Give us a plate of buttered noodles and a good breaded chicken and we're happy!

Of course, after all of these meals, you need to have dessert. We have been having loads of fun trying out all of the different chocolates and treats. So far the boys love the Cadbury chocolate buttons best. I like all of them best. It's a good thing we're walking all over the place here so we can afford to indulge in dessert!

I think we're looking forward to having a fully stocked kitchen so we can really explore the food London has to offer.