The Seasoning

On my eightieth birthday, Jonathan gave me a notebook. Hard-backed with brown and pale yellow marbling on the cover, like chocolate in cream. 'I want you to write something for me,' said Jonathan, his dark eyes locking onto mine. 'I want you to write your story, Mam.' Peggy's story is the story of her Snowdonia village – of a community that that shares its joys and its woes across floured kitchen tables and scrubbed shop counters. Throughout Peggy's life food looms large – the lack of it, the sharing of it, the eating of it – from gingerbread to cawl, ce-cream to bara-brith. Her recipes are well-used and much appreciated, but no one is quite sure where her inspiration comes from, why she is the way she is. Not until everyone's tale is told does Peggy's story unfold... as thick, dark and sticky as treacle.