To me, food is as much as about the moment, the occasion, the location and the company as it is about the taste.
- Heston Blumenthal
Sundays are to be spent with family on the islands, whether it is staying home and having a home cooked lunch, or heading out for a beach picnic or going out for lunch at a restaurant.
This Sunday, Charles and I set off for a little cousin adventure of our own, we headed out for lunch at the Seselwa Restaurant in the Ephelia Resort found by the Port Launay beach on the west coast of Mahe.
True to its name, the Seselwa Restaurant serves up a Creole buffet and a little word of advice come here on an empty stomach because you are spoiled for choice. There was so much to choice from, all sorts of starters from palm of heart salad, pickled carrots (Charles and I could have eaten that alone), seared tuna, pickled snake gourd and pumpkin chutney to name a few.
Main courses were even better and the choices ranged from vindayes (a sort of pickled curry), to coconut milk based curries, curries, grilled meats and fish which was served with saffron rice, vegetables and ladoubes (which are root vegetables cooked in coconut milk).
By the time desserts rolled around, I had gone a little overboard and had no space for desserts! There was no stopping Charles though, he enjoyed his desserts as much as everything else (I'm still trying to figure out where this boy finds space to eat the amount of food he eats). For desserts, there was mango pudding, flan, coconut nougat, banana caramel, cassava cake and rice pudding to name a few.
Once we had paid and we were walking along to the car, we came across another tradition in Seychelles and that is a makeshift table (normally consists of a piece of plywood and a stump) surround by four men playing a game of dominoes. Naturally Charles asked to join in and well we spent quite a bit of our afternoon with our new found domino friends.
Once Charles and he's slightly intoxicated domino partner had won a quite a few games, we left on a high and headed off to one of my favourite places; Police Bay with a small detour to an Indian Supermarket to grab a few beers and off we went to watch the sun set.
All in all, it was a Sunday well spent with great company. It can be said that a photo can capture a moment perfectly or is worth a thousand words, this photo does just that:
