Just as well we had decided yesterday morning to get out early before the rain began. It hasn't since stopped, a day and a half later. At that time yesterday morning there was still snow left on the ground, on rooftops and throughout the ravine. Now there is nothing left. And a Christmas Day without snow is just simply unCanadian. So much for Ottawa's reputation as representing the third snowiest, coldest capital in the world.

Toronto, on the other hand, and much of southern Ontario, is uncharacteristically colder this day than eastern Ontario. And they've more snow than I would warrant they really want to have. When we came downstairs this morning for breakfast a glance out the front door informed us unequivocally that this would not be an outdoor day for Jackie and Jillie, much less for us. 

It was raining, heavily, but more than that, the atmosphere was in deep fog. Actually, fog is beautiful to look at, but at this time of year if fog is to appear it's usually an ice fog that leaves a coating of ice on trees as it withdraws which can be exquisitely lovely to behold. Instead, as it dissipated, more rain fell, more heavily.

Jackie and Jillie prefer indoor days when this kind of weather presents. They snooze and they play about, challenging one another to zip about from one end of the house to the other. Because there are two of them, small siblings, they have company in their misery, only they don't think they're miserable as long as they can anticipate meals on time. (Jackie just came over as I was writing this to remind me I had forgotten their afternoon cauliflower treat.)

 My husband helped me clean up the kitchen, drying the breakfast dishes, then he did the Friday morning quick vacuuming, and headed downstairs to his workshop. He's likely making a birthday card for me for my birthday next week, but ostensibly he's working on  his glass windows. We had yesterday or the day before discussed what he'd like to have for dinner today. Turkey was out since we had it on Monday.

First, he reminisced about strudel, that I haven't made one in quite awhile, and I haven't. So I decided that we'd have strudel for dessert for this evening. When I was a child I used to watch my mother's older sister in her kitchen when I had the opportunity. I was fascinated by her so very obvious efficient comfort in a kitchen with her voluminous pantry never short of ingredients, preparing all manner of exotic meals and scrumptious desserts. Viennese-style strudel was one of her many specialties.

 It also occurred to my husband that we haven't had a tortierre yet this winter. That's a traditional French-Canadian meat pie that is usually served on Christmas Eve in French homes. I wondered if that wouldn't be too much in the way of pastry, since it's a pie and requires a top and a bottom pastry crust, and the strudel too is a rolled pasty. My husband waved away my doubts and I decided to proceed.

First the dough for the strudel which has to rest for an hour after it's been kneaded into a soft ball. I cubed apples, cut up glace cherries, added raisins and pecans, cinnamon, brown sugar, butter and graham crumbs for the filling, then rolled out the strudel pastry. And rolled and rolled, though I could have rolled forever and made the resulting casing twice the size and consequently thinner. As it was it was semi-transparent, so I filled it, rolled it and baked it.

I've prepared the filling for the meat pie, which means I only have to make the pastry dough to assemble the pie and bake it just before dinner. We might as well please our gustatory aesthetic on such days, and forget the gloom outside. And hope that by tomorrow the rain will finally come to an end, freeing us up for a fresh-air round through the forest trails in the ravine. And maybe even hope for a snowy day.