Our neighbour is turning 80 next year and he's decided to have a party - a fondue party! Fondue parties have strong happy memories for him - they're his favourite party food (apart from Singapore Chilli Crab - but that's another story!)

He's not been very well lately so having a party to focus on has been great for his mental and physical health. It's given him a focus, purpose and much more energy. Together we've been scouring charity shops and Trade Me for fondue pots (who knew there were so many out there) and now we're onto choosing what to put in the pots - so I've been hunting out fondue recipe books for him to browse through. Most nights he'll pop over to talk about one recipe or another - all with memories attached!

Food memories are powerful things - not just for the taste of the food itself, but for the company they brought together, the shared experiences they created, the stories of success and failure! We all have food memories and each are closely linked to who we are and where we come from.

I've just acquired a copy of Let's Eat by Tom Parker Bowles (to pop into one of our Mystery Packages - honest!) and the whole book is dotted through with his personal food memories. They're not fancy recipes but great home cooking ones, often refined and handed down through his family's generations - a great example of the power, connectivity and comfort that food brings to our souls.