I  love food. The only reason I endure going to the gym three times a week (OK, mostly I only make it twice. Or once. Or not at all on busy weeks) is that I can justifiably stuff my fact for 8 weeks a year when we leave Dubai and travel back for the summer. (We’ll save discussing what happens in Dubai the other 44 weeks of the year for another time…) Anyway, for me, one of the things that I really look forward to about going home is all the yummy food I’ve missed the rest of the year – stuff I just can’t get in Dubai. And as it’s just under a week until I get on a plane out of here (HOOOOOOOORAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!) I am already salivating in anticipation of a Waitrose shopping trip. Here, in no particular order, are the top 10 things I am looking forward to eating when I get home:

Fish and chips and a muddy estuary: you can’t get better than that. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

1. Chicken with skin that actually goes crispy

2. Really, really good pork sausages that go sticky in the pan

3. Mashed potatoes that don’t just consist of lumps of starch amongst a watery gloop

4. Fresh salad

5. Big ripe beef tomatoes that taste of something akin to a tomato. Served sliced with a beautiful red onion and lashings of oil & vinegar, and a french stick for dunking.

6. Fish and chips from the chippie not some posh pub grub wannabe nonsense

7. Lush wholemeal/seedy/brown sliced bread that doesn’t resemble particle board

8. Asparagus that doesn’t take a chainsaw to cut through.

9. A chinese takeout with prawn toast, seaweed, duck pancakes, crispy chilli beef and vegetable spring rolls, all of which arrive actually crispy. (Dunno what you’re all having)

10. A picnic. With booze and friends involved. And pork pies.

Ahhh, England. It’s what maxi dresses were invented for.