Last Friday, I met my friend Kate Johnson and my daughter Shannon in Portland—Maine’s largest city—for lunch. This was a big outing for me. Most of my days, and thus my lunches, are spent on Narrows Pond Road, where I live, so going out to lunch is a special treat, especially when it’s over an hour away. The occasion for this lunch was Shannon’s birthday, and Kate and I treated Shannon to a meal and gave her some presents as well.

We had lunch at David’s, which is in Monument Square. The lunches were good enough, but the desserts were outstanding. So delicious, in fact, that it would be worth stopping at David’s just for dessert and tea. We each ordered something different so that we could share, and all of the desserts were equally worth getting—chocolate raspberry torte, pecan and white chocolate torte, and crème brulèe. Being a good eater, I not only ate all the dessert I ordered—the crème brulèe—but I also helped Kate and Shannon finish theirs. What can I say? When I indulge, I indulge.

Not far from where Kate lives in New Hampshire is a Lindt factory where the chocolate is actually made, and accordingly, Kate gave Shannon several bars of chocolate. She also gave her a dessert cookbook. (I think the focus was on pie.) I gave Shannon a pair of earrings I made—with my husband, Clif’s help—that had fresh-water pearls.

Shannon wasn’t the only one who received presents. Kate brought some chocolate for me as well as some peach butter she got on recent trip to North Carolina to visit her daughter, Erin. Now, I might be a northern woman, but I have a love for peaches that borders on obsession. I get them at the grocery store as soon as they come in season, and each summer I badger my friend Judy to bring me back some peaches when she visits family in Connecticut. One of the biggest thrills in my life was when we took our eldest daughter, Dee, to Bard College in New York, and I saw peach orchards for the very first time. All those peach trees! Unfortunately, except for a few microclimates, peach trees do not grow in Maine, and as much as I love this state, there are times when I think I live a little too far north.

In fact, I was very much aware of this peach butter. When visiting her daughter, Kate had sent me an email and had told me about the peach butter. She had also mentioned how she made my mother’s biscuits to go with the peach butter, and I was so moved that I wrote about it for this blog. Therefore, I was thrilled—no, that’s not too strong a word—to be handed a little gift bag with bars of chocolate and a jar of peach butter.

As we lingered over lunch, dessert, and pots of tea, we chatted about this and that and had a wonderful afternoon. But all the while, thoughts of peach butter ran like an undercurrent in the back of my mind, and that night for supper I had poached eggs, toast with homemade bread, and, of course, peach butter—smooth, a little dark, and sweet with a slight tang of cinnamon, even though it’s not listed as one of the ingredients. It reminded me of summers long ago, when my family shopped at a little market in Waterville, a small city in central Maine. On the sidewalk in front of the market, Lee, the owner, set out mellons and peaches in wooden crates, and when it rained, their sweet smell mingled with the hot warmth of the pavement.

Summer time, summer time.