Goodbye To An Old Faithful, Aylesford

This casserole dish had been with us for many years and served up countless meals and dishes both savoury and sweet. The last meal ever to grace it's simple, almost austere, practicalness was a lovely mince, pea and red onion pie made by my brother. There was enough left from yesterday to have it for lunch today with creamed spinach and baked beans. Unfortunately, when I took it out from the oven I forgot to turn one of the gas rings off after I'd plated everything up. The casserole dish was sitting on top of the said gas ring (which I didn't realise was still on) and a few unattended minutes later there was an almighty cracking sound and it exploded onto the lino floor beneath. There was obviously no rescuing it so I thought I'd better take an image of it for posterity!