*“Who’s the Knight-Mayor?” I cried. Instead
Of answering my question,
“Well, if you don’t know THAT,” he said,
"Either you never go to bed,
Or you’ve a grand digestion!
“He goes about and sits on folk
That eat too much at night:
His duties are to pinch, and poke,
And squeeze them till they nearly choke.”
(I said “It serves them right!”)
“And folk who sup on things like these–”
He muttered, "eggs and bacon –
Lobster–and duck–and toasted cheese –
If they don’t get an awful squeeze,
I’m very much mistaken!*
Screw the indigestion part. I love the idea of a midnight snack of lobster mayonaisse, cold roast duck, and a big platter of bacon and eggs.
And many’s the long night I’ve dreamed of cheese…toasted, mostly.
I love this board. I came here to mention the chowder in Moby Dick , and there it was, along with the glory that is the Nero Wolfe Cookbook.
One more I’d mention – that glorious stew that Toad bought from the gypsy in the Wind in the Willows. Can’t find my copy, but in my memory it has every meat you could imagine in it.
In her book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou describes the many goodies available at the yearly church picnic. She talks about pans of fried chicken, mountains of potato salad with hard-boiled eggs inside and baked hams coated with pinapple slices. And of course there was the barbecued pork and chicken roasting on the spit, and perch and catfish caught in the local pond and fried on the spot.
Those were just the main dishes. There were desserts such as orange sponge cake, coconut cake with white frosting, and pound cakes loaded with butter. Just writing about it makes my hungry for all those foods familiar to my childhood.
We do, but the local law enforcement doesn’t cotton to people shooting them. And even if they did, I’m not much of a hunter. I do my hunting at Wal-Mart .
Really, Uke? Haven’t you ever had some of that delicious African/Moroccan food that typically involves lamb and cinnamon and all those spices? And what about Cincinnati style chili - you like THAT, right? You’re a foodie, I’m surprised to hear you say “Ick” to meat & spices.
Regardless, the French Canadian Tourtiere is very lightly spiced - it’s just enough to give it a bit of fragrancy. Plus, I ain’t speaking for the recipe I posted - it’s just an example I found on the Web, it’s not my great-grandmother Bolduc’s recipe. I’m pretty sure I’d have to get some sort of blood oath before I gave out that recipe. I will say the real recipe is typically made with pork and venison - at least, on the years one of the men in my family manage to get a deer.
Yummm… meat pies, I’m gonna have to make some of those pretty soon.
In his WWII memoir The Brass Ring, Bill Mauldin describes the great food he got in the French countryside. Not that it was fancy or anything, but after a few years of K rations, a crust of pumpernickel and some red wine can be pretty freakin’ delicious. He talked about swapping canned peaches for ordinary farm food, and both sides of that deal really felt like they’d come out ahead.
In Crime and Punishment, Raskolnokov is so hungry and destitute that any scrap of food he gets seems inordinately delicious. Dostoevsky’s descriptions of the humblest teas and sausages sound pretty mouth-watering in context:
Finally, in Thomas Harris’s Hannibal–No, I’m not referring to the gross-out scenes here–we finally get to see the Evil One strut his stuff as a gourmet in a couple of scenes. I particularly enjoyed the scene in Williams-Sonoma where he bought an expensive picnic basket, discarded the cheap plastic china and replaced it with some good stuff.
Where you saute diced eggplant in olive oil? And then saute chopped leeks and carrots, then add ground lamb with garlic and ginger and fresh chiles? And deglaze with a little water and put the eggplant back in, along with cinnamon, coriander, cumin, paprika, turmeric, cloves, lemon zest, chopped tomatoes, and yoghurt? And simmer for around a half-hour, then stir in chopped cilantro? And serve over broad noodles, garnishing with more yoghurt and some fresh mint?
Yeah, I’ve had some of that.
…I wasn’t saying “ick” to meat and spices; although I’m not crazy about cooking meat with what I consider the “sweeter” spices…cinnamon, cloves, etc…I do it sometimes. We make an ass-kick “peasant sauce” of ground beef and tomatoes with cinnamon, cumin, and oregano, a sort of faux-Greek pasta sauce.
It just doesn’t sound right to me for a meat-pie. Do you put it in yours?
Yes, I do put nutmeg and cinnamon and cloves in my Tortiere - but it’s so little that I doubt most people would notice. It’s enough to give the dish a distinctive taste, but not enough that a non-foodie would recognize the “sweet” spices. I’m guessing that if you asked most of my family (excepting, of course, the people who make the pies) if there was cinnamon in our meat pies they’d think you were smoking something.
I’m a nut for mixing sweet with savory. My favorite pizza is one I made up that involves carmelized onions, smoked chicken, and blueberries. I have a pint of fresh blackberries in my fridge, and I’ve been noodling on either a quesadilla or taco with smoked duck and an adobo-blackberry sauce. Lamb with cinnamon and cloves and all that is dreamy to me. So I guess it all depends on personal taste! Still, though, the spices in tortiere are so subtle that even my father (who detests the sweet/savory stuff - he won’t eat my pizzas!) loves it.
The Ladies’ Day luncheon scene in The Bell Jar, at least until the part where they all get food poisoning. The description of grape jelly makes me run to the fridge with a spoon.
Robert Parker’s Spenser mysteries generally have him whipping up some sort of nummy treat, or spilling some great sandwich filling on his shirt. Years ago, my dad and I asked Parker if there would ever be a Spenser cookbook. He said yeah, it may be in the works, but we never heard another word about it.
One food scene that sticks out is in a book I can’t even remember the title of. The main character is cursed by the wizard so that he is constantly hungry and constantly growing.
His first food after the curse was a gypsy camp. They had made a huge pot of stew and he proceeded to trade everything he had for it. It was described as having meat, rice and spices. I think I pictured my mom’s spanish rice.
There was a children’s book I loved years ago about some gargoyles who lived above a pizzeria. I cannot remember the name of it and I haven’t been able to find it.
But there were the most incredible descriptions of how the pizzas would just drip with gooey cheese. I always wanted pizza after I read that book!
There for awhile I was devouring the The Cat Who . . . books, and they always contain the most luscious drool-worthy meal descriptions. I did buy the cookbook for that series of books, although I haven’t had time to try any of the recipes yet.
I, too, was most disappointed with my first taste of Turkish Delight after having read about it in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. When I discovered seafoam some years later, I decided it was the true Turkish Delight, having corresponded precisely with my mental picture of the treat.
I’m another one who loves all the food descriptions in the Harry Potter books. So much so that I buy every one of the Harry Potter-connected candies. So far they’ve all been disappointing, with the sole exception of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans. Those I refuse to eat because they’re just plain disgusting, although I still relish the time I got my husband to try a handful.
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