Gillman
10-30-2007, 18:01
The English have, or had, a genius for evocative, textured writing about food and drink. I have given (multiple) examples of the former from the canon of Elizabeth David.
Here is a short but effective piece on "pastis", the licorice- and herb-flavoured French aperitif which replaced absinthe after its ban. It is from, "The Complete Book of Spirits and Liqueurs" by Cyril Ray, copyrighted in 1977:
"Pastis is not only lacking in the wicked wormwood but is only about half so strong in alcohol as the absinthe of the good-or-bad-old-days. It is sweeter, too, and so need not have the necessary water added, drop by drop, through lumps of sugar on a perforated spoon, as used to be the ceremonial practice.
All the same, it is one of the most evovative of cafe-table aperitifs, as is its Greek cousin, ouzo, the smell and taste of the one summoning up visions of the cobbled street of some Attic or Aegean-island hamlet, bleached under the blazing sky; the smell and taste of the other recalling the click-clack-click of high heels on the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, the sight and the scent of the girls in their summer frocks, and the wish that one were a fortnight younger than one really is".
(That reference to a fortnight may be cited as a classic instance of English understatement mingled with irony).
The memories associated with bourbon can be evoked just as charmingly in our land.
Will anyone here try...?
Gary
Here is a short but effective piece on "pastis", the licorice- and herb-flavoured French aperitif which replaced absinthe after its ban. It is from, "The Complete Book of Spirits and Liqueurs" by Cyril Ray, copyrighted in 1977:
"Pastis is not only lacking in the wicked wormwood but is only about half so strong in alcohol as the absinthe of the good-or-bad-old-days. It is sweeter, too, and so need not have the necessary water added, drop by drop, through lumps of sugar on a perforated spoon, as used to be the ceremonial practice.
All the same, it is one of the most evovative of cafe-table aperitifs, as is its Greek cousin, ouzo, the smell and taste of the one summoning up visions of the cobbled street of some Attic or Aegean-island hamlet, bleached under the blazing sky; the smell and taste of the other recalling the click-clack-click of high heels on the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, the sight and the scent of the girls in their summer frocks, and the wish that one were a fortnight younger than one really is".
(That reference to a fortnight may be cited as a classic instance of English understatement mingled with irony).
The memories associated with bourbon can be evoked just as charmingly in our land.
Will anyone here try...?
Gary