The War to End All Dinners

Upon the 100^th anniversary of the outbreak of World War I, we might expect a commemorative dinner hosted by Heston Blumenthal. Let’s only hope then that he doesn’t insist on doing his own research for the theme, else his cooking staff are in trouble. Here he is conceptualising:

‘I’m going to do a cut of beef – beef culottes (we’ve all heard of skirt steak, but Heston would have found a rarer cut, not quite skirt but culottes, named after the 1980s-favoured flappy shorts that looked like a skirt (the only instance of optically deluding garment)). Now I want the perfect marination with the ultimate enhancer of beef – mustard. But how best to infuse the meat? Aha! Well, I have help on hand. Here’s a letter dispatched by a Private Tommy Farrell of the Royal Fusiliers from the Western Front. In it, it says:

“To my dearest Elspeth,

Well my darling, I hope this finds you in good health…”;

Blah, blah, blah, until we reach what for me is the most interesting passage:

“… the warning went up, masks on. Poor old Sergeant Fellows couldn’t get his apparatus on in time. Bought it I’m afraid. Mustard gas…”

Mustard gas! That’s it! I submerge my culottes in a trench – much like the New Zealand Maoris do with their hangis, burying the meat underground – and waft over the mustard gas. In its gaseous form that mustard is going to penetrate the beef to the max…’ (CLICK ON 'Read more' LINK, BELOW)

From Refried Beans to Used Bog Roll

Witness this, a common scene in the Mexican cantina – a man suddenly convulses and spews his food all over the terracotta tiling.

‘Jesus! Jesus! What’s wrong?’ asks his concerned wife.

‘Que?’ asks the man.

‘What’s wrong? – ‘que pasa?’ in our language… well the Spanish language. What happened with our indigenous Aztec language?’

‘That’s another issue, Conchita. Let’s deal with this one first. Waiter? Waiter, take these beans away! They’re undercooked. Tastes like they’ve only been fried once.’

The Mexicans kicked off re-using things with their refried beans. They won’t go anywhere near them if they’ve been fried only once.

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