The two nations with the most complex traditions of cooking (um..yes, I'm conveniently ignoring the Italians, who taught the French to cook, the Vietnamese, the Koreans, etc etc etc) met in battle today, in 1862, and the French were thwacked.
To celebrate this matching of equally ferocious culinary forces one will drink, on the tiny terrace, of course, margaritas - fresh lime juice, tequila and cointreau; inhale guacamole, and nibble at slow-roasted pig shoulder, at the last put on the first coals of spring, but now recumbent under a blanket of broiled tomatoes, onions and garlic and moistened even more with orange and lime pulp, with some terrace thyme thrown in for good measure. Not to forget dark-roasted chile peppers, raw brown sugar and startling quantities of black pepper.
A guy at the check-out counter said, looking with glittering eyes at my pig and produce, Excuse me, but have you just been watching Channel 13?? Um, no? I said...Well! he said, rather crossly, they were cooking a pork shoulder with lime, and tomatoes and onions...
The French had no business down there in 1862 any way. Yet the French Foreign Legion clings to its celebration of the 1863 (lost) battle of La Camerone. Colonialism was an evil of its own. Still. History doesn't always repeat itself. Tonight I will celebrate the battle of Saucisson. July 27, 2007. Thwacked. :-)
ReplyDeleteHa! That was no battle. That was a capitulation, :-)
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