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SUNDAY SPECTATOR
April 2, 2006
Lenten fare
Fear not, gentle reader, this will not be another of my religious columns. Instead I have chosen a culinary topic: the idea of fast and abstinence as it progresses through the Lenten season. We have reached the fifth Sunday, with Easter a fortnight away. It is now or never to begin taking the discipline seriously.I am sometimes astounded by the lengths people will go -- women especially, but also some “modern” men -- to shed weight, or avoid putting it on. And by how it becomes the equivalent for them of a moral mission, such that when they slip and eat a cake, they whip themselves like Perugians of old. I think their purpose must be what George Jonas has called the modern mania to produce an attractive corpse. Let me remember Véronique of Alsace (changing name and provenance in case she’s still among the living) -- a tall, slender, beautiful girl who, thanks partly to careful grooming in a finishing school, had something of the flavour of ice, made from distilled water. She said, usually, little in French, less in English, but that little always perfectly grammatical, and wonderfully detached. Escort her through the Louvre, however, and she could save you the price of an audio-guide, for her mind had been stocked with an extraordinary quantity of trite remarks about the great paintings. I have taken you to Paris, in the summer of 1973. I’m sorry to disappoint the reader who’d prefer a more current scandal. Véronique introduced me to her friends as “my English boy”. I tried to confess my Canadian parentage, but she dismissed my efforts, assuring me that she could “never wish to be seen with an American”. When I tried to distinguish between Canada and USA, she denied the very existence of my country. “Please! stop trying to pretend you come from some imaginary place.” Apparently, she’d been taught in school that “Canada” was a purely geographical expression, unworthy of anthropological inquiry. The reader will guess it was a short-lived “relationship”, brought definitively to a close by some awkward remark of mine, expressing pride in a country that had “twice liberated France”. It had to end: we had nothing in common beyond our shared admiration for Véronique’s beauty. But before it ended, I was given a priceless insight into the dietary practices in French finishing schools. That is where young ladies are (or more likely, were) taught the twin arts of cooking, and not eating. From the simplest of ingredients Véronique could concoct the most elaborate and exciting dishes, and then enjoy them only with her eyes. True, she would pick politely at a few dainty pieces, but only to taste. To my plea, “You must eat, or else you will die,” she replied that she was quite healthy. She was, too: slender but muscular, taking nutrition from I know not where. I thought, though I was not yet a Christian: “What a waste of a fine nun!” Now, I suddenly recall an exception to her rule of refusing to acknowledge my origins. It happened when I persistently offered to help, in a kitchen where -- having just pressed dough, cracked eggs, and pitted cherries for a tarte -- and having jockeyed an array of molten pots and pans -- while slicing and paring colourful leaves and vegetables -- she ruthlessly slew a blushing young trout, and skilfully disembowelled it through the tiniest of openings. Having ignored my first couple of offers, she interrupted a third with, “Please! your contribution will be to enjoy the fish. Do you think a Canadian could rise to that?” The fifth Sunday in Lent has been called “Passion” by the English for the last few centuries, but “Care” or “Carle” or “Carling” before that. This name gave honour to the “dole of soft funereal beans” going back to Roman times, which evolved in one direction into mushy peas, but in another into the parched peas of the traditional carlin dish, buttered and discreetly sauced with rum. In mediaeval inns, it was fried in big brass pans, and served to hungry pilgrims. I imagine the beautiful Véronique in mediaeval costume, restraining herself from indulging in such fare. Such ideas as penance and sacrifice are hardly gone from Western society, will hardly ever go. Only the idea of obedience has dissolved, and especially, obedience to custom. My exact contemporary, I could see in Véronique all the ingredients of a pious person. The only thing missing from her life was purpose. * P.S. several readers, including my own mother, have commented on the column above, to the effect that it made no sense to them whatever. Ah well: I thought it one of my better effusions. Though I own, I tried to make five related points, subtly; instead of the usual one point, overtly. But if senseless it is, may I protest against the tyranny of reason? Why must every column make sense? Shouldn't there be a few senseless ones, to provide some shadowing and relief? David Warren
© Ottawa Citizen
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