I’m home for spring break and I’m preparing an Italian feast for my friends. Spaghetti and meatballs made from scratch, garlic cheese bread not made from scratch since I forgot my bread pans, and a chocolate cherry cake roll thingy for dessert.
Chicken meatballs with onions sauteeing in a pot..gettin' ready for their sauce
Sauce all herbed up and ready to simmer...I don't know why the bay leaf looks like its glowing
Feast!
So its not exactly a feast more like a nice meal, and as I’m preparing it, I can’t help but think of real feasts, and of course that leads me to think about the one man who can right feasts like no other. The one man who can write about feasts and make you, as the reader, want to try everything on the menu. It’s because of him that I was so stoked to try elderberry juice in England—although I promptly spit it out I still had to try it.
That man, if you haven’t already guessed, is Brian Jacques.
Brian Jacques is probably the only author who can pull off writing two pages about food and make it okay. Yes, you may skim them, but if there is one thing I remember about the Redwall series, it was the food. It makes your mouth water and it just blows my mind with the sheer creativity of the dishes. Listen to these passages from Mossflower:
“After all, who could resist roast chestnuts served in cream and honey, or clover oatcakes dipped in hot redcurrant sauce, celery and herb cheese on acorn bread with chopped radishes, or a huge home-backed seed and sweet barley cake with mint icing, all washed down with either October ale, pear cordial, strawberry juice of good fresh milk.”
“Seafood and potato stew, that’s the skilly. It’ll put hairs on your chest like a giant sea dog. There’s plenty of pepper and sea salt in it, too. Finish it all up and show me a clean plate, then I’ll dish you up some of my own warrior’s recipe: plum and chestnut duff in cream and beechnut sauce.”
See? See? How amazing do those things sound? How does that man do it? He has to be thinking about food 24/7 to come up with such things that make, not only the characters in the books mouths water, but my mouth water as well!
And if you think those passages sound tasty, just wait until you read the abbey feasts! Abbey trifle…mmm *drool*
I did a little bit of research and there is a Redwall Cookbook . I think an investment in necessary.
Make those tofu balls and *drool*
ReplyDeleteI don't know how I missed this post...I ate this for like three days and it was unquestionable perfection. I don't remember the elderberry spitting moment...I do remember the salt and vinegar crisps that tried to kill me, h aha.
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