The Reluctant Cannibals

by The Reluctant Cannibals (mobi)

  The Reverend poured Arthur a glass of 1896 Dow port. Arthur, still distressed by the descriptions of the taste and texture of his leg from his former colleague, passed no com-ment. For a few minutes the two men sat and sipped in comfortable silence.

  ‘So what did you discover in your grand experiment?’ asked the Reverend Bloch. Arthur lifted his glass and absent-mindedly sampled the aroma of the fnest port ever

  created. The words formed in his mind and then hung suspended on his lips like the last drop from a bottle until fnally he spoke.

  ‘For all our superiority, humans cannot compare for favour with a mere pig or humble crustacean. So morals apart, one shouldn’t eat people on the grounds of sheer good taste.’

  15 George Le Strang lived to see the day that this prediction came true. In 1976 an English wine merchant by the name of Spurrier arranged a blind tasting of the best of Californian and French wines in an event that has come to be known as the Judgement of Paris. A panel of distinguished French wine experts rated an American wine the best. The French suspected foul play, but nothing was proven.

  Epilogue

  The fnal paragraph of Arthur Plantagenet’s will was never read out on that memorable February day in 1970 in the offces of Cragsworth, Cawl and Barringer. The following day, Mr Barringer personally delivered the full text of Arthur’s will to all the members of the shadow faculty of gastronomic science. Despite their obligations as executors it was some time before any of them happened to read it to the end. When Augustus Bloom came upon the document in his old age, this is what he read:

  As my fnal legacy to gastronomy I require that the executors of my will record and publish details of this great experiment. Most importantly this publication should reveal the details of how my leg was prepared from a culinary perspective and, most importantly, the verdict in relation to the question of the gastronomic attributes of humans .

  The weight of this obligation forced Dr Bloom, against his better judgement, to share his knowledge of these events with the author. Though it has taken many years for this story fnally to be told, in the publication of this book the last demands of Arthur Planta-genet are fnally fulflled. In his many years of pondering why his spirit had failed to pass over, Arthur himself had forgotten this fnal facet of his legacy. With the publication of this book, Arthur’s spirit has at last found peace. He entered the cellars on the night of that fateful dinner in the summer of 1970 but has now left the precincts of St Jerome’s College and fully passed over to the place he had briefy glimpsed during his brush with death in the closing days of the year 1969. We can all but wish to pass on with the con-fdence that Arthur Plantagenet had in the hereafter at the time of his death.

  At the express instructions of the late Dr Bloom, this manuscript was not sent for pub-lication until after the death of the last member of the shadow faculty of gastronomic science. Dr Bloom himself was survived for several years by Charles Pinker who passed away at the age of 82, sadly robbed of his faculties and memories by dementia but at last fnding complete absolution in amnesia. He had, to the surprise of many, converted to Ro-man Catholicism on his retirement, citing his personal beliefs on transubstantiation. To

  his closest confdents within the shadow faculty of gastronomic science, this came as no surprise at all.

  It is the express hope of the author that the shadow faculty of gastronomic science, regrouped in the hereafter, can now continue their culinary endeavours in peace and in the knowledge that this book will have made a small contribution to furthering the cause of gastronomy. Sadly Oxford University have yet to create a Faculty of Gastronomic Science, but a small private university of gastronomic sciences was founded in northern Italy in 2003. This is a small but momentous movement towards the goal frst set out by the man who inspired this group of Oxford men in their grand gastronomic adventures and to whom this book is dedicated, namely Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.

  Appendix

  A Brief History of the Shadow Faculty of Gastronomic Science The history of the shadow faculty of gastronomic science begins at Christmas in 1964 with George Le Strang, Professor of Modern History, who was justifably proud at having procured a truffed turkey that he generously donated for the last high table dinner of term. An act all the more magnanimous as this wasn’t any ordinary truffed turkey but the fnest Perigordian truffed turkey obtained through the contacts of Le Strang’s aristocratic French uncle. As anyone interested in the science of gastronomy knows, one can’t present a truffed turkey with a gathering of true gentlemen without the name of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin entering the conversation.

  This illustrious Frenchman wrote a slim tome entitled La Physiologie du Goût or The Physiology of Taste . Brillat-Savarin was spurred on in his literary endeavours by the be-lief that gastronomy deserved to be considered a science worthy of academic attention rather than merely a skilled kitchen craft. His book took Paris by storm when it was pub-lished anonymously at Christmas 1825, though sadly he lived barely a few weeks past its publication. After a period of intense speculation, Brillat-Savarin was identifed as the author and for a while his star shone brightly over Paris and indeed across Europe until the book quite unfairly faded from dinner table conversation.

  Under the cover of darkness on that historic night, Friday 4th December 1964, a group of Oxford dons made a frst step towards Brillat-Savarin’s dream of elevating gastronomy to the level of a true science. Mellowed by the fne turkey and spurred on by lengthy and erudite discussions of the great man and gastronomy in general, the shadow faculty of gastronomic science was born in a truffe-scented and wine-soaked haze. Though if it hadn’t been for the conscientious Reader in Criminal Law, Dr Theodore Flanagan, the new faculty might not have survived the amnesiac splendour of the after-dinner absinthe that was Professor Le Strang’s other contribution to dinner that night.

  As no-one had a defnite memory of who actually suggested founding the faculty of gastronomic science, the credit is generally given to Theodore Flanagan as he had the presence of mind to draft a constitution for the faculty. He formally inaugurated the fac-ulty with the help of the only suitable writing surface, a fne linen napkin that had been

  starched into a reasonable facsimile of parchment. The assembled founding members then enthusiastically signed Flanagan’s constitution and celebrated with a particularly fne 1919 Baron de Saint-Feux Armagnac, in scenes that the collected dons fancifully likened to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles at the end of the Great War.

  While the new faculty members slept off the excesses of the previous night, Gerard the mute senior parlour steward worked to clear away the evidence of the night’s cel-ebrations. On fnding a napkin adorned with the beautiful copperplate script of Dr Flanagan, Gerard knew this was a document of some importance. The napkin arrived in Dr Flanagan’s pigeonhole neatly tied in ribbon, freshly ironed but thankfully un-laundered. At breakfast, Flanagan took great delight in reading his magnifcent docu-ment and just faintly recalling his involvement in the founding of Oxford’s newest if unoffcial faculty. He lost no time in spreading the word to the other founding members as they surfaced over the course of the day.

  Only later did it sink in that Flanagan’s elegantly brief constitution allowed no mech-anism of electing new members. The choice of the words ‘immutable rules’ that had pleased Flanagan so much the previous night now seemed less appealing. In that turn of phrase he had frmly closed the door on correcting his minor oversight in relation to new members. So the founding members became the only possible members of the shadow faculty of gastronomic science. Poor Flanagan, needless to say, suffered mightily for his lack of legal foresight. Whereas an historian can be comfortably proud of knowing almost nothing outside his own period, Flanagan’s protestations about the differences between criminal and contract law fell on deaf ears. Despite his two doctorates and es-teemed academic reputation, poor Flanagan had to endure years of increasingly obscure jokes at his expense.

  Over the next few years the faculty blossome
d and expanded the horizons of gast-ronomic science in this small part of the world, but the path towards Brillat-Savarin’s goal was not without obstacles. Unfortunate accidents and natural causes accounted for the loss of two members of the faculty under rule six. Dr Stanley Lovell, an enthusiastic young fellow and St Jerome’s College’s frst experiment with a non-Oxbridge trained northerner, died during a demonstration of the extreme voltages creatable with a Van de Graaff generator. Although this demonstration had been done many times before and should have borne no risk, an inherited weakness of the heart was blamed for his early departure. Although tragic in its own way, this was not in reality a great loss to the fac-ulty. Having been present on the inaugural night, he had signed up for the faculty with appropriate wine-fuelled enthusiasm, even though he had never heard of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin before.

  The second loss was more keenly felt. Gordon Maxwell, as a Lecturer in Modern Languages, had the major advantage of being able to read and enjoy the full nuances of Brillat-Savarin’s text in its original tongue – French. Unplanned as it was, Maxwell passed away in a manner he would have surely approved of – in his rooms with a pot of tea, a plate of Madeleine cakes and the last volume of Proust’s mammoth La Recherche Du Temps Perdu on his motionless chest with his thumb marking his place at the last page. While admiring the fact he had died in such a ftting manner for an Oxford don, at his memorial service in the college chapel the chaplain had spoken for all the faculty members, when he expressed the sincere hope that Maxwell managed to complete that last page before expiring.

  Conrad Petersen, Professor of Biochemistry, was lost to the faculty but not this world, through rule four. His guest at the second ever dinner had inexplicably changed his plans at the last minute and by extraordinary bad luck produced a fne brace of chilled sky-larks with pickled walnut stuffng that he had prepared himself in great secrecy hoping for great acclaim. Compliments were duly paid, but as skylark had graced the table at a previous dinner, Petersen knew the consequences. A stickler for rules, he was insistent that as rule four had been breached by his guest he must leave the faculty. Appropriate protestations were made but as Petersen was a rather humourless character they acceded to his decision with gentlemanly reluctance and inner relief.

  The apparently harsh rules four and fve that had banished Petersen were later to seem highly prescient when a Japanese guest of Augustus Bloom tragically died after a slip up in the preparation of his own recipe for Fugu. This Eastern delicacy prepared from puffer fsh has the sole disadvantage that most of its internal organs, notably the liver and ovaries, are spectacularly poisonous. Indeed the whole fsh is mildly poisonous but therein lies its unique appeal. Eating the fesh gives just enough of the poison, tetro-dotoxin, to leave the tongue tingling and mildly paralysed. Even a trace of the liver is enough to paralyse everything including breathing, though the victim remains fully con-scious, with the usually unavoidable consequence of death. Rules four and fve ensured that no other members or guests of the faculty could be lost due to a puffer fsh. The combination of these tragic events and Flanagan’s constitution led to the shadow faculty of gastronomic science in its latter years being referred to as the ‘Declining Dining So-ciety’.

  Post Scriptum

  If you have read this far in the belief that these events were real or at least in the belief that this is a fctional story based on real events, then this work of fction has achieved one of its goals. For the sake of any sensitive souls alive or dead, or indeed any institution, please be reassured that these events are entirely fctional. Despite what was claimed in the epilogue, direct or allusory references to real people and places are solely a literary device to add authenticity. No offence is intended and I hope none is taken. With the exception of Arthur Plantagenet’s leg, all other gastronomic matters discussed by the characters in this book are intended to be factual. Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin did indeed write the famous tome usually referred in English as The Physiology of Taste , most wonderfully translated by Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher. This master of modern culinary prose never, to my knowledge, visited Oxford, but from reading her writings and letters I suspect she may have enjoyed it as much as her fctional alter ego. I would re-commend her writing without hesitation to all of you who have had the interest to read this book to the very end.

  On Gastronomy and the

  Origins of this book

  This novel is set in Oxford in 1969. Both the time and the place have great relevance. This was an important year for mankind as the 21st of July marked the start of humanity’s exploration of another planet when Neil Armstrong took his frst step on the moon. It is also important as on Friday the 14th March that same year, the distinguished professor of physics at Oxford, Nicholas Kurti gave a lecture titled ‘The Physicist in the Kitchen’ at the Royal Institution in London. Professor Kurti was a low temperature physicist who was a fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford. During World War II he had contributed to the Manhattan project by devising a method of purifying uranium-235. At Oxford, he dis-covered a technique for cooling objects to within a millionth of a degree of absolute zero. As well as these achievements, he was an enthusiastic and experimental cook. During his lecture, Professor Kurti cooked a chartreuse souffé while providing a live read-out of the temperature inside. Keeping up the link between gastronomy and space exploration he said: ‘I think it is a sad refection on our civilization that while we can and do meas-ure the temperature in the atmosphere of Venus we do not know what goes on inside our souffés.’

  In this historic lecture, which was shown on television later that year, Professor Kurti cre-ated a reverse baked Alaska (a frozen Florida as he called it) that was cold on the outside and hot on the inside, a feat achieved with a newfangled machine called a microwave oven. Huge and fuffy meringues were created with the aid of a device that created a low-pressure vacuum. He also demonstrated the impact of injecting pineapple juice as a ten-deriser to pork. Sadly it seemed to remove almost all texture from the meat once cooked and the famous chef Michel Roux, who had been called in to pass judgment, could only fnd one good thing to say about the professor’s roast pork: ‘but the crackling is superb’. Young as I was in 1969, I have clear memories of seeing both the moon landing and the professor’s pineapple juice injected pork on television. Both events clearly made an im-pression on me as I have now written one book on space ( Journey by Starlight ) and this one on gastronomy.

  In creating the eccentric collection of fctional gastronomes that feature in this book I have certainly drawn inspiration from Professor Kurti, but he has had a far greater infu-ence on the development of what we eat than he could ever have imagined back in 1969. While manned exploration of our solar system stalled after the Apollo missions, pro-gress in culinary matters has continued apace. Professor Kurti has certainly contributed to that process and can reasonably be claimed to have given birth to the movement that has become known as molecular gastronomy. Many years after his lecture at the Royal Institution, he teamed up with Hervé This, a French chemist who had been scientifc-ally testing many of the precepts of traditional French cooking. In 1992 they organised a workshop in Erice, Sicily on ‘Science and Gastronomy’ that brought together scient-ists and professional chefs. This meeting fully set in motion a new approach to cuisine that was initially called ‘Physical and Molecular Gastronomy’, but later simplifed to just ‘Molecular Gastronomy’. The rest of the world came to hear about this movement from the rise to international fame of chefs such as Ferran Adrià and Heston Blumenth-al. Despite following the spirit of Nicholas Kurti’s early endeavours, some of the leading proponents have tried to distance themselves from the term, ‘Molecular Gastronomy’, arguing that it makes the creative process of cooking sound overly complicated and elit-ist. Whatever name is given to our newfound love of experimental cuisine it has cer-tainly transformed our attitudes to food.

  In many ways I too feel that the term molecular gastronomy fails to accurately capture the spirit of Professor Kurti’s, or indeed
the Shadow Faculty of Gastronomic Science’s, approach to food, which is one of enthusiastic experimentation with the primary purpose of entertainment and enjoyment. The philosopher Jeremy Bentham, an historical fgure who features in this book, captures one part of this approach in his ‘principle of greatest happiness’. The other historical fgure who inspired this book and gave birth to the mod-ern concept of gastronomy was, of course, Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin. His rather curiously titled Physiology of Taste (to give it its short title) is a wonderful read. It is a strange but delightful combination of autobiography, philosophical musings, anecdotes, aphorisms and above all enthusiasm. Many of his aphorisms are now widely quoted and indeed Professor Kurti opened his lecture with one of Brillat-Savarin’s best known say-ings: ‘the discovery of a new dish does more for human happiness than the discovery of a new star’. It seems that in differing by only one letter, astronomy and gastronomy are forever going to be intertwined.

  The Physiology of Taste is also full of other wonderful details. One portion of this book that rarely gets quoted, meditation XXII, addresses the cures of obesity. Brillat-Savar-in acknowledges the usual advice that ‘anyone who wishes to reduce his weight should eat moderately, sleep but little, and exercise as much as possible 16 .’ But he then shows his keen insight into human psychology by explaining why us weak humans can never maintain such a regime. His solution is to avoid ‘everything that is starchy or foury’. He also recommended total avoidance of beer. My favourite tip, which I still fnd myself following in restaurants, is eating only the crust of the bread, more of the favour and less of the carbohydrates. So it seems a rarely acknowledged fact that Brillat-Savarin beat Robert Atkins to the low-carb diet by 150 years. Brillat-Savarin also claimed other benefts from following his regime that might still be appealing today – ‘soon as you be-gin you will fnd yourself fresher, prettier, and better in every respect’. Admittedly some of his other pronouncements might have less resonance today. He roundly claimed that ‘every thin woman wants to grow plump’, an aspiration that may have had more relev-ance in the days when consumption was rife.