Imperative cooking: culinary disasters
`And this one's the Great Bore.'
The basic problem the English and the Americans have with coffee is that they don't have enough of it. Yes, I know they are always drinking it, often out of enor- mous mugs with childish slogans or dispos- able poly-something cups, the stuff electri- cal goods come packed in. But what they are drinking is largely water. Why they should worry about having too much caf- feine I can't see. About the only problem they are likely to suffer after drinking their dishwater is continual urination. Others worry equally stupidly about not sleeping. Now even strong coffee won't stop a proper chap sleeping. If you can't sleep after a couple of strong espressos that is because you have not drunk enough wine. The rem- edy is not to drown yourself but to drink more claret.
Anyway first we need to drink more cof- fee, like, for instance, the French. A coffee- drinking family of Frogs will consume about two pounds a week. And that is all, quite correctly, consumed at breakfast and immediately after lunch and dinner; none of this wandering around offices cradling earthy mugs all morning. Next, coffee should be consumed with tiny amounts of water and made properly. That means either one of those Italian machines where (water goes below and is boiled up through finely ground coffee into a top chamber or, better still, an espresso machine. No one can accuse this column of a fondness for gadgets but some are necessary in a good kitchen and others desirable if the cash is there. This last year I have bought, for example, a new mandoline for a couple of pounds in Budapest and a fish descaler in Cadiz made by banging nails through a hairbrush-shaped piece of wood.
Espresso machines, I am afraid, cost much more. But there is now a more affordable type on the market in England called a Nespresso. It works on individual capsules of coffee which remain sealed and hence fresh until the machine breaks them when you make the coffee. Since coffee oxidises very quickly once the packet is opened, this is an advantage even over more expensive traditional espresso machines. They sell half a dozen varieties of coffee. Imperative cooks will want Roma, Capriccio or Arpeggio: the others are for girls. Another advantage is that the machine heats only the water needed for each cup and thus is ready very quickly.
The point about the Nespresso is that it is meant to be fool- or rather Philistine- proof. It even comes with small cups, which solves the quantity problem. The beans have been properly blended, roasted and ground so that even the Richardsons can't ruin the coffee. That is the maker's boast anyway. My bet is that somehow Michael will find a way to sabotage even this 'fool- proof system, if only by pouring the excel- lent coffee into a huge mug and adding a jug of luke warm-water.
Digby Anderson
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