MARGINAL COMMENTS
By ANTHONY POWELL
THE subject of English cooking has been hacked about nearly as much as the food itself. There exist three main schools of thought ; the defeatists, who regard it as filthy and without hope of redemption : the nationalists, who hold that " at its best " it is excellent, if not unsurpassed : and the apologists, standing between these two extremes, who admit that there is truth in part of the first view but pin their hopes to the notable strides that have already been made towards the second. Meanwhile, the Board of Education have stepped in and announce that there is to be a nation-wide campaign to improve the standard ; and most people will agree that " at its best " is sufficiently rare to justify government intervention.
It is not necessary to travel far in France to explode the legend that any little restaurant offers a Lucullan spread for a few francs. In some French tourist centres the food can be as bad as anywhere in Europe. On the other hand, once popular resorts are abandoned, there are plenty of pleasant surprises, and there is an attitude towards the whole question of eating that it would take centuries to cultivate in Great Britain, even supposing it possible to cultivate at all.
During the Paris Exhibition previous to that now packing-up, a party of guests in one of the barge-restaurants moored along the Seine threw the head waiter into the river as a protest against the quality of the food. The Exhibition is for- gotten, but that act stays green in the hearts of gourmets.
In England such an episode would command small public sympathy. There is a debased under-current of opinion that one should suffer in silence while soggy greens and potatoes of the consistency of apples are served up.
True, there are signs of a renaissance. The newspapers are full of cooking articles. Prizes are offered for the recipes of regional dishes. But what does it all amount to ? How to put a special sort of icing on a Christmas cake ; a cheap way of making toffee : contriving a savoury out of tea-leaves and orange peel. The whole fundamental question of meat and vegetables remains untouched. The art of flavouring, when to use a little stock, when to use a little onion, might just as well not exist.
" I like all simple things," says the hero of one of Mr. Somerset Maugham's books, when asked if he can eat macaroni, " Boiled eggs, oysters and caviare, truite au bleu, grilled salmon, roast lamb (the saddle by preference), cold grouse, treacle tart and rice pudding." Perhaps Ashenden's activities might be transferred from the Secret Service to the Com- mission on Cookery, for his words seem to exemplify the spirit in which they should go to work.
In Russia several Soviet cooks have recently been executed for trying to poison the victims of their art. This should serve as a salutary warning to cooks in this country where even under democratic government there is such a thing as The Unwritten Law. When the nation has become officially trained it is doubtful whether juries will convict in cases of cook-slaying in self-defence and, even if matters do not go as far as this, there are rivers all over England to receive head waiters, and cooks too, if they show no disposition to mend their ways after ministerial encouragement.
The Board of Education cannot alter the whole basis of the cuisine anglaise but they may be able to ensure that when we order a cut off the joint and two veg., it is a well-seasoned joint and two well-cooked veg. If they manage this, their efforts will not have been in vain. But perhaps we under- estimate the powers that a modern government office can wield, backed by the forces of psychology and propaganda.
Perhaps the days of the cut off the joint and two veg. are already numbered, and slips bearing the precepts of Brillat- Savarin will be included with Income Tax demands and handed to us together with the summons for traffic obstruction.
Previous page
