THE GOOD LIFE Pamela Vandyke Price
People tend to go all droopy and maudlincadenced about ends of things. I, who've cheered myself in the dark moments of wedged drinks parties, dinners that should have been consigned to the waste bin and an omelette substituted before they began, luncheons at which I've got to speak afterwards, and tastings at Which not one single wine possesses even vaguely potable characteristics, by reflecting that time, thank goodness, won't have a stop, am absolutely revivified by the prospect of beginnings.
Of gastronomic goings-on in 1971 that should never have started, I cull the following mauvaises bouches: The misplaced business about the weight of loaves of bread. Apart from the fact that I've never seen a bakery with scales in its shop (I'm told they must be there somewhere), I don't believe anybody buYs bread by poundage. If these bread crusaders did something about the guar/ of the bread, instead of allowing the bun' of the population to eat pseudo-innersod or mock roofing felt (sliced, and average 'brown' respectively), the discriminating would be catered for and the Britisli mightn't be as obsessed with the slugginly ness of their bowels as the French tlre with the incapacities of their livers. The folie de garniture that sign'tle gourmet cooking' (whatever that means in the majority of colour advertisementsd and even editorial features about food an, drink. The otherwise admirable CanuPar; has recently associated itself with ' 'dinner party menu of (sic) "Mel? prawn and ham medley, Ducks WD apricot and ginger, and Lemon souffle: (sick indeed). After even reading about my acidulated taste-buds are fighting t° get out of the fruiterer. Breakfast as a business function. I den, like anything or anyone in the first cet0: of hours after I get out of bed and as are not yet an American colony, it is t! everyone's interests for me to keep In' morning misanthropy to myself. Would-be conversationalists who st81 'I don't know anything about wine, but do like Nuits St. Georges.' As there are many different sorts of Nuits St. George; as there are shippers and producers n, same, cut your cackle after the staterrien that you don't know anything about wine Clearly you don't. Dinners that are arranged for three Ct,t four married couples, and one odd man "go with" me. I bet he hates it as Trinc,, as I do — and we usually detest ea‘: /other. Why not invite just the people Y°( like and why, anyway, do husbands an wives ha`ve to go out together in these peci, missive days? One could have a le6. time and Vother would solve the sitte,i problem. Or else do as I do — never 0 the married and the unmarried.
Correspondents who write and tell Ire; wine I recommended was 'absolutely ni drinkable' when what they really mean either that they didn't like it or else lielt drunk three doubles of spirit-based 03 tails first so that it tasted of nothing. e„, Party gushers who say of course Uritui tunately they are never able to read ati, thing I write because they don't go to hairdresser/dentist/on long train neys/belong to their club any more, they do all their cooking/wine buYiP', restaurant choosing according to the Colt sels of A. B and C and what do I thill14! ' them? As there are only about six Writec on food, two on eating places and three,i wine whom I wholeheartedly respect 6,f others are, naturally, dear, sweet, friends), it's not then fair to label ' bitchy when I simply tell the truth. , Press officers of food and drink flit!, who invite me on far-flung journeys for a jolly.' I can get my jollies , myself without quitting Kensington OF you, and if I am to do their clients s°, eventually, myself, any good, I preterit work on such occasions, instead of 1)6,t surrounded by sixty-two salesmen ° their ladies, four travel writers and their .friends,' and someone whom I don't much — and who is going all out to cut my Professional throat — in my own line.
nYbody who says more to me than ood morning," when I am in the middle ?I tasting, and insists on telling me the ,aktest on their dog, their child and what ,"'eY went through in hospital/with their lover/and at somebody else's tasting. I'm there to taste. People who say their nephew/godson/ uoY friend wants to go into the wine trade and will I help, because the candidate has • academic, language, accountancy, sloess, chemical, legal or physical `Itlalifications and doesn't know (and can't establish even a reverse blanket relationship with) anyone useful. Some lieoPle, dear friends, are like poor old 0 edIPus — doomed. Either shuck them off. r,he prepared to subsidise them. h,,r1OW wonderful if none of these things 'ng over into 1972! But they will. Hower, the really good things of life — the wonderful wines (cheap and costly), the g_ astronomic delights (simple and complex) *i_rld the surprises (intelligent readers. co?iPerative colleagues) do go on as well. I thc)Pe that they plonk down more heavily in We scale than my preoccupation with oleIght, irritability with people, inability to (31,v things away and tendency to leave Party at which I am bored. Hope is a :tttle — and it is always for today as well " 'or tomorrow.
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