There’s a file that sits on my computer
desktop labeled “Psycho-gourmet Use?” – a cabinet, or perhaps larder, of curiosities,
and the contents stay there for some time until I eventually use them in the
blog or trash them. These are generally
not very serious things about food, sensuality and obsession, rather they’re
the kind of flotsam and jetsam that float around the internet and I scoop them
up for my own, and possibly other people’s amusement. And so being the start of the new year I
decided to clear out the file. Much has
been trashed but here’s what remains.
The Psycho-gourmet is a (slightly grudging) fan of Lindsay Lohan. Here she is
eating, or at least pretending to eat, a slice of watermelon:
And here’s Jane Fonda posing with, though
not even pretending to eat, a potato:
And here is a woman posing beside
allegedly the world’s largest cheese, and who could possibly eat a cheese that
size? Though I’d be prepared to make a
start:
Sun Ra the Afro-futurist composer and
keyboard player (and much more besides) has never has never been a completely
open book to me, and I don’t know anything at all about his eating habits –
except that George Clinton once said, “Yeah, Sun Ra’s out to lunch ... same
place I eat.”
But if he ever got an urge for canned mushrooms, well he’d probably
go for this brand wouldn’t he?
Right at the end of 2015 I found myself
reading about David Hume – he of Treatise
on Human Nature fame (there’s a new biography) – and again Hume is not a
open book, but I do know that he did his great work at an early age and devoted
much of his later life to food and eating – he was especially proud of his
mutton and port recipe.
Hume was
described by a contemporary as: “broad and fat, his mouth wide, and without any
other expression than that of imbecility…the corpulence of his whole person was
far better fitted to communicate the idea of a turtle-eating alderman than of a
refined philosopher.” For him, turtles:
Then Frank and
Bing in High Society – which was on TV
over the holidays – blue curacao and cherry brandy – drinking champagne, and singing the lyrics of Cole Porter:
Porter, I
learned recently, was the inspiration for the Seapea cocktail (“seapea” as in
C.P.), sometimes known as the Seapea Fizz.
It was invented by Frank Meier, author of The
Artistry of Mixing Drinks - “the juice of one half lemon, glass of
sweetened Anis ‘Pernod fils’; shake well, strain into fizz glass, add Schweppes
soda water or syphon and serve.”
Cole Porter also, improbably, hilariously,
appeared in ads for Rheingold beer.
Swellegant, elegant indeed.
Again, perfect.
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