Is There a Nutmeg in the House? (49 page)

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Authors: Elizabeth David,Jill Norman

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‘A bottle of cooled white wine is already in front of you,’ she begins tantalisingly, ‘and from the big table in the centre of the restaurant a waiter brings hors-d’oeuvre to keep you amused and occupied while more serious dishes are being prepared… quantities of little prawns, freshly boiled, with just the right amount of salt, and a most stimulating smell of the sea into the bargain, heaped up in a big yellow bowl; another bowl filled with green olives; good salty bread; and a positive monolith of butter, towering up from a wooden board.’

From the appeal of the bowls and the confidence she thinks anyone might place in whoever had had the taste to choose them, she moves deftly into a careful review of the dish that followed: langouste in a garlic-scented sauce of tomato and brandy. Her scholarship, enhanced by entertainingly appropriate digressions, is impeccable; her sources are cited elegantly (‘these facts are all on record and can be read in M Robert Courtine’s book,
Le Plus Doux des Péchés
’) and her clarity and wit engage even those with, as yet, no intention of surrending their tin-openers. Then, inevitably and willy-nilly, even they catch her enthusiasm as she pokes around for the origin of the dish, holding its name to the light to unravel its history; they, too, share her curiosity about the restaurant’s own version of it; and then, with interest fully piqued, their fingers will fly through the pages to find the actual recipe at the merest mention of where it might be.

Her activities broadened. In 1965 she had opened a kitchen shop in Pimlico – a model for hundreds that have followed, both here and in the United States – and by the time
Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen
(1970) and
English Bread and Yeast Cookery
(1977) were published, the scholar had taken over from the travelling journalist – as, by then, was to be expected. Elizabeth David had severed all connection with the shop by 1973, but she was still there on the day in 1970 when I dropped in to say goodbye, literally on my way to the airport. I was leaving
London to live and work in New York and I knew I would miss her.

Our meetings over the next several years were indeed few and brief, but in 1982, by which time I was living in San Francisco, she came to stay for a while. It was her first visit to California and I took her to Yosemite and the old gold-mining towns of the Sierra, where she was quick to uncover remnants of the nineteenth-century ice trade. She was enchanted by California, and returned again every year – sometimes for a month, sometimes for two – until a badly broken leg last year made travel impossible.

I had known her well in London, but it was in California that I got to know her best. We spent much time together on our own. Her daily routine was to read and write in bed in the mornings while I worked alone in a secluded office hidden behind my kitchen, but we always sat for an hour or two over a late lunch, either at home (usually little more than a slice or two of a local prosciutto, some cheese, a few
gaeta
olives and a bottle of wine) or at one of the two or three San Francisco restaurants she most liked. She appreciated the calm, the light, the views across the city’s hills and the bay – and San Francisco bread.

Though she didn’t seem much impressed by California’s home-grown cheeses, she enjoyed California wines and took a great interest in the young restaurateurs of San Francisco, for whom she had long been a cult figure. (Judy Rogers, the chef at Zuni, one of the city’s best and most popular restaurants, asked once in an interview whether her cooking style was more French than Italian, replied, after a second’s thought, that it wasn’t either really; it was Elizabeth David.) She enjoyed the enormous choice of fruits and vegetables we have on the West Coast and would ask about them often. I remember how amused she was once when we had driven down the coast to lunch at Pescadero, a fishing village between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz. It was November, very bright but chilly, and we ordered the hot pumpkin soup-of-the-day. Knowing that the farms around Half Moon Bay were well known for their pumpkins (there is a Pumpkin Festival there every year), she was curious to find out what variety of pumpkin would have been used for the soup. The waitress had no difficulty telling her. ‘Oh, that was our Halloween pumpkin,’ she said brightly and whisked busily away.

Though Elizabeth David’s reputation was bound up with the Mediterranean (‘Let’s look it up in Braudel’ was her answer to
most questions) and her favourite dishes, at least in these last few years, were Lebanese, she was just as much an enthusiast for British food. I remember it was she who first introduced me, many years ago, to an Arbroath Smokie; and the treats she most enjoyed recently were good Scotch smoked salmon and farmhouse cheddar. I spent most of last Thursday with her. It was a visit much like any other except that she couldn’t move very much. We ate a little together (‘I think there’s some caviar in the downstairs fridge,’ she said); we drank a little (‘I need a bottle of good Chablis’); and we laughed quite a lot. She was surprised that I couldn’t pick up an allusion she made to Sir Philip Sidney. ‘Look it up,’ she said, ‘I might not have got it right.’ I pulled the
Chambers Biographical
off the shelf. ‘It doesn’t help much,’ I told her. ‘There’s nothing here about a glass of water.’ We were both still wondering about Sir Philip Sidney’s glass of water when I kissed her before leaving. She knew I would be coming back to London to see her on Tuesday. ‘I’ll look it up before then,’ I promised.

Obituary published in the
Independent
, May 1992

Bibliography

A Book of Mediterranean Food

First published by John Lehmann 1950. Revised editions 1955, 1958, 1965, 1988. New introduction 1991

French Country Cooking

First published by John Lehmann 1951. Revised editions 1958, 1966

Italian Food

First published by Macdonald and Co 1954. Revised editions 1963, 1969, 1977, 1987

Summer Cooking

First published by Museum Press 1955. Revised edition 1965

French Provincial Cooking

First published by Michael Joseph Ltd 1960. Revised editions 1965, 1967, 1970

Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen

First published by Penguin Books 1970. Revised editions 1973, 1975

English Bread and Yeast Cookery

First published by Allen Lane 1977

An Omelette and a Glass of Wine

First published by Jill Norman at Robert Hale Ltd 1984

Harvest of the Cold Months

First published by Michael Joseph Ltd 1994

South Wind through the Kitchen: The Best of Elizabeth David
compiled by Jill Norman

First published by Michael Joseph Ltd 1997

Index

Acton, Eliza
Modern Cookery
xi
,
216–17
The English Bread-Book
217

Addison, Joseph
194–5

agliata
100

Alexis of Piemont
see
Ruscelli, Girolamo

ALEXIS SOYER
209

Alix, Marie,
107
Recettes
xii

almond ice cream
277

almonds and orange ice cream
278
and strawberry ice cream
278
broth, to go with chicken
115
compote of strawberries with a. milk
253
in bianco-mangiare
207
relish, with hard-boiled egg yolks
100
with walnuts
100
with cooked aubergine
64

almond sablés to serve with ices
264

Alsace-Lorraine, cooking of
120–21
,
141

anchovy and cos lettuce salad
162
in Ligurian pizza
233
in Provençal pissaladière
235

Andrews, Jack
168

Angela (cook to Priscilla Longland)
163–5

angevin salad
50

aphrodisiacs
73–4

apple caramel
243
,
245

apples and prunes for pie filling
59
in mostarda
106

apples stuffed with spiced lamb
179

apricot caramel
246

apricot ice cream
275

apricot mousse with Grand Marnier
256

Armenia, cooking of
235–6
,
258

Asher, Gerald
299

aubergine
57
,
63–4
vivanda d’aventani, with almonds
63

aubergines with garlic, olive oil, and tomatoes
75

Aubrey, John,
Brief Lives
109
,
110
,
113

bacon in brioche
185

bacon with scallops and white wine
159

Bailey, Nathaniel,
Dictionarium Domesticum
269
,
270

baked fillet of beef
173

THE BAKING OF AN ENGLISH LOAF
217

BANKETTING STUFFE
237

barley cream soup
34

barley salad
34

Barr, Ann & Paul Levy,
The Official Foodie Handbook
15–17

Bartholomew the Englishman
see
Glanville, Bartholomew de

basons
268–9

battuto
65

beans cooked in Tuscan bean jar
76
Tuscan bean soup
35

Beck, Simone & Louisette Bertholle
& Julia Child,
Mastering the Art of French Cooking
118

beef broth
28
extract
see
Liebig’s Extract of
Beef fillet, baked, with tomato fondue
173
minced, in ‘ragu bolognese’
139

Beeton, Isabella Mary,
Book of Household Management
23–4
,
217

beet shoots: minestra with sorrel, borage and fennel shoots
62

THE BESPRINKLING OF A ROSEMARY BRANCH
84

bianco-mangiare
207

black grapes – a relish
101

Blond, Anthony,
The Book Book
14

bohémienne
57

Bolland, Jean
151

bolo de mel
293

boned loin of lamb baked in a crust
177

Boni, Ada
La Cucina Romana
260
Talismano della Felicita
106

borage: minestra with sorrel, fennel shoots and beet shoots
62

Borella,
The Court and Country Confectioner
255–6

borlotti beans cooked in Tuscan bean jar
75
in Tuscan bean soup
35

bouillon cubes
see
stock cubes

Boulestin, Marcel
35
,
53
,
164
Savouries and hors-d’oeuvre
119

Bovril
21
,
22
,
23

bread baking an English loaf
223
brown bread ice cream
283
cheese and dill sticks
229
equipment necessary for making bread
222–3
a loaf made extra slow
226
a quickly made loaf
225
rye bread ice cream
284
salted and spiced strips
227