A fine mountebank

Forgive me if I swerve from the track for a moment.

I adore old words, even the archaic ones that are out of place in current usage, which, when they pop up, can sound like a fog horn in a love song or look like a desperate attempt at smug scholarship. When you look up their etymology sometimes there are surprises about their origins. I always enjoy the rich diversity that underlies the English language, from roots that derive from Arabia to Scandinavia and from every linguistic group in between: French to Finno-Ugric. In America there are often direct connections to our immigrant forebears. Not a lot of people see the Dutch as having enriched our vocabulary, but then they may not be yacht owners, the boss being the captain. See also frolic, Yankee, and snoop among many others. On the other hand, testamentary to our tradition of xenophobia is the long list of pejorative terms attached to the word Dutch-: treat, door, oven, prince, rub, uncle, courage and on and on.

Anyhoo, there are some old-fashioned not exactly archaic words which deserve more pointed usage today. The 16th century word mountebank is a good one found in Shakespeare's work and fits nicely into current conversation without any effort. I name no names. The descriptor blow-hard is not heard enough these days, neither is windbag for that matter. The former describes a loud braggart (from unrelated nautical origins) and the other a tediously self-extending speaker (from the term for an organ bellows). These under-appreciated terms carry the weight of time with them and are reassuring in their apt currency to describe some notorious characters at work these days. The connotations and disapproving associations ought to travel with them.

Without too much mental exertion the old word charlatan springs to mind in the rich vocabulary of scoundrels, cheats and tricksters. The modernized version is the well known snake oil salesman, who has a cure for whatever ails you, coming from the Italian or French language and mixes chatterbox tendencies with a medicinal sales pitch. A carnival barker sounds about in the same vein.

Depending on the damage inflicted, a person may be a scallywag or scalawag but that denomination is far too moderate for someone whose power is enormous and able to do great harm with so little effort, such as a few keystrokes. As a side note it is interesting that the Scalawags as a group actually had a political and practical role in the life of the South after the Civil War but that is another topic.

Recognizing the appropriate word and its origin clearly does not prevent some people from being taken in and swindled. For the victim, the admission of this fact and recognition as a “stooge” is far too painful to admit, let alone embrace. Therefore the cautious and discerning individuals can only stand to the side and cluck tongues. At least we have a long history of naming these destructive rogues who damage our faith in humanity and continually affirm the willful gullibility of some.

There. I feel better.

For a gracious tomorrow with abundant kisses,

Celeste

Pillow talk

Cheries;

Girls, let’s talk. Excuse the informality but this is simply too important not to mention. It is about pillows. The current trend is a tidal wave and beginning to crest for goodness sake. We are being swamped with them. I have actually seen bed arrangements that literally engulf more than half the space available. Stop before it is too late!

It is no less inviting to prepare a bed with two pillows per person and a nice bolster for support if needed than it is to establish a beach-head of fluffy obstructions to wade through. Where on earth do you put them all when you sleep? I hope not on the floor but I suspect as much. Spend your effort on economy in the bedroom and do it tastefully with a sleeping pillow and a nicely covered display pillow for accent. If you can, have the display pillowcase monogrammed or use very fine material to make a special presentation. Many heirloom fabrics are still available in the better linen stores. Let the hotels exaggerate the pillow-mania and reserve a signature style for your home. Please don’t make it look like a hotel. Your guests are there for you.

Then there are the sofas. Call them davenports, couches, lounges or what you will they are usually quite comfortable as they are made, usually with abundant cushioning. Use pillows as accents and not as an excuse to slouch and slump in dreadful postures. Is it any wonder that the advertisements for back pain remedies and even for surgeries are more and more commonly displayed everywhere? The modern American back muscles have been softened to a frightful degree and excessive pillofication is the culprit. Pillows are accents. Use them accordingly. They are not to hide behind or wrestle with unless you are under ten years old. Choose contrasting colors, patterns or fabrics to make your points. A fine bargello needlepoint offers a touch of refinement and plenty of support. Don’t be stampeded into over-doing it just because you see them cascading in catalogues. Remember that their purpose there is to sell you more pillows. A tsunami of pillows is an obstacle and not an accompaniment to conversation or to rest. And you really don’t have to crease them in that sort of artificial manner seen in hotel lobbies across the land.

Girls, my advice is that if you want to make a fashion statement, do it with subtlety and an artful choice of restraint. One is not impressed with piling on. It is easy to avoid this fault of common-ness. Your home ought to exemplify your personal standards in every way. Make your style stand out with an exercise of moderation when it comes to pillows, the accents that display a warm welcome and solid comfort.

As ever, Celeste

Party chatter

Some people can tell a joke at parties. I can't. I suppose that is one reason I am not a professional comedian. My daddy was a sociable funny person in his own reserved way, and he had a kind of country wit that everyone around him appreciated. He had lots of stories, some of them gathered from his legal practice either from his own cases or those of his associates. His stories were about the foibles of human nature at all levels of society, education or wealth. Lawyer stories are usually didactic and are not received as outright comic gems at parties.

Anecdotes are a joke variation which can be funny and are supposedly reality-based. We get an earful of those at many social functions throughout the year. Often the degree of pleasantry is directly proportional to the quantity of alcohol consumed. This humor quotient or ratio is practically a rule of nature. Alcohol as a social lubricant has become essential nowadays to sustain a level of jollity which current world events can easily diminish in a dull moment. Both the listener and speaker are involved in this delicate choreography of distraction. The storyteller is usually relating something that happened to him or that he witnessed, and with a hilarious fillip at the end, sends every nearby listener into paroxysms of explosive laughter. But what do you do when the effort falls flat? If you are carrying a fan you can hide behind it, rustle it vigorously and titter amiably before moving on to the next topic. Sadly, personal fans are not carried often except on certain Asian occasions.

In many cases the suspension of reality during the failed anecdote has been so complete that the shocking return to the present is met with dumb silence and shifting postures. Be prepared. During the recounting of the awful tale, let your mind wander to some clever associative remark, “My brother is just like that!” or “I've never heard of anything quite like it!” or “Where do you come up with these stories?” or “Oh well, what can you do?” Avoid putting the raconteur in an awkward position at all costs as this will only accentuate any discomfort occasioned by the defective effort. Make no reference to over consumption of beverages as this tends to broadly insult the speaker's social capabilities even though it may be an accurate observation. Make no general observations such as “Insurance sales is a racket like that” or “All car mechanics are crooked,” since one of their number in that field may be present. “Have you tried the paté?” is a reliable dodge with the specific plate (cheese board, kale salad or vichysoisse, etc.) substituted where appropriate. Everyone in the circle of hearing will be relieved that someone has taken the lead to extricate the group from awkwardness, no matter that it may seem to be an abrupt segue. I say any life saver is fine in an emergency.

Parties are not meant for introspection. They are meant for convivial sharing and by making allowances for human frailty your part can only be enhanced. If you don't want to participate, find the host's library and open a book, but you and everyone else are best served if you march with good will in this occasional parade as a healthy deflection from ordinary reality.

Many more kisses, Celeste

More food memories.

It happens that the topic of food memory is a rich though non-caloric one. I prefer the digestible length of one page notes but some subjects require more commentary than others. Broadly, there are the holiday food memories, ordinary food memories, the memories evoked by aroma or by taste and the memories prompted by sight and occasion. Most of these in my experience are good memories although the complex nature of human biology does allow for unpleasant and unsavory reflexes when confronted by certain foods. Sadly, my dear Wallace couldn’t eat onions for years due to an untoward experience with them during silly college fraternity hazing.

Anyhoo, in my experience a food memory can be extraordinarily intense, sometimes in a literary way, provoking floridly descriptive passages of less than novel length. It casts me back to the entirety of the circumstances at the time of my experience. I may be 5 years old or I may be 25 and the reminder of the time, place and feeling can be overwhelming. Often when I drink a certain sweet tea in a certain glass with a certain sprig of mint I am fully transported to the front steps of my childhood home, on a warm June day, a soft breeze ruffling the leaves of the great pecan tree in front, the aromas of mown hay sweeping across the road and up our little sloping yard, to enfold me in a safe and happy embrace. It is pure calming pleasure and contentment. This complete feeling is total and really does begin at the top of my head and travels to my toes in a sort of force field of emotion. It is fleeting but I can see and hear and sense all the things as richly as I did at that prior moment. From the mossy green step I see the slouched figure of the farmer across the way, one hand on his tractor wheel, one adjusting his hat, stirring the field and its creatures like the pilot of a ship traversing the waves. He glances at me and raises his hand in recognition and I do the same in shared approval. It captured serenity and the promise of glorious summer all in one gesture.

On the other hand a birthday cake of the white kind with yellow, red and blue icing reminds me too well of the party where the guest of honor got so over-excited and ate so much that he threw up in multicolor hues across the table from his youthful guests. I haven’t felt the same about birthday cake since, favors notwithstanding.

Distinct from that, those special ‘dining out’ experiences with one’s parents can have a strange and powerful hold. The appearance of shrimp cocktail in a little dish of shaved ice centered on an ampoule of unbearably hot tomato sauce always reminds me of my parents’ delight in treating us to utter extravagance from time to time and to my high school graduation in particular when their mood was so genuinely gleeful that I cried the entire time, for what I am still not quite sure, but you know what I mean.

Fond hugs,

Celeste

Device protocol

Celeste’s Clip ‘n’ Save suggestions for electronic device protocol.

Once again I find myself in the position to beg that one subscribe to a few courtesies when it comes to the public use of handheld devices. In this case public is defined as “in the presence of another.”

• Furtive use is futile. Everyone can see what you are doing. Don’t think you are hiding anything.

• Accommodate your need with smallest device you have. It is not necessary to haul out a lap top to look up “Amarone” at the dinner table.

• Settle arguments by consensus if you can. Even that world wide webby thing does not have all the answers to everything.
• It can wait. Ask yourself if it is absolutely necessary to review your cousin’s social network comments right now.

• Consider what it says about you as a person. At solemn occasions such as funerals, leave your email account alone.

• Share your view with everyone. If you must scroll your photo album make sure everyone can see it clearly.

• Do not endanger others. If you are driving, pull over.

• Excuse yourself. If you must, acknowledge your mental departure with a few polite words and go to a private location.

• Be here now. Occupy the moment with your undistracted presence.

Clip ‘n’ Save

Some really good fruits

Apple is also a fruit. Let’s not forget that. Even though in today's world it may have technological connections in the laboratory of plant breeders it is still a comestible and it’s a ridiculously versatile one, making appearances, some surprising, in many dishes. In the American tradition you have used or consumed it in a betty, a crisp, a crumble, a cobbler, a grunt, a buckle, a slump, a sonker, a dowdy or even a pie, to name a few of its many baked incarnations. It pops up in desserts all over the place and even makes cameo appearances in main dishes or salads. Waldorf anyone? We ought not ignore the foreign contributions to this effort, such as the tarte tatin where the ingredients are simple but the process is somewhat complexified to the point where the entirety is the apotheosis of each ingredient. Really: sugar, apples, flour, butter, egg yolk and an optional lemon. The final combination is essentially brilliant but beware that the apples are the right type to ensure that those big chunks don’t disintegrate in the baking.

This commentary also pertains to our native fruit, which the common apple IS NOT! Even as widespread and adapted as its reach is today, it was not found on the shores of North America when the first immigrants landed. They brought their own plants or seeds and from there the diversity multiplied readily, so much so that legends were created and careers made by its propagation. Its tasty precursor in very ancient times was the medlar, a primitive form of tree fruit that has to be practically rotten before it is used. The delightfully descriptive adjective “bletted” describes this state of near-decay. Needless to say medlars never really clicked like apples.

Some of our neglected native fruits deserve a little attention too. If we limit ourselves to trees, that eliminates scuppernong and concord grapes, cranberries, beach plums, raspberries, blackberries, cloudberries, blueberries and a host of other delicious bear forage species.

Everyone likes cherry pie but the native black cherry is probably not the source of the filling except in the most rural areas where the trees provide abundantly for the taking. The stone size relative to the flesh is pretty big and most of the fruit goes to the birds or survivalists.

That leaves us with persimmons and paw-paws, two popular but localized favorites. Talk about underutilized, well they are the ones. Each has its own particular charms and you needn't be ashamed if you never heard of one or the other. This also means you are not a Kentucky native or from one of its neighboring states where their use in season is pretty common. If you ever have the chance to try either of these native fruits don't be shy. They each have a rewarding and unique flavor that deserves more frequency at any table. I say bring back the megafauna which were theoretically responsible for their distribution in the first place! We'll make room!

Smooches, Celeste       

On kitchen tools

Doesn’t everyone have a favorite kitchen tool? It isn’t as if we invented the little thing but we can still feel a sense of pride in possessing it and putting it to its intended purpose with some skill and smoothness of operation. You probably have a short list as do I. I’ll bet there are special implements in your kitchen that you would feel bereft of if you were unable to reach for them at just the right moment. That moment is special. It combines a feeling of satisfaction in finding the tool exactly where it is handy and in the anticipation of working it the way it was intended. Happily this includes those tools of our own adaptation which we use, which were never intended to serve the purpose we find for them. There is a secret and satisfying celebration in this quasi-inventive success as it vibrates sympathetically with the tool-using regions of the human brain.

In general, these tools are complex to some degree and manufactured en masse. I am not talking about spoons, knives and forks though there are many subtle variations on those themes, including the specialized and au courant use of long-handled ice-tea spoons for swirling coulis. Nor am I speaking of adapted medical and dental instruments for who knows what purposes, although it must be said that medical pincers do allow for more subtle placement of garnishes and that hypodermic syringes efficiently deliver edible infusions of all sorts. These are heady times for industrial inventiveness among chefs who prowl the hardware stores, equipment catalogues and flea markets for implements that will serve their extravagant visions.

Dare I suggest the carrot peeler as one of the most perfect tools, which now has an ergonomic and comfortable handle? There is a considerable amount of design and ingenuity in this little piece as anyone knows who has purchased a cheaply crafted version that doesn’t quite operate as well as it should in spite of its similarity to the superior and more serviceable model. If the blade angle is not right or the arc of swing of the blade is not appropriate then you find yourself going over and over the same segment of the vegetable, carrot or potato. These micro efforts have an insidiously cumulative and negative effect in any kitchen where efficiency and ease of effort are the underpinnings of finely prepared meals. Every effort, no matter how small, contributes to the ultimate success of the dish or meal. Wasted time and energy cannot be anything but a drag on the quality of the total experience of preparation and a genuine impairment of the enjoyment of serving the final product.

This exultation in the heft of a good implement can be marred by disappointment when tools are misplaced by others or go un-replaced immediately when lost or worn out. Let this serve as a caution to those who enter the temple of the kitchen and who casually avail themselves of its utilitarian resources without fully understanding their exalted importance to the celebratory communion to follow. You know what I am talking about!

Kisses as Ever,

Celeste