Nifty nibbles and tipples

Whatever happened to the delicacies of childhood? I’m talking the raw weiner and moulded ball of white bread staples of my youth. I’ve had many a fine meal since, but the pure intense delights of food at its most basic has never reached the heights of my halcyon days stripping a perfectly ordinary piece of bread of its crust then rolling it between my palms until it was a lumpy essence of bread blob which I blissfully consumed, après or avec, the pink finger of swirled up meat and not-meat products that was the hot dog of days gone by. We are definitely not talking the pure beef or tofu gourmet doggies with which one is confronted today. Rumour was that the original hot dog's ingredients included the floor sweepings in the plant where they were made. Urban myth or gritty approach to food prep in days gone by? Either way, health food they were not, a realization of stunning non-relevance to a pre-teen wiener nibbler.

This is not to suggest that my mother was not concerned with our culinary habits. We spent a good solid week being subjected to the liver and porridge good-for-you breakfast no doubt being touted in some magazine article of the day that convinced her to adopt it with a vengeance, at least until we made her life a living hell as a result. Our cat ate very well that week as he was tossed little tidbits of finely cut up liver leather, tossed discreetly by the older of us in the crowd, flung gaily by the lest discretion-oriented youngsters. When we were busted at that game and placed in separate rooms, some of us managed to stuff a few of those tasty morsels into heating vents. Sometimes I imagine I can still smell that warm smoky liver odour wafting up from the floor. And to this day I cannot think of oatmeal without conjuring up great gleaming glops of a glue-like substance dumped into our unsuspecting bowls. Even the cat wouldn’t touch that stuff.

Living with an amazing cook means that I have been the lucky partaker of many a wonderful meal – I eat far better than anyone has a right to. And yet it is the vividness of those early delights and horrors that stick with me. Literally. I think I can still feel a year’s worth of wonder bread balls encrusted on my ribs. Maybe I need a little nip of Baby Duck to wash it all away. Now we’re talking.