Amuse bouche
[ 8 minute read - 1635 words ]
It means an 'amusement on the mouth' and is a free offering from a chef to signify / boast of the chef's skills, like an aperitif.
Inadvertent Manipulation
There is a new shopkeeper in my village. He is friendly towards me, but, in conversation, one of us lacks the ability to create a safe meeting place in which we can just, well 'meet'.
I listen to LBC, a no music, phone-in radio station. The presenters, not dissimilar to the late James Whale in disposition and perspicacity, amaze me with how they respond to callers when they are asked by each of the callers, 'How are you?'.
'Yes, fine.' They NEVER ask the caller how they are, because it is a waste of time. If I was the radio presenter I would have to say, 'What is it you want to say?' and ignore their automated greeting that lacks substance. Asking how someone is, in person, is not an amuse bouche, it is a quick wag of a dog's tail. The tail wag is certainly absent when the caller starts with, 'I blame you people in the media' type comments. So, I suppose it has some value.
On Sunday, I was bored, and having recently made a blackberry and tomato tart, and finding it delicious, I felt like making another sweet, baked thing; another tart. I went to the shop to buy butter and a tin of fruit or pie filling that I could use with more blackberries from my garden. I am also not someone who just buys items from a recipe and follows it; I can cook, and I can taste in my head, so I make up dishes according to my experience of flavours.
'What is WoodApple?' I asked the shopkeeper.
I had found a jar of WoodApple Jam and showed it to him. He couldn't explain the flavour, so didn't try; and at £2.49, he was not about to let me open it merely to taste it. He did offer to bring in an opened jar he had at home though. I suggested some flavours, 'Banana, coconut, starfruit, lychee, dragonfruit, kiwi fruit?' He just shook his head. He told me that there is a WoodApple drink in the refrigerated area for £1.30. I never buy soft drinks unless I need a quick boost of energy. However, my bank account had persuaded me that it was too fat and needed to lose some weight. I like spending money and since I was about to buy butter anyway I thought, 'Why not! I will take one for the team.' I took a sip and realised why the shopkeeper could not describe it, but being full of self-confidence, patronising and boorish, I reeled off some more flavours to him, 'Plum with orange and Brazil nut after you have swallowed?' He just smiled wanly at me.
I bought the WoodApple Jam, vanilla essence, saffron essence (never heard of it before let alone tasted it), some expensive berry jam, a tin of evaporated milk, and some butter; tasting each of them in my head as I selected them. I intended to mix the WoodApple with some evaporated milk as the filler in a tart. This tart, like the berry tart I would also make, would be sharp and tangy, not sweet. But I wanted the WoodApple tart to be smooth, hence the evaporated milk. Because the shopkeeper had told me he loves the taste of WoodApple, this tart (or a portion of it) would be an 'amuse bouche'. I have a confidence of my abilities that outstrips my skill. But, no worries, there is a recipe for shortbread on the flour bag and Mr Kipling uses that for his pastry, right?
Previously, I had followed the shortbread recipe, but didn't want to eat half a block of butter in one sitting again.
Cassava is a plant of which the starchy root is eaten. It is also poisonous if not prepared properly. My local shop-keeper loves it. It can be mixed with flour, and sugar if you like, and deep-fried like little doughnut balls. It has a sharp taste to it. I have mild synesthesia so it tastes a bit green, but not the taste of chlorophyll in grass, more like the green in white wine.
Because I hadn't been properly preparing the cassava I had been using from my cupboard, it gave me slight Atrial Fibrillation (heart skips a few beats) and a wheeziness in my chest ten minutes after eating it. Absolutely delicious little doughnuts though; and they really keep their shape, even when cold. However, I have since managed to survive my experiments with it and either I am immune to it or I prepare it better now.
I thought I would substitute some of the flour in the pastry with cassava and add a little water to the butter and flour shortbread mix I had read on the flour bag. It didn't work well. Adding water means you have to be good at blind-baking. I have never been able to do that well. Aha! I should practice making shortcake first, and then add more water for every new bake! More pencil scrawlings on my kitchen cupboard doors, and make a new hole in my belt.
Also, I will add some cassava to the filling mix because it works like a tangy thickener. I cook like Mickey Mouse casting spells in Disney's 'Fantasia'; that is, with an idea of what I want but leaving a lot to chance. The tart filling had the berry jam, blackberries, vanilla essence, saffron essence, cassava, ginger, evaporated milk, and salt in it. The filling turned out really delicious; the pastry not. Too many colliding experiments, I realised. But this was a practice run for the WoodApple 'amuse bouche' tart I would make. I had to practice more.
Why all this waffle about cooking? This is why. Remind yourself of my first sentence; "There is a new shopkeeper in my village. He is friendly towards me, but, in conversation, one of us lacks the ability to create a safe meeting place in which we can just, well 'meet'."
When I went into the village shop yesterday, the shop-keeper greeted me.
'Hello, young man, How are you?'
'Fine. Well, you know!'
'I remember, I wanted to ask you what you think to the WoodApple Jam.'
We had already discussed the flavour of WoodApple in the drink I drank right in front of him, on Sunday. I should not have gone into the shop yesterday. Our individual time-frames were not sychronised. Mine should have had me offering him a slice of WoodAppleTart as an 'amuse bouche' to serve to create a safe meeting place for us to, well, 'meet'.
He wanted a simple answer to a simple question. Hmm! It seems that I can't do that; give simple answers, that is. Instead of saying, I haven't tried it yet (I am never going to put mostly sugar on my toast, or eat it from the jar! It being a jam made for a populace who regards sweet things as a luxury it has lots of sugar in it, I suspect. The manufacturer of the jam is the same manufacturer of the very sweet WoodApple drink), I instead launched into why I had not offered him an 'amuse bouche'; except I didn't call it that or explain what I was trying to achieve with it.
The explanation
There are two things of note here: I use my intelligence to enhance my experiences in the world, in that I try to discover new things; look at things differently. When there is a repetition of something, I ask myself what is the hidden agenda behind deliberately suffusing a solution with a solute? or Overdosing. It is, quite plainly, to dilute the solution or environment; to change an environment that is less hostile to the later, and deliberate, introduction of a reactive solute; to bring about change in an environment.
I tried to introduce a reactive tart into my village shop environment with the intention of changing the social environment, and the failing of my attempt, and subsequent explanation, brought about disruption in the fulfillment of a relationship.
In modern society, we have actors who will use diffusion tactics, diversions, and distraction to drive out any voice that is not their own. If there were enough of me in the shop at the same time, all chanting the same mantra and then each of us adding a little portion of my ideology, I would suppress the shopkeeper's social defence by suffusion and then, a reactive solute (my ideology) could then be introduced as a Trojan Horse. I also know that the Trojan Horse should be in the shape of my ideology but constructed in the shopkeeper's mind by following my blueprint. In effect, this can be achieved by transmitting the blueprint as a Trojan Horse . I know that, and I could, by using those tactics, manipulate the shopkeeper into bending to my weird, complicated, and complex social approach, based on my belief of how things should be, which, as a result of my upbringing, is warped.
In cooking, there is a French expression, 'sous vide', which is cooking something in a sealed container for a long time at a lower temperature than normal. This requires very accurate temperature control and repetitions of applied heat through the use of a thermostat. If this concept is extended - cooking a frog by steadily increasing the heat so it doesn't run away. In forming a mental stance or position, we could consider it to be 'baked-in thinking'.
There is no doubt I was trying to manipulate an environment with a physical object to act as a talking point. However, I did not set out to suffuse a solution with words or actions that would dilute the safe environment that the shopkeeper expects to experience. That happened by accident. At least I am not sneaky.
