The Physiology of Taste (53 page)
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Authors: Anthelme Jean Brillat-Savarin
They swept on … and I continued my meditations.
*
The piano has been developed solely to facilitate the composition of music and to accompany singing. It has neither warmth nor expression when played alone. Spaniards describe with the word
BORDONEAR
the act of playing on such plucked instruments.
†
A term in musical slang:
FAIRE LES BRAS
means to raise the elbows and shoulder blades as if one were overcome with emotion;
FAIRE LES YEUX
means to roll up the eyes as if swooning;
FAIRE DES BRIOCHES
1
means to miss a note or an intonation.
*
Alibert,
PHYSIOLOGIE DES PASSIONS
, volume I, page
241
.
†
Alibert,
PHYSIOLOGIE DES PASSIONS
, volume I, page
196
.
*
In a well-managed establishment, public or private, the cook is called the
CHEF
. Under him as assistants he has the entrée man, the pastry cook, the roast cook; and the scullions are the cabin boys of the kitchen, and like them they are often knocked about and often make their way upwards.
*
Madame Migneron Remy is the mistress, at Number
4
Rue de Valois, Faubourg du Roule, of a dames’ school under the protection of the Duchess of Orléans. The location is superb, the establishment is run perfectly, the enrollment is very exclusive, the instructors are the best in Paris, and, what is most important to me, the tuition is so low that young ladies of even modest fortune can enjoy such unusual advantages as it offers.
*
Most working men in Paris finish up their jobs on Sunday morning, turn them over to their employers, and are paid, after which they leave, to spend the rest of the day enjoying themselves.
Monday morning they meet in groups, pool whatever money they have left, and continue to celebrate as long as the sum total permits it.
This state of affairs, which was completely usual as little as ten years ago, has been somewhat bettered by conscientious employers and by insurance companies and banking houses; but the evil is still very great, and many work hours are lost, to the profit of beer gardens, restaurants, bars, and taverns in the capital and its suburbs.
1.
This slang, which was still current in 1884 when Nimmo and Bain quoted Lorédan Larchey’s
DICTIONNAIRE DE L’ARGOT PARISIéN
, sprang from the custom in the opera of buying the little cakes called
brioches
with money collected from any artist who sang or played out of tune. Brioches are a light, pale yellow, faintly sweet kind of muffin with a characteristic blob on top, rather like a mushroom just pushing crookedly through the ground. Once eaten in Paris, they never taste as good anywhere else. The best commercial ones I ever ate were delivered every morning about 8:57 to the Brasserie de l’Univers (or was it a café then?), across the sidewalk and past my hungry nose, from a dapper little horsedrawn wagon. That was anywhere from fifteen
to fifteen hundred years ago, according to the effect upon my spirits of the weather and the daily news.
2.
Here is another of Brillat-Savarin’s private words, the adective
SéBUSIEN
, probably from the Latin
sebosus
, meaning stout. It might apply to Alibert (1766–1837), or it might very well describe this other Professor, who was forever wary of his silhouette, and who fought a grim but intelligent battle with over-weight.
3.
It is impossible for me to read this description of Borose without wondering if I only imagine that Brillat-Savarin despised him. The words seem straightforward, but I sense a hatred of the smug rich patronizing gourmand. He bought a soldier, and then he bought a scholar, one to save his life and the other to enrich it. He sent his fine scraps to the hovels and attics of
deserving
charity cases. He graciously opened social or at least commercial doors to
deserving
young married merchants. Yes, I suspect the Professor of a good bit of quiet malediction here, and the fatal stroke of lightning could not come too soon.
4.
She was, obviously enough, a celebrated dancer of that day.
BOUQUET
Gastronomical Mythology
148:
GASTEREA IS THE
tenth muse: she presides over all the pleasures of taste.
She could claim to rule the world itself, which is nothing without the life in it, and that life in turn dependent upon what it eats.
She is happiest in places where the grapevine grows, where orange trees send out their perfume, where the truffle waxes and wild game and fruits may flourish.
When she condescends to appear, it is as a young girl: around her waist she winds fire colored ribands; her hair is black and her eyes are like blue sky, and her limbs are full of grace; beautiful as Venus, she is also everything that is pure loveliness.
She seldom shows herself to mortals, but her statue consoles them for her invisibility. A single sculptor has been allowed to look upon her charms, and such was the success of this god-chosen artist that whoever sees his masterpiece believes that he recognizes in it the features of whichever woman he has best loved in his life.
Among all the places where altars to Gasterea have risen, she loves this city, the world’s capital, which holds the Seine between its palace steps.
Her temple rises on the famous hill to which Mars gives his name, and rests upon an immense white marble base, to which a hundred steps lead up from every side.
It is beneath this hallowed place that lie the secret cellars—kitchens where art questions nature and submits it to its unchanging laws.
It is there that air, water, iron, and fire, put into action by most cunning hands, are separated and reunited, ground and blended, to produce effects incomprehensible to the uninitiate.
It is from there, finally, that emerge, at predetermined times, those fabulous recipes whose inventors prefer to stay unnamed, since their happiness rests within themselves and their reward consists in knowing that they have pushed back the limits of human knowledge and brought new pleasures to mankind.
The temple, a unique monument of all that is simple and majestic in architecture, is supported by a hundred columns of Oriental jasper, and lighted by a dome which imitates the one of heaven itself.
We shall not give here the details of the marvels enclosed within this edifice: it will suffice to say that the carvings which ornament its pediment, as well as the bas-reliefs which encircle it, are consecrated to the memory of the men to whom we owe so much for their practical discoveries, such as the use of fire in our daily needs, the invention of the plow, and other like things.
1
Far from the central dome, and in a sanctuary, the statue of the goddess can be seen. She leans her left hand upon an oven, and in her right holds the products most precious to her worshippers.
The crystal canopy which shelters her is held up by eight columns of the same clear mineral, and these are ceaselessly flooded by an electric flame, which seems to spread an almost celestial light within the holy place.
2
The worship of the goddess is simple: each day at sunrise her priests come to take off the crown of flowers which ornaments her statue, place a new one on it, and sing together one of the numerous hymns by which poetry has always celebrated the countless blessings which the gods have showered upon mankind.
These priests are twelve in number, led by the oldest of them: they are chosen from the most scholarly of men, and all other things being equal the handsomest of these are the ones preferred. Their age is a question of years, and they are thus subject to the physical changes of maturity, but never to the decadence of senility, from which they are preserved by the air they breathe within the temple.
Feast days to the goddess are the same number as the days in a year, since she herself never ceases to pour out her blessings, but among these celebrations is one which is above all dedicated
to her: September twenty-one, called the
gastronomical High
Mass.
3
On this solemn day, the capital is from early morning veiled in a cloud of incense; citizens crowned with flowers throng the streets, singing the praises of Gasterea, speaking to one another with gentle affection; every heart is filled with happiness, and the air seems to vibrate with an infectious tide of friendship and love.
A part of the day is taken up with these demonstrations in the streets, and then at the traditional hour the whole mass of devotees turns toward the temple where the sacred banquet is to take place.
In the sanctuary, at the feet of the statue, a table is laid for the twelve high priests. Another table seating twelve hundred guests of both sexes has been prepared under the central dome. Every art has been called into play to decorate these two ceremonial boards, and never even in a royal palace has anything equalled their elegance.
The priests arrive, at a slow pace and with rapt countenances. They are dressed in tunics of fine white Cashmir wool, edged with incarnadine embroideries and with belts of the same color to tie up the ample folds. Their faces glow with health and good will, and after an exchange of greetings they sit down at their table.
Already servants dressed in fine linen have placed the dishes there: no ordinary preparations, meant to appease common hungers, for nothing is ever served at this august table which has not been judged worthy of it and which does not spring from a transcendental source, either through the material it contains or through the depth of skill that has composed it.
The venerable diners are more than deserving of their high functions; their calm intelligent conversation turns upon the marvels of Nature and the sublimity of Art; they eat slowly, savoring with enthusiasm; the movement of their jaws is smooth and gentle; it seems as if every bite has its own significance to them, and if it happens that one or another lets his tongue lick discreetly at his glistening lips, the cook who has made the dish then being eaten is from that moment among the immortals.
The wines, which are worthy of the feast, are poured in proper
succession at set intervals by twelve maidens who have been chosen, for this single day, by a jury of painters and sculptors; they are dressed in the Greek fashion, one which flatters their beauty and does not affront their modesty.
The priests are above any affectation of hypocrisy, and do not turn away from the pretty hands which pour out the world’s finest wines for them; but even as they enjoy looking at our Creator’s most beautiful masterpiece they do not lose the solemnity which wisdom has engraved upon their brows: the manner in which they pay their thanks and then drink is full of this double sentiment.
Around their esoteric board can be seen a constant press of kings, princes, and famous foreigners, who have arrived for the celebration from every part of the world; they walk quietly, and watch every move that is made, for they have come to learn all that they can of the great art of good living, a difficult one of which many people are still completely ignorant.
While all this is going on in the holy of holies, a general gaiety and brilliance animates the diners around the great table under the dome.
This emotion springs mainly from the fact that no man there is seated beside the woman to whom he has already said his say: such is the will of the goddess.
4
To the almost immeasurable table have been invited, by choice, the scholars of both sexes who have enriched gastronomy by their discoveries, the heads of households who fulfill most graciously the duties of our French hospitality, the cosmopolitans to whom society is most in debt for their pleasant or practical importations, and those generous men who nourish the unfortunate on all that is best of their own superfluous good things.
The center of the banquet table is hollow, and leaves a great space filled with a crowd of carvers and servers, who hasten here and there and to the farthest places with whatever anyone may wish to taste.
There too are displayed most advantageously everything that Nature in her prodigality has created for man’s nourishment, and these richnesses are doubled a hundredfold, not only by their juxtapositions but by the changes to which the art of cookery has subjected them. This art has brought together the Old World
and the New, confounded man-made boundaries, and lessened all our distances, and the perfume which rises from its knowing preparations embalms the air and fills it with a gas that is irresistibly appetizing.
Meanwhile young men, as handsome as they are well-costumed, patrol the outer circle of the table, ceaselessly presenting cups filled with the most delicious wines, which are now brilliant as red rubies and now like the more modest topaz.
From time to time skilled musicians, placed in the galleries around the dome, make the whole temple sound to the melodious accents of a harmony as simple as it is cunning.
Then heads are raised, the attention of all the diners is attracted, and for these short periods conversation ceases; it soon begins again with even more animation, as if this new gift of the gods has refreshed imaginations and given every heart a renewed capacity for gaiety.
When the pleasures of the table have taken up the time assigned to them, the band of high priests draws near, to join in the celebration, mix with the guests, and share the Mocha which even the Oriental lawgiver permits to his followers. The spicy liquor fumes in vessels of carved beaten gold, and the beautiful cup bearers from the inner sanctuary hurry among the guests with sugar to disguise its bitterness. They are charming, and yet such is the influence of the temple of Gasterea and of the air breathed in it, that not a single female heart holds any jealousy.
Finally the leader of the priests intones a hymn of gratitude; every voice joins in, and every musical instrument: this homage rises from all hearts toward the heavens, and the ritual comes to an end.