On the Road

Underreported among the latest batch of Oscar nominations was the Bleakest Family Meal category. There are only two contenders: the pig's feet shared by mother and daughter in Precious and almost any of the meals shared by father and son in the Road.

Precious is the frontrunner. It might be that, in the Road, the entire world is either dead or dying, and father and son face an impossible future, but you know, at least they have each other. Even with out a global apocalypse, Precious contains no such lightness. Precious frying up two disgusting, hairy pig's feet for her monstrous sadist of a mother is one of the film's unforgettable images.

The Road is also memorable for food because of the use of brands. Since all plant and animal life is gone, the characters have nothing to feed on but preserved goods. An ageing can of coke has a cameo. Such a mundane product, found on street corners across the globe becomes a sacred relic in the film.

On the Guardian food blog there's a nice piece about product placement, on how companies are now happy to have their merchandise associated even with negative scenes. The writer missed some sparkling examples in the Road. One scene sees father and son stumble upon an underground bunker and find a treasure trove of Spam, Prince's tinned fruit, instant mashed potato and flavoured water.

Spam is so maligned that the makers must be delighted with the pr, even when it is literally eaten as the last meat left on earth. Prince's, perhaps not. Picture the slogan: "Fruit cocktail, for when unimaginable environmental catastrophe strikes."

Screwdrivers and other tools

Would you like a Screwdriver? If you're stuck for an answer, let me rephrase. Would you like a vodka orange? As a cocktail name, a "Screwdriver" struggles to justify itself. It's confusing to name a combination of just two ingredients. Martinis are fine because of the ritual involved in making one. Screwdrivers? No.

In Quentin Tarantino's Jackie Brown, Samuel L Jackson's character is partial to a Screwdriver. But he never asks for vodka orange. It's one of Tarantino's branding exercises, in the same way a "Royal with Cheese" will forever invoke Jules and Vince in Pulp Fiction.

Odd drink choices crop up in all sorts of films. In another Tarantino picture, Inglourious Bastards, Christopher Waltz's SS man orders milk, the childish beverage sharply contrasting with his sheer calculating nastiness. Warren Beatty's tough gambler in McCabe and Mrs Miller likes a raw egg and whiskey, while Sally Bowles' bohemian in Cabaret prefers raw egg and brandy. Jack Palance's bad guy in the Western Shane drinks black coffee from a black coffee pot. No one orders quadruple whiskies except characters in Withnail & I.

What I think is different about Screwdrivers in Jackie Brown is that the drink seems close to the very essence of the film. It's very cool and a little retro. The examples above however are mere moments, giving brief insights into a character. The only comparable example I can think of is White Russians, drunk throughout the Big Lebowski. Somehow that silky, sickly combination of milk, Kahlua and vodka matches exactly the laid-back weirdness of the film. Mine's a Mojito.

Duck a la wrong

The Tour D'Argent, France's oldest restaurant, has been flogging off some of its wine collection to make way for new stocks.

It's quite a collection too: 18,000 were expected to be sold from a cellar of 430,000. Sadly, even if you had a few thousand euros knocking about, the sale is now over and the "middle-aged, besuited men" got in there first.

The restaurant is also known for its signature dish, Canard a la Presse, marrying haute cuisine and heavy industry. It's created by roasting a whole duck rare, removing the breasts and legs, then crushing the carcass in a bizarre apparatus which looks straight out of the fine brass ware wing at the Tower of London. The ground up bones and other bits create a kind of duck smoothie to use in the sauce.

FX Cuisine has a photographic guide to its creation. Try not to think of Jemima.

There are some delicious vegetarian alternatives to the most unexpected items. Veggie haggis and black pudding come to mind. Good luck to the chef who takes on this one though. Goat's Curd a la Power Drill anyone?

Organic eggs - my epiphany

Organic food is overrated. Overpriced, meagre and disappointing, there is a reason why we farm with chemicals - it helps produce cheaper and more plentifully. Simple as.

There are products well worth the effort (and expense) though. Organic eggs are far superior in every way to their tainted barn or battery mates. Crack one open and the clue will be there straightaway in the yolk - they are just so damn orange.

Even at organic prices, they are still relatively cheap. A box will do you an omelette one night, a couple of boiled eggs for Sunday lunch and still leave you with a spare.

It may seem hard to see why a basic item can be so special. But organic eggs really are the business. The difference between an organic egg and a free range egg, is just as pronounced as the difference between a free range egg and a battery egg.

Use them in dishes where eggs have the lead role - piperade, scrambled eggs with mushrooms, heuvos rancheros, or my personal top hangover buster, fried eggs with plenty of sea salt and tobasco.

Tautological crisps

Above is the advert for the widely promoted new range of Walkers crisps, with flavours picked out by members of the public. Crispy Duck and Hoisin is the nicest.

Personally, I have something of a conceptual issue with the Fish and Chips flavour. What do chips taste like? Potatoes. And what do crisps taste like? Ditto.

Therefore, Fish and Chips should really just be called Fish.

Playing with food. And a coronary bypass

Having just written about a cheese deliberately infested with maggots, I didn't expect to find something even more gross barely days later.

Thanks to a workmate, here is the thisiswhyyourefat website.

Casu Marzu

Casu marzu is a new discovery of mine. I say discovery, but it is more that I have become aware of its existence - you won't see it in Tesco, because even in the country of its origin it is illegal.

The cheese is made by introducing a particular kind of fly to a block of pecorino. The fly hatches its larvae into the cheese, who hatch, then start to munch their way through their new home. As they eat, they secrete a digestive enzyme and break down the cheese even further, giving a creamy, if wriggly texture.

Wikipedia explain more, in alarming detail, here. I myself am writing about casu marzu because now I know about it, I find it very difficult to forget. Share the cheese, share the pain.

Here, Antonio Carluccio tries it for himself. Yes - the cheese does squirm.