[Jayne Osborn]

Here's the latest challenge.

Who's going to be the next Spherian to win lots of dough?
It was no recipe for disaster last month - we were "cooking with gas", thanks to having Chris and Martin in the line-up. Good luck with mixing those ingredients and turning out a good poem.

Please write, in verse form, some sort of recipe. Poems should, as always, rhyme and scan, in twenty-four lines or fewer. Send them to reach these offices (by email if you must/live abroad) by 29 November.

(By post: The Literary Review, 44 Lexington Street, London W1F 0LW
By email: editorial@literaryreview.co.uk)

[Martin Parker]

Jayne, I doubt if this is the "good poem" for which you were hoping ! But it was great fun to write.

Discomfort Food

To a tin of baked beans add some chilli.
Do not stint; spoon it in willy-nilly
with, should you so please, cloves of garlic in threes
for gilding this culinary lily.

Use that fiercest of chillies, the Naga.
Let it simmer for hours on the Aga
till the reinforced steel of the pan starts to peel.
Then serve with a great deal of lager.

The effect on one’s gut is corrosive,
cathartic, intense and erosive.
It’s a dish to appeal to a masochist’s zeal
to blow himself up with explosive.

[Jerome Betts]

And great fun to read. Don't see why it shouldn't do well.

[John Whitworth]

Bravo, Martin. Have you read the recipes in 'Inside Mr Enderby' by Anthony Burgess?

[Jayne Osborn]

Martin,

I agree with Jerome.
I love it, and the very clever title. Naga chillies have a gorgeous 'smokey' flavour, which I adore. (I can eat hotter stuff than anyone I know; it's been put to the test many times. My husband reckons I just have no nervous system! )

[Roger Slater]

Jayne, do I remember correctly that only subscribers are eligible to collect the big money prizes? I hope I'm wrong about that, although I seem to recall someone saying that at one point.

[Roger Slater]

I have a poem that is around ten years old that I suppose would work for this contest, and I'm pretty sure it's never been published:


CATCH OF THE DAY

Making sure your knife is sharp
draw it up along the carp
so the scales come off the skin.
Use it then to slice the belly,
scoop out that disgusting jelly
known as fish-gut, then begin
lifting out the bones, filleting
almost like a child playing
on the ribs of some toy harp.

Heat some oil in a skillet,
add some pepper, freshly mill it,
toss in garlic, add the zest
of half a lemon to the sizzle,
then balsamic, just a drizzle
(do not skimp here, use the best).
Turn the heat up, add the fish.
Now warm up a serving dish.
If you have a wine glass, fill it.

[Jayne Osborn]

Jayne, do I remember correctly that only subscribers are eligible to collect the big money prizes? I hope I'm wrong about that, although I seem to recall someone saying that at one point.

Sadly, Bob, that is the case, I'm afraid. It's harsh, I know, that non-subscribers can win only a tenner. The way to look at it is to absolutely revel in the kudos if your name appears on that page!!! Believe me, that kudos really counts over here. Hope that makes you feel better

PS. You've got three 'some's in fairly quick succession there. Also, might I suggest a slight change to 'If you have a wine glass...' ? I'd assume they do have a wine glass, based on personal experience , with something like Take your crystal wine glass. Fill it.

[Roger Slater]

Thanks. I know I'll need to revise this. I was pretty new to metrical writing when I wrote it.

Bummer about the prize. I sure hope Chis was a subscriber. I'm not sure they'd be allowed to penalize non-subscribers like that in the US.

[Susan d.S.]

Turducken: or, Yorkshire Christmas Pudding Revived

Ask a turkey to swallow a pigeon
seasoned with spices and buckshot (a smidgeon).
Tell the turkey to swallow a pheasant
(talons removed, or it may get unpleasant).
The turkey then must gobble a chicken
(with beak and comb and tail-feathers sticking).
To swallow the chicken it downs a duck
(freed from the muck, but quite out of luck).
It swallows the duck to catch the chicken
to catch the pheasant to catch the pigeon,
seasoned with spices and buckshot (a smidgeon).
Soon the turkey resembles a sow. It dies—so, now:
encrust and bake it or spit- rotate it, hours long,
as did ancient cooks of the Yorkshire of yore,
when appetites, arms, and stomachs were strong.
Tip: when roasting nested birds, more is more.
So, stuff the whole turkey inside a bustard
and baste it with lager and Coleman’s mustard.
(and if you don’t have time to bake Cherpumple Pie,
roly-poly some jam and float it in custard).

("Turducken" is a contemporary term for a dish of nested roasting birds, with roots in the Classical world and in 18th c Yorkshire)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turducken

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...as-dinner.html

http://theclearlydope.tumblr.com/pos...-water-board-a