[John Whitworth]

Lucy, why are you deserting the poets?

No. 2854: fresh food


As if there weren’t enough cookery books in the world, you are invited to invent a title for a new one, with a fresh angle, and supply a publisher’s blurb. Email entries of up to 150 words to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 25 June.

[Rob Stuart]

‘Cooking the Books’

Times are hard. The chances are you can hardly afford to buy a tin of beans at the moment, so what could you possibly want with a cookbook? Well don’t worry, ‘Cooking the Books’ doesn’t expect you to ponce about with wagyu beef or pomegranate molasses like Yotam Ottolenghi. In fact it doesn’t expect you to have any ingredients at all; the pages themselves contain everything you need for a complete meal! Choose from a variety of simple recipes such as page soup (pages shredded into a bowl of lukewarm water), mashed pages (the same, but less water) or page salad (no water at all). Remember, paper isn’t a ‘superfood’, it doesn’t form an essential part of a balanced diet, it doesn’t contain any vitamins or minerals, it doesn’t detoxify or aid digestion or even taste nice, but it does fill you up!

[Adrian Fry]

Excellent idea, Rob, and you have provided me with a suggestion of how I might at last be able to digest the novels of Henry James.

[Douglas G. Brown]

Anyone living near a moderately busy American highway can minimise his protein expenses by utilising the vast bounty of roadkill. Why buy a hunting licence when deer, hare, grouse, duck, and other game appears almost at your doorstep? And pampered dogs and cats provide ample amounts of succulent, well - marbled flesh. For the adventurous gourmet, don’t overlook non-game species. Everything from reptiles, amphibians, and small mammals, to an enormous variety of songbirds, nicely round out the bill of fare.

The first secret of roadside foraging is to begin at dawn. Just as the early bird gets the worm, so does the early riser get the choicest roadkill. The other secret is to marinate everything.

Borrowing heavily from classic French cuisine, this book has 1,248 pages of recipes for preparing memorable meals … from freshly run-over critters, to those who have been baking on the tarmac for as long as two weeks.



I've made several grammatical corrections, as advised by Ann and others. Where I live, there is an overabundance of deer. In the 1950's, I recall roadkilled venison being donated by game wardens to public school lunch programs. I've had co-workers and friends for the past 40 years who have picked up roadkill when the occasion presents itself ... including phone calls in the wee hours to help them dress out a deer.

I saw a roadkilled snapping turtle 2 days ago, but left it for a more courageous forager.

There was a "Roadkill Cafe" for several years in Greenville, Maine, (on the shore of Moosehead Lake), back in the 1990's.

According to the 'net, the word "roadkill" is of American origin, circa early 1970's. So, I guess I'll keep this American. I live close to Canada, and roadkill is eaten up there (moose, caribou, and bear), but I guess the concept is a bit more off-putting in the UK. I'm hoping that the novelty of the concept of roadkill cuisine appeals to Lucy.

[Ann Drysdale]

I like this, Douglas (done it, in fact; poor folk have poor ways) but I think you need a tweak or two to make it fit the Speccie. Lucy is well aware that she has US entrants but the readership of the magazine is basically Brit. and some of your turns of phrase would sit oddly with them. I suggest you swap your z’s for s’s to make minimise and utilise, swap your hunting license for a shotgun certificate and make all the game singular – hare and duck in line with deer and grouse. And there are a few too many commas for the British taste.

Do others agree?

[Rob Stuart]

I'm sorry to say that reality has beaten you to it with this one, Douglas.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Original-R.../dp/0898152003

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by Ann Drysdale

I like this, Douglas (done it, in fact; poor folk have poor ways) but I think you need a tweak or two to make it fit the Speccie. Lucy is well aware that she has US entrants but the readership of the magazine is basically Brit. and some of your turns of phrase would sit oddly with them. I suggest you swap your z’s for s’s to make minimise and utilise, swap your hunting license for a shotgun certificate and make all the game singular – hare and duck in line with deer and grouse. And there are a few too many commas for the British taste.

Do others agree?

Well, not entirely, Ann. Both 'minimise' and 'minimize' are, I believe, acceptable UK English spellings, and I myself would tend towards the latter. I'm sure Lucy wouldn't have a problem with 'hunting licence' ('license' being the verb, he said pedantically). And the only comma that seems to me entirely otiose is in the phrase: "And, pampered dogs and cats provide ..."

Still, like you, I enjoyed Douglas's piece, and I can't wait to order the book on Amazon. The streets of Paris are full of squashed pigeons just waiting for the right recipe ...

[Adrian Fry]

I disagree with Ann: leave the piece American. The word - almost the concept - of roadkill strikes me as somehow American. There's a strain in the American character that makes a book like this altogether plausible - I'm thinking of suvivialism, long Texan roads etc. Anglicised, the piece would just strike false.

[Jerome Betts]

Perhaps, leaving Fry and Allgar v. Drysdale aside, the parsimonious solution would be to insert American before highway?

[John Whitworth]

There IS some Brit who has written about eating roadkill. I can't remember who he is but I feel sure..

Yup. Austin Hill is his name. He hasn't written a book.... yet, but his recipes are on Youtube.