I Was a Dancer - Jacques D'Amboise [53]
After perusal of the menu, with a beaming waiter hovering and his two buddies in the background watching my every move, I ordered an Alsatian dish, the house specialty, choucroute garnie—sauerkraut cooked in champagne with black peppercorns and caraway seeds. It arrived, a steaming mountain on a giant silver platter, encircled with boiled potatoes and covered with varied sausages, slabs of ham and pork, rashers of bacon, and, on the side, a plate containing half a dozen assorted mustards. “Et pour boire, Monsieur?” the pleased waiter inquired.
A moment’s hesitation from me. Ah! To drink. “Un verre de lait, s’il vous plaît.”
Don’t forget, I was sixteen and used to guzzling down two quarts of milk a day. With a disbelieving look, the waiter’s face fell. His two buddies, lurking in the background, froze.
“Ce n’est pas possible, Monsieur,” the waiter’s little eyeballs were twitching.
“Pourquoi ce n’est pas possible? Je veux un verre de lait and a big one, if you don’t mind.” I switched to English. The waiter retreated to confer with his cronies and, bolstered by their support, checked out his English, then returned and announced, “Milk, you cannot have.”
Stridently, I yelled, “I don’t see any other customers here! It’s not as if this restaurant is loaded with patrons. Do I have to go somewhere else to get a glass of milk?” The Ugly American had flared out of this pimply faced teenager.
Adrenaline surged on all sides. The waiter scurried back and the trio disappeared to the back of the restaurant, while I sat there fuming. They returned moments later with the maître d’, a slight man, his straight black hair plastered flat against his skull. He stood ahead of the triangle of waiters, pursed his lips, and announced in elegant tones, “Monsieur, it is not possible to give you milk with your choucroute. This cannot be done.”
“Why not?” I barked, half rising from my seat, both hands planted on the table.
To which he parried, “Monsieur, milk is a food. Choucroute is a food. And one does not drink the kind of food that is milk while one eats the kind of food that is choucroute.”
Triggered by whatever gods of gastronomy enlightened me, I sat down, took a big breath, and, somewhat calmed, asked, “Then tell me what would be the right drink to have.”
They danced with delight. Oh, the smiles, the nods of relief and sighs of amiability from the quartet. “May I recommend,” said the maitre d’, “une bière d’Alsace, or a wine peut-être—a white, a Gewürztraminer—it has a perfume spicy, slightly sweet—with the choucroute, a good balance.”
Thus, I discovered choucroute garnie and Gewürztraminer!
The platter held enough for four people. I ate it all, including most of the mustards, and drank every drop of the scrumptious wine. With each mouthful and sip, the audience of delighted gastronomical mentors watched on, a bevy of mothers cooing as their baby stuffed himself. Sated, I sat back in my chair and searched out the last morsel of juicy pork, still stuck at the back of my teeth, my tongue caressing it. Oh, so happy! And slightly drunk.
The maître d’ approached, victorious. “Monsieur, voulez vous une dessert? We have les pâtisseries, le sorbet, and a wonderful baked Alaska.”
Before he could go on, I said, in my disordered French, “Non, non, non, merci. Je suis fini. Le choucroute, c’est superb, mais ça suffit. Enough, I can’t eat another bite. L’addition, s’il vous plaît. The bill.”
The maître d’ disappeared. A few moments later, one of the waiters came with the check on a small, rectangular silver plate and retired. I reached in my pocket, pulled out a wad of dollars, and started counting them out. Looking up, I saw the quartet slowly approaching, a procession led by the maître d’. In his hand, he carried a grand silver platter. On it were a bowl of sugar, a silver spoon, and a little vase with a single flower, standing in attendance to a glass of milk. “Mes compliments,