• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 475 0

He died on February 2, leaving life, as a close friend later wrote, “like a well-fed guest leaving a banquet … without regret.”

The rights to his great book were sold by his brother for fifteen thousand francs, the price of a good horse at the time. The first edition sold out. New editions followed in 1834, 1835, 1838, and 1839. It has never been out of print. On its spine, Balzac said, could be written, “Here lies the soul of Brillat-Savarin.”

PLATO

Plato, of whom it is said that all philosophy is merely a footnote to him, felt that conversation was by far the most important part of the meal and had little regard for cooks and cooking. He prescribed and subsisted on a simple diet. When he voyaged to Sicily, known for its abundance and its rich food, he wrote scornfully of a society where they thought that happiness came from satiety at the table, never sleeping alone at night, and the other indulgences that went along with such a life.

CASANOVA

1725. Giovanni Giacomo Casanova was born this day in Venice. Famous not only for his conquests but for his memoirs filled with accounts of food and meals, he often made special journeys to taste such delicacies as lark, cap mushrooms, and unusual wines and liqueurs, including one made of maraschino cherries, which he found helpful in increasing his sexual potency.

He knew, of course, the sensual importance of dining, the opening act in so many of his seductions. Prominent in his memoirs is the use of truffles or champagne as aids, and by voluptuously passing oysters from mouth to mouth, he once led two young novitiates into carnal sin. In the last year of his life, at age seventy-three, it was observed that though he was no longer a god or satyr, he remained a wolf at the table.

FOX’S HOUSEGUEST RULES

Joe Fox was from Philadelphia but lived most of his life in New York. A senior editor at Random House—Truman Capote, John Irving, and Philip Roth were among the writers he worked with at one time or another—he had been divorced from his first wife and for a time was living as a single man, with two sets of evening clothes to keep up with invitations. He had manners when they were called for and fixed rules of behavior, including six for being the perfect houseguest:

• Never arrive early.

• Bring a house present the hostess will love.

• Stay to yourself for at least three hours a day

• Don’t sleep in the wrong bed.

• Play all their games.

• Leave on time.

POLPETTONE ALLA TOSCANA

Occasionally at dinner something—or perhaps someone—makes such an incredible impression that you simply must know more—in the case of food, this means asking for the recipe.

One night at our great friend Lorenzo’s when he was living on Union Square, there was a marvelous meat dish, dense and deeply flavored, in a rich sauce of wild mushrooms. Though in slices like tenderloin, it turned out to be a kind of meat loaf, but far less ordinary than that sounds.

Meat loaf, of course, is a great favorite of almost everyone, chefs included, and there are countless recipes for it, all with strong assurances, but this version, from Marcella Hazan’s The Classic Italian Cookbook, is easy to prepare and will reward you handsomely many times over. For us, it has never failed, to a degree that has made it a bit difficult to confess that it’s only a simple Tuscan recipe:

POLPETTONE ALLA TOSCANA (Adapted from Marcella Hazan)

2 ounces imported dried wild mushrooms

1 pound very lean ground beef

1 tablespoon milk

2-inch square of white bread, without the crust

1 tablespoon finely chopped yellow onion

2 teaspoons salt Freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons chopped prosciutto or (second choice) unsmoked ham

⅓ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

¼ teaspoon finely chopped garlic

1 lightly beaten egg yolk

½ cup unfavored bread crumbs

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 tablespoon butter

⅓ cup dry white wine

4 tablespoons tomato paste

Soak the mushrooms in two cups of lukewarm water for half an hour or more. In a bowl, loosen the