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PEPYS

Strange to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everybody.

—SAMUEL PEPYS, The Diary of Samuel Pepys

MONTAIGNE

At table, I prefer the witty to the grave; in bed, beauty before goodness; and in common discourse, eloquence, whether or no there be sincerity

—MONTAIGNE, Essays

ROMAN GOURMETS

There were magnificent gourmets in ancient Rome, where feasts and extravagance were famous—Lucullus, Cicero, and Pompey among them. The Emperor Vitellius (15‑69 A.D.) spent more than the equivalent of ten million dollars on his table during his brief reign of less than a year and is said to have habitually eaten a hundred dozen oysters at a sitting.

Apicius, who also lived in the first century A.D. and is responsible for the oldest Roman cookbook that still exists, had a vast fortune, almost all of which he spent on eating. When there was only a fraction left, he committed suicide rather than being forced to live a meager life.

FIGS

“Virtue! A fig!” Iago exclaimed.

He didn’t have much regard for a fig. The ancients did. Cultivation of figs began in Egypt or Arabia at least five thousand years ago. They were grown in the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the vanished seven wonders of the ancient world, and are mentioned in Homer and repeatedly in the Bible. There were more than two dozen types known to the Romans of this sweetest of all fruits—according to Pliny, the best came from Ibiza.

What we think of as a fig is actually the fleshy container of innumerable tiny seeds—these can be spread, even when figs are eaten by birds, since the seeds pass through them unharmed.

Figs can be eaten fresh—purple, green, or deep amber and best of all, Smyrna figs—or dried. Oddly enough, they are more nutritious when dried, which is done by putting them out in the sun or even burying them in hot desert sand.

The Buddha, it is somehow consoling to know, in the search for perfect understanding, sat in meditation beneath a fig—a bo—tree.

RESTAURANT SEATING

Restaurants, like houses, have places where it is agreeable to sit and others where it is not. Every restaurant is different, and sometimes the best tables are not where you might expect, but there are some general rules:

• Sit near the bar in most cases, if it is not too noisy. A restaurant may not have a bar, but it has a kitchen and washrooms. Don’t sit near either.

• The second floor is almost always undesirable, in some cases unacceptable. It is removed from the drama. The same goes for adjoining rooms.

• Oddly, the personality of many restaurants is altered when they are enlarged or a room is added. Little can be done about this, but the old section is usually the best.

• Don’t be afraid to decline a table. In a good restaurant, they will try to find you another.

DUMAS’ FAVORITE DRESSING

Alexandre Dumas, a renowned patron of Parisian restaurants, in at least one of which he had his own private room, had a favorite salad dressing that he always prepared himself, not infrequently at after-theater suppers in the apartment of his mistress, the actress Mlle George. These repasts might be small or well-attended. The pleasures of dining, as Brillat-Savarin wrote, can mingle with all the other pleasures.

In a large salad bowl, Dumas mashed the yolks of hard-boiled eggs in olive oil—one for every two persons—added chervil, crushed thyme, crushed anchovies, chopped gherkins, chopped egg whites, salt, pepper, and at the last some good vinegar.

The greens were then put in, all was tossed, and a pinch of paprika added.

GARUM

The condiment of ancient Greece and Rome, fundamental to their cooking and dominating recipes, was called garum, derived from fermented fish. The innards or pieces of fish were salted and layered. Some months later, a liquid was drawn off. This was garum, often mixed with olive oil, vinegar, or wine.

“Delenda est Carthago!” was Cato’s repeated demand to the Roman senate—Carthage must be destroyed. Its greatest