What We Eat When We Eat Alone - Deborah Madison [73]
Another woman made papa al pomodoro, a bread and tomato soup, thinking that all foods from Italy were bound to be romantic. But her boyfriend, who later became her husband, always referred to her seduction dish as “that bowl of wet bread you made for me.” At least it’s a family story, and clearly there was more going for this relationship than the success of a dish. Fortunately, that’s often the case. Indeed, one of the first foods Patrick and I shared was a Thai coconut soup with the pieces of galangal left in, which caused it to be referred to ever after as “that wood soup we had when we first met.” It didn’t prove to be a hindrance to our friendship, though.
It’s important to think things through, including what to drink.
“Wine helps a lot,” says a man. “A nice bottle, just the age it should be. A good pinot—women respond to that. Depends on the person though. Some girls don’t distinguish wines one way or the other. Oysters. Steak. Champagne can’t hurt.”
“The person I’m seducing is strongly affected by ale, so that’s not a good idea,” another bachelor tells Patrick.
“I want her to be uninhibited but not legless. Big California wines frighten me. A French country wine with a certain amount of warmth is better. One from Provence. With dessert there will be more wine—I’m doing the left side of the menu first and of course thinking ahead a bit to the culmination,” he says. “We don’t want a sugary dessert wine, but perhaps a Hungarian sweet wine. A half-bottle. It’s got a sweet edge, but it’s been aged. There’s a tradition behind it.”
Tradition can be very seductive. I was a faithful Veuve Cliquot drinker for years simply because a wine rep had come to the restaurant where I was pastry chef and told us, with an effective amount of emotion, the story of the brave, young Madame Cliquot. Once I heard her story, I wanted to be a part of her lineage and the way to do that was simple: always drink Veuve Cliquot.
Patrick quickly learned of the power it had for me. “I don’t have to know how to pronounce it,” he says, “I just get the one with the orange label.”
“We don’t want a heavy meal; we want to have our wits about us,” says another. “A nice garlic bread is going to be in there and something a little fishy to start the taste buds. Rollmops, young pickled herring in the sweet pickle tradition of Norway. Not too salty; lovely flavor. The person I have in mind has a sweet tooth. We come to the main course, something meaty, say beefsteak. Filet. It’s no good throwing it on the grill. Young ladies can be delicate. The marinade is important—an herby, oily marinade with some black pepper—the aromas are thought to be an aphrodisiac. For a New Ager, incense, but we won’t go into that.”
Curiously, not one person proposed chicken or lamb for a seduction meal. Perhaps people feel that chicken is too common and too bland, which a good chicken isn’t (chicken broth is another matter), and that lamb is too robust, bordering on being gamey. Fish, on the other hand, is delicate, while beef suggests lust. Shellfish is somehow both delicate and lustful. It might have to do with its slippery texture, but perhaps it has to do with the primordial briny taste of the sea. How often people have spoken of being invigorated by the bracing coolness and damp sea scents of salt air. It’s powerful stuff, indeed. Whether foods actually possess inherent aphrodisiac properties is debatable, but if they seem to, then, like a placebo, they do. Of course, their power to excite has to begin with something as basic as a person’s likes and dislikes. I can’t imagine being charmed by a piece of rare beef, but a perfect white peach or briny little oyster would have plenty of allure. It’s quite a personal matter.
“I don’t understand why some people think things like oysters and roll mops and other forms of cold fish are seductive,” cries Patrick, who finds such edibles profoundly off-putting. He would