IT wasn’t loved at first bite. Which is hardly surprising, as intense pain and amorous infatuation are hardly the most natural of bedfellows—unless you’re that way inclined. However, this is a column about food, rather than the exploits of the Marquis de Sade, and my lifelong infatuation with chillies started not with a whimper, but a bang. When, at the tender age of seven, my unsullied taste buds were flayed into submission by an excess of Tabasco sauce.
In fact, this was the only form of chilli you’d find in our house, apart from a dusty old pot of curry powder at the back of the cupboard, which was annually exhumed to take part in that godless mess they call Coronation chicken. But this first searing experience, the result of a sneaked sip of my father’s Bloody Mary, certainly left its mark. At first, there was pain, intense pain, like Vesuvius erupting in my mouth, with waves of molten fire coursing down my throat, laying waste to my senses, flooding my eyes with tears.
I spent the next 20 minutes with my tongue— now little more than engorged, useless gristle —under the tap. All to no avail, as capsaicin, the irritant alkaloid where the heat is found, is not water-soluble. Which means the agony is simply spread further. Milk, bread or bananas make a far better sop. Yet, once the fury had subsided and the world came back into focus, I felt enraptured, enveloped in the warmest of glows. Colours seemed more vivid, sounds amplified and a great grin was plastered across my face.
Denne historien er fra August 11, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra August 11, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
