SYNCHOPATED FEASTINGS

Welcome to the new year. I heard the kids (people under 30) referring to the new calendar year as Twenty-dime. I feel old when I hear things like that. What is wrong with ought-ten? The Saucyblog will have a few new features and contributors in the upcoming year, but for the time being - FOB - Friend of the Blog, Charles Seluzicki, shares thoughts on holiday feasts. Thank you, Charlie and enjoy.

The other day my friend Kirsten was describing her traditional Christmas Eve dinner: cheese fondue. Well, "describing" isn't wholly accurate. She was complaining that they had run short and now, a full five days later, she was still hungry for fondue. Kirsten and I frequently talk about food, so the plaintive rift on the ritual piercing of hunks of bread and coating them in the melty blend of three cheeses that followed was hardly uncharacteristic. And it got me thinking about about the rituals of eating and particularly those forms of eating which require interactions with food beyond the usual mechanics of the fork, the knife and the spoon. I think of these forms of feasting as syncopated because they shift from the emphasis of everyday eating, a quality that in itself is a great part of its appeal. They are commonly communal in nature and their ritual nature is particularly pronounced. Eating, quite literally, occurs in a whole new key.

In Baltimore, going to a crab house on a warm summer night is just such a seasonal ritual. Families sit around picnic tables covered with newspaper, mallets, claw crackers and picks. Pitchers of cold beer and iced tea come and then a couple dozen steamed blue crabs covered with a thick layer of red spice. Everyone will talk about how work intensive the process is but they will also proudly display great intact sweet lumps of claw or back fin like a prize, lovingly devoured as just the right seasoning is added, licked directly from the fingertips. In winter, my father and my uncles would take us boys with them into the back yard in the middle of December with a couple bushels of oysters. Yes, the men were shucking for the oyster stew but their prize was the oysters on the half shell. They would show my cousin Johnny and I how to pop the shell of those beautiful Chincoteagues; it was a magic trick, learning how to open a stone.  I did not cry when the spring steel blade of my first oyster knife broke two years ago. Sometimes I still feel like it though. I own a dozen oyster knives but I have yet to find another with just that perfect feel.

In New Orleans, they have their spicy shrimp and crawdad boils, in New England, lobsters and clams steam under layers of seaweed and wet burlap. The young and newcomers learn how to suck head, pinch tail, unlock secret cavities in crustaceans and marvel at troves of tasty roe. Great discussions about spice mixes, steaming liquids, sauces and various accompaniments ensue. Specialities in different places inspire genuine surprise. I still remember a visit to a crab house in Baltimore where crabs were dipped in a spicy batter and deep fried. What emerged was a monstrous piece of golden sculpture, three or four times the size of the original crab and roughly retaining its form. The outside was crispy, the dough fluffy and perfectly flavored. And, of course, the crab finally emerged, a crabcake packed into the top shell, the succulent body and legs ready to be cracked and picked. The best of all worlds. This was a great favorite of my mother's.

My son Adam suggests that even toasting marshmallows over an open fire qualifies. Preparing a righteous stick, finding that spot over the embers to perfectly toast your confection, even the occasional pyrotechnics, all speak to the marvelous "difference" that characterize these forms of eating.


Charles Seluzicki