Sunday column May 11th 2014 Raisin Pie

He looked at me with benign contempt whilst I sent a withering laser of disdain across his bow in return. This in my own club! It was too much. The foregoing had come about because of a breach of club rules by a new mem called Mr. Trestle-Tram that proved once and for all that the membership committee was asleep at the switch. To let this thug into our midst was an appalling misstep. When I explain my side of this outrage the scales will leap from your eyes. For the last few weeks the club has been serving a fixed menu lunch, where for a reasonable price one receives the club roast beef and Yorkshire pud with its pretorian guard of two veg. The dessert consists of the “home of homes” raisin pie created with great élan by Rudolph our chef. I don’t know about you, but the very thought of raisin pie brings on a case of uncontrollable dribbling from me. I dream about the stuff, and why not? Only a fool dislikes raisin pie.

The incident began when Mrs. ffrangington-Davis had decided upon a diet where desserts are outlawed and offered me first dibs on her unwanted pie, which comes anyway with the fixed menu, if you see what I mean. It was universally understood that it was mine. Now follow me closely, for I don’t want to lose you in the cut and thrust of the intricate plot against me. This Trestle-Tram absconded with my raisin pie.Yes! He snatched it and gobbled it in almost one motion and then grinned, and not sheepishly. I am almost prancing like a fire-walker as I write this. I have told several faithful friends that I may have to resign over it, but Kitty, my wife of some 50 years, thinks I am making too much of a fuss over this. Can you believe it? I will move on, of course, but I have been scarred.

My late father would always wallow in bromides like: “It is the little things that start wars.” For instance, it is an almost unknown fact that the Russian-Turkish war was instigated by one of those everyday misunderstandings that escalated before saner minds could intervene and avoid a terrible conflict that solved nothing. It began on a bright and sunny day in Constantinople when the Russian ambassador, Count Nicholas Toomuchstinki, dropped in for a chat with his friend, the foreign minister for Turkey, one Mustafa Large-One, at his ornate home. The usual strong coffees were served along with a large date cake, which the Russian found too rich for his liking. The date cake is the key here, as you will see, for it was cooked by Mustafa’s favourite wife. The conversation was steaming along as usual, touching on such things as perhaps Turkey could let up a bit on the slave trade, the Tsar found it repulsive etc. The friendly riposte from the large and reclining Turk, after pressing the homemade cake on the ambassador, was along the lines of perhaps the Russians might give those pogroms against innocent villagers a miss as the Emir found the whole thing disgusting. The foreign minister tried again to interest the Russian in his wife’s cake, but again it was declined as the ambassador was not himself, thanks to an underdone eel the night before in a highly suspect restaurant across from his go-to brothel. Just at that moment the veiled wife in question, Fatima, arrived, presumably to accept the expected polite applause for her renowned date cake from her husband’s old friend Count Nicholas. When she pointed a hairy finger at the almost untouched delight the ambassador unwisely grumbled: “It is bloody awful.” With that, an enraged Fatima brought her large foot down onto the open sandal of her husband, and hit a bunion. Harsh words between old friends led to a terrible conflict.

I still resent the pie-stealing new mem, but I must relax.

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