I make use of room temperature dogs

"It's funny", I say to the pathologist as I balance a prune on the same slice of bread as a glacé cherry and a slice of pork, "the more disgusting the recipes are, the more I want to do it."

Yesterday we spoke of the Valentine Cake, an extraordinary thing made of margarine and Marie Rose sauce. What we did not speak of were the sandwiches that came before the cake.

There is little to do or say, other than to show you a picture of the final work and to share the pathologist's live sandwich-by-sandwich commentary. I didn't make 16 sandwiches, and I didn't make all the ones pictured on the recipe card; there were some recipes on the back of the card that weren't in the picture but so good that I had to do them (e.g. spaghetti in curried mayonnaise).

If you want to follow along, start top left, go down, then start at the top of the next row. (NB: I sit at the table with my laptop and transcribe the pathologist's reactions word-for-word. No editing, no nothing.)

Danish Open Sandwiches




Sliced egg and tomato

“Is there anything on the bread? Tomato and egg sandwich. What is there to say?”

Frankfurters and potato salad with mustard mayonnaise, crispy bacon and onion rings

“It’s definitely not small enough for a canapé… you’re just stuffing it in your mouth so you can’t be standing around chatting in a distinguished Danish style. You’re just trying to make sure it doesn’t end up on the floor. It was nice that one though. It had bacon in it.”

Diced chicken and mushroom in mayonnaise with cucumber and tomato.

“So artfully prepared… you couldn’t have this at the ambassador’s reception. Unless it’s the Albanian ambassador.  Chicken, cucumber. What’s not to like? So delicate.  [Stares at cake.] I’m just so fascinated by the cake. Is it made out of sugar?”

Cold meat with horseradish, prunes and orange

“That was just weird.  I got a big bite of orange peel.”

Chicken with gherkins and tomato

“Looks like a bunch of little eels.  Let’s see what we do can do with that.  That little baby eel family.  Chomp chomp.  I think it’s good.  It dilutes the pickle.  The bread and chicken.  Mixes it all up and makes it more palatable.  I approve of this one .”

Pork, pineapple rings, cherries and bacon

“I don’t know. Reminds me of going to a friend’s house and eating ham with pineapple on it. Which is not a happy experience. Who comes up with ideas like that I wonder? Danes? Did they have like scurvy problems, the Danes?”

Cooked spaghetti in curried mayonnaise garnished with herrings, a slice of egg and cress
 (Note: I drew the line at herrings.)

“Now this makes no sense at all. I can tell from just looking at it. A spaghetti sandwich? It’s like, what the fuck? It’s not delicious. There’s a big chunk of butter so that helped. I think she was running out of combination possibilities at that point. She was getting desperate. You can smell the desperation in this combination.”

Sliced ham, mayonnaise and mixed vegetables

“Again, the butter is the only saving grace.”

Cooked sausage and onion rings

“I could go for that being Danish. Raw onions and frankfurters. I know nothing of the Danes, but in my mind that’s what they eat all day. Gives them strengths to put umlauts over their vowels. Or crosses over their Os. Slashes. They do that. I’ve seen them do it. This is delicious. It’s like a hotdog. Well a cold dog. A room temperature dog.”

Smoked pork, cheese, tomato and parsley

“This is more civilized.  Parsley is the um … makes a repeat performance throughout the evening.  Do you remember the days when all you had to do to show a bit of class was to have a bit of parsley? Maybe you don’t. Maybe you’re too young. Nowadays it just means that you’re a family restaurant in the suburbs, but back in the 60s I’m sure it was the height of sophistication. Especially in Denmark.”

Cold beef with mustard mayonnaise, horseradish, tomato and onion

“I like that. I might even close it. Now this feels like an actual sandwich. Not a travesty of one. Why do you think they did open sandwiches like that? Is it because they were running out of bread?”

Ham stuffed with diced vegetables with mayonnaise, pineapple and cherry.

“Well. We’re down to the last one and it looks like a doozy. Fucking hell. So basically you use whatever’s left. It’s like all the foodgroups in a mouthful. It’s very bad. It’s terrible. Fruit, vegetable, meat and mayonnaise in the same mouth? It’s just wrong.  It’s just a crime against nature.  To hell with those Danes, I say.”

Coming soon: something to do with fish and fruit.

I use margarine

"It says margarine! I am not using margarine. Where is the margarine? In its own special corner marked 'margarine' under the sign that says 'Margarine'? I am not going there. It is a bad bad place. Can I use butter? No! I cannot use butter. Marguerite Patten says I must use margarine. Margarine is disgusting. Is it worse than lard or suet? Are lard and suet the same thing? Can't I use butter?"

Yes, I must use margarine, and I am not talking to myself but to my 'husband' who is in the shop with me pushing the trolley (small) and saying, "what do you MEAN, Frankfurters in a tin? Where would they BE?", like I have told him that chickens hibernate. It is endless, the margarine chat spurting out of my mouth; I am horrified by margarine for many reasons, not least that it contains unpredictable amounts of water and that, my friends, is a disaster for baking.

"Baking what?!" I hear you cry, your tiny simple little faces alive with expectation. "Why, Marguerite Patten's Valentine Cake, of course!", I reply kindly, pulling on my pipe and thrusting my hand into a packet of crisps.

"A picture speaks a thousand words", they say. The picture that I am about to show you of what happened in my kitchen earlier today does not speak a thousand words, it speaks two: 'vomit' and 'confection'.





































I have little to say in my defence, leaving instead the final word to the pathologist via the means of a new feature (introduced tonight) in which I do an exact transcript of his reactions to the things I cook as he eats them. You will like it, I think! Here goes:

"Did you do it exactly like the recipe?  For once it won’t be a big drama to throw it in the bin. The white bit’s alright. It’s the first time I ever said no to cake without any regrets. Man. What the hell is that? I mean you just made it and it tastes like it was made 3 weeks ago and left on the counter.  So you did this one verbatim? Well you know. People were made of tougher fibre in those days. Maybe eating cake was a sort of character building experience.  I thought it was going to be a delicious mocha cake, but no. I’m curious about that flesh colour, though."

Coming tomorrow: 12 Danish open sandwiches, each one accompanied by a 'live review' from the pathologist. You should be made aware that pineapple rings, pork and glacé cherries make an appearance. On the same sandwich.

I update the playlist of my readers

Woo-weeeee, Daddy-O! Not bad, my friends, not bad: here is the most recent playlist constructed of songs submitted by you, my loyal and adoring readers. Not all of them have made it on, but that is more because of the length it already is than whether I like Placebo or not.




If you wish to submit yet another song in the meantime, simply go here:

Send me your track
Pip pip!

DJ Sir NWM

I prepare for Marguerite

Yes, my friends, it is true: after last week's astonishing spherical foodstuffs, many of you have, I know, been on the edge of your tenterhooks waiting to find out what this week's rummage (by the French-Canadian veterinary research histopathologist) into the box of Marguerite Patten 1967 recipe cards will yield - and therefore what delicious projects will be on my 'to cook' list this weekend.

You need wait no longer, for now all is revealed:












































So many questions. Why is there a medallion on the cake plate?  Is that corned beef? Is this really what Danish people eat?   And more to the point, how do you get the juice out of a cucumber?

Pip pip!

NWM

I need more songs

Do come along now, readers, we need more songs.  I have had a great number of submissions (some not yet 'uploaded'), but we are in need of some more jaunty tunes; the kind of tunes that make you want to skip and shout "hoorah!".

Here is where we are. To listen to it all, press the big orange 'play' button on the left. Or squeeze the life out of the individual 'tracks' (dread word) by pressing on them with your mouse.

Non-workingmonkey Clockwise Twirl Music by Nonworkingmonkey

And here is where to send me your bangin' choons:

Send me your track

No, I cannot explain the Lightfoot either.

Pip pip!