Garlic, Mint, and Sweet Basil by Jean-Claude Izzo

Author:Jean-Claude Izzo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Europa Editions UK
Published: 2013-03-20T16:00:00+00:00

GARLIC

The first girl I ever kissed smelled of garlic. It was in a hut in Les Goudes, at that hour on a summer’s day when adults take an afternoon nap. I learned, that year I turned fifteen, to love garlic. Its smell in the mouth. Its taste on the tongue. And the intoxication of kisses, of pleasure. Then came the joys of bread simply rubbed in garlic and the spicy bodies of women. Since then, in my kitchen, garlic has reigned supreme. In spite of its bad reputation. Because garlic, as you must have realized by now, is part of our hunger for life. It is garlic alone that opens the doors to all flavors. It knows how to welcome them. That’s what cooking and eating is: a welcome. Lovers, friends, children, grandchildren. All of us, without exception, around the table, peeling white or red beans, cutting eggplant and zucchini and green and red and yellow peppers, gutting fish, washing octopus and squid and cuttlefish, cutting up rabbit, marinating red meat . . . Sea bream in fennel, aïoli, ratatouille, bouillabaisse, vegetable soup, paella, braised artichoke in white wine broth, cod in tomato and red wine sauce . . . These dishes are born out of friendship, out of the pleasure of being together, unrestrained words and laughter. And the house is filled with a strong odor. A bold, wild odor. Because it’s obvious that cooking with garlic is a culinary outrage, an insult to good taste. It is in these gestures around garlic that worlds divide. More seriously than you might imagine. Nothing, in fact, goes better with garlic than wine, preferably red wine. Bandol in particular, from the wonderful Mourvèdre grape. Generous, elegant, powerful, rich, aromatic wines. With each mouthful, the garlic and wine together push the outrage to its limits, until the palate can’t take it anymore. Like the intoxication of a first kiss. That’s why I say, in opposition to all the bloodsucking vampires who steal our energy, empty our brains and dry our hearts: Eat garlic and drink wine. That’s life. Because, to paraphrase the writer Jim Harrison, it’s hard to get by in this life without garlic and wine.

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