[Yesterday's supper: chicken curry, with a side of raita and a small amount of lime pickle. A very small amount, really. But I shouldn't have added the chilies. There was not enough raita.]
I felt like I had eaten a British dinner. Spam, baked beans from a can, plus spongy fried bread. It tasted much better, but the effect on the bowels was similar. Baked beans would be immeasurably improved by the addition of lime pickle and chilies. Try it sometime; you'll be astounded, mate.
[That last remark is for the benefit of wandering Englishmen. Who may or may not be seeking to expand their culinary range. Baked beans in a can may also be served vindaloo-style, with a cup of chicken tikka, or with butter-chicken sauce over bangers and mash. You'll never have to figure out how to cook, just open the tins and decant into the skillet. Very British.]
Gastric distress. And a larcenous simian. Who desires to buy a banana plantation and have naked white men sweating in the hot sun of Jamaica harvesting his fruits.
Yesterday his pet-turkey, Giuseppe-Bob (actually a three-inch tall plush rooster with lovely plumes), was threatening to burn him with matches if forced to fly over Wheelie Boy and spray him with an Armalite. Which is understandable, because manipulating a machine gun while flapping your wings is problematic, to say the least. Giuseppe-Bob is talented, but not even a boy scout could manage.
[The senior roomie, ms. Bruin, is the one who came up with the plan. Aged teddy bears do not react well when neglected by young women swooning over hot buns in wheelchairs. The young lady is my apartment mate and long-time friend, Savage Kitten. The hot buns in a wheelchair belong to some dude.]
The only possible response to all this drama -- raging dyspepsia, rowdy stuffed animals, and thoughts of British food -- is, naturally, a bowlful of St. Bruno Flake. That being a tobacco I once described as the antidote for eggs.
Yes, I can still understand why generations of married Englishmen fell for this stuff. It's the perfect answer to their wives' cooking. If you're going to open tins, might as well include one with good stuff inside. The top-dressing would mask the mildew funk of the house pretty well, and would not be amiss in a pub either. It's sort of a restrained middle-class village harlot odeur. All in all likely to remind Bruce or Winston of his years at school, when life was carefree and ale was cheap.
Before the endless routine of baked beans, fried tomato, and canned muck dumped on top. British married life. Which is icky.
ST. BRUNO FLAKE
Mildly sweet, if smoked slow. Dark steam-pressed Virginias with a touch of Kentucky, and an unidentifiable top-dressing of the "we're SO refined" type.
It bears relighting, and will not leave a funk.
Pleasant, full-bodied, and a bit earthy.
Provided you keep your pipe cool.
I want a spot of tea now.
Might even go with sherry.
Not a bad tobacco. If I were exiled to England, I would probably smoke this more often.
I took back my wallet, by the way. Much to the distress of a furry miscreant. I do not need a banana plantation in my apartment.
Despite the warm tropic ambiance it would bring.
He's howling on my bed right now.
I am, he says, utterly evil.
A very bad man.
TOBACCO INDEX
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