Sunday, November 19, 2006

mia makes great potato salad

That's an anagram, but like the best anagrams, it also happens to be true when taken at face value. I am not sure where she got the original concept from but it might have been at least partly inspired by our Denver friend Naomi who also makes a great potato salad. Pickled gherkins, or dill pickles as they may also be known, are key.

I think we let potatoes down a lot, not Mia and I, I mean everyone, except possibly Mia and I, and Naomi, because we tend to regard them as a stodgy filler for whatever flavour we are up for at that moment. But potatoes do have a terriffic flavour of their own. They are not the vanilla of vegetables, so don't say they are.

I mean I suppose unpickled gherkins, whatever they may be (are they immature zucchinis? It's incredible and wondrous to me what I don't know - like absolutely everything in my life I blame, naturally, the Victorian Education Department of the 1970s/early 80s and specifically the grotesque John Gardiner High School of Burgess St, Hawthorn) might also be seen by many as, if not stodge, at least a template, characterless in themselves. But I say not at all. Not at all. Or am I being contrary.

I have been watching the first season of 24. My verdict over half way through - well, life's too short, but then again as my friend the philosopher Andrew Withycombe (name droppin') once said, 'Life's not that short'. And both of those notions are true.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

They're little tiny cucumbers.

Anonymous said...

A great potato salad has fresh dill, mint & chives chopped & mixed through with the mayonnaise. But gherkins! That's inspired.

David Nichols said...

Well, they are perfectly appropriate. Of course they are dilly.

the early 70s was all juxtaposition

October 1970, everyone had their arms out in the air, from Barbra to, um, whoever that is on the left, to Thumbelina. This is from the Sprin...