Miguel Fliguer's Blog
January 8, 2018
First German review of "Cooking With Lovecraft" !
Many thanks to Marcus Pohlmann for his kind review of Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen. Much appreciated!
http://www.roterdorn.de/buch/cooking-...
This is the book's first German language review... perhaps a new translation is in order ?
http://www.roterdorn.de/buch/cooking-...
This is the book's first German language review... perhaps a new translation is in order ?
October 29, 2017
"Cooking With Lovecraft" featured on Dread Central !
Very nice shoutout !
Read the article here.
[...] The result is an interesting hybrid: part-cookbook, part-anthology, Cooking with Lovecraft is a collection of 23 stories and 13 recipes that come together to form a tongue-in-cheek tribute to this pioneer of weird fiction. Novices in the kitchen need not worry: The recipes often read like playful in-jokes to anyone well-read in Lovecraft’s body of work—from a sausage-based dish inspired by “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” to banana bread that takes its cues from “Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family.”
Similarly, many of the tales give you equal helpings of humor and eldritch horror. Some are original works with a wink and nod to well-loved Lovecraftian tropes or references; others are a new take on familiar stories that are told from the viewpoint of not-so-familiar side characters: One, dubbed “The Feastival,” is what Fliguer describes as a “Lovecraftian Passover story” that plays out like a parody of Lovecraft’s “The Festival.” Another, “Bratwurst mit Sauerkraut” is set in the German submarine in “The Temple.”
Read the article here.
October 15, 2017
The Horror From The Ice-Cream
“The Vermonster is a large ice cream sundae found in Ben & Jerry’s ‘scoop shops’, which is served in a ‘Vermonster Bucket’ and consists of 20 scoops of ice cream, a fudge brownie, four bananas, three cookies, 10 scoops of walnuts, four toppings, four ladles of hot fudge, and whipped cream. It contains 14,000 calories and 500 grams of fat. Each Vermonster is intended to be shared by four or more people. Roman and I will consume one each.” -- Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Chef
[…] We arrived to St. Johnsbury after a long journey through beautiful New Hampshire, and for the night we rented a cheap, old shack on Webster St., not far from the town square. We were thrilled to be in Vermont again, this time with a clear purpose… to face, and conquer, the legendary Ice Cream Bucket. Or, as locals call it, The Frozen Beast.
Ever since our first visit to Maxfield’s, Morton and Lovecraft had developed a queer obsession with finding, and conquering, the most outrageous ice-cream desserts in the Northeast. Lovecraft in particular still grumbled about that fateful day in Warren, when he could try only twenty-eight flavors instead of the full thirty-two from the menu.
For months, we had heard rumors and whispers about people claiming to have seen the Beast from afar. Somewhere in the Green Mountains dwelled a hermit who once sent a remarkable letter to Lovecraft, vividly describing his dreams of a dairy monstrosity walking among the snowed peaks. And there was that disturbing St. Johnsbury’s Caledonian-Record news clipping about a man found on the road to Burlington, babbling madly and covered in a gelid substance which, when analyzed later, turned out to be melted ice-cream.
Rumors, old wives’ tales… But now, we were close to the truth. Only fifty miles separated us from the town of Waterbury, home of a creamery establishment called Benedict & Jeremiah, where the Beast had been first summoned into existence. That place was usually open to the general public but our source (a man whose name I will not mention here) had provided us with a telephone number for “special visitors”. So the three of us went to a postal office, and Lovecraft telephoned the man, as we huddled our heads close to the receiver.
After an exchange of pleasantries, the man on the other side of the line asked how many pilgrims would be in our party, and our names, and whether we would fancy a tour of the creamery workshop afterwards. He also mentioned that the usual choice for the few selected visitors was to sample a few favorite flavors. Apparently, our reputation of fearless ice-cream devourers had not preceded us, so Lovecraft asked him directly about the mythical Frozen Beast.
The line went silent for a moment. Then, the man spoke in an awed, respectful tone, “Ah, I see. But I would like to warn you first, Sir. Being worthy of The Bucket, or as you named it, the Beast, calls for the finest qualities in a man… Courage, determination, and of course a clear, strategic mind. Since you and your companions have come from far away to Vermont in your quest, I realize you are men of the highest calibre, and it will be my honour to personally prepare a Bucket for your party to share tomorrow. The Bucket is conceived for partaking among four, five or even six people. However, sharing one betwixt a party of three is not uncommon.”
Lovecraft replied, “That is very courteous of you, Sir, but to be perfectly clear, each of us would like to consume one Bucket.” I did not catch the man’s reply, but Lovecraft said, “Very well, we will be there at noon. Thank you very much Sir.” He was grinning mischievously, and that made Morton and I smile as well.
After the call, we returned to our lodging place and slept peacefully. In the morning we fortified ourselves with good coffee and biscuits, and took the bus to Burlington. On the way we saw a glimpse of the gilded domes of Montpelier shining in the distance. We got off in Waterbury at ten o’clock, which gave us time to explore the town before our noon appointment. Lovecraft, always the indefatigable, excitedly led the way looking for old steeples and windows and other architectural oddities, while Morton and I enjoyed the peace and quiet of the almost empty streets.
After a short walk up the road to Stowe, we reached the grounds of the creamery. Lovecraft announced our presence to a cheerful receptionist, and after a brief wait our contact man greeted us and led the way to a garden inside the factory grounds. We walked to a beautiful gazebo, and sat around an old-fashioned wooden table.
The man shewed us a list of flavors to choose, and proudly explained that a Bucket contained a mighty twenty ice-cream scoops. Morton dryly observed that since we had conquered a twenty-eight flavor marathon in Maxfield’s the previous year, a mere twenty-scoops was almost contemptible. The man, undaunted, replied that the Bucket also included a brownie, four whole bananas, three cookies, ten scoops of walnuts, four toppings of our choice, and four ladles of hot fudge, with a generous slathering of whipped cream on top.
Lovecraft seemed to be reassessing the challenge under this new light. Morton looked worried. We did not have considered the addition of alien ingredients to what we thought it was a pure ice-cream confectionery.
Presently Lovecraft spoke, “Very well my friends! We have come from faraway lands to conquer this challenge and we shall not be deterred. In fact, I believe we can use those elements to our advantage!” He then produced his travel notebook and pen, and proceeded to draw an extraordinary diagram of a Bucket, with several ice cream “geological substrata” (as he called them), and betwixt them, the additional unexpected ingredients in well-ordered layers.
He ripped the page and gave it to our contact man, saying “Here, please build for us three buckets according to these architectural specifications. Break the larger ingredients in minute pieces, and please use twenty different flavors for the scoops. We trust your judgement for the selection of toppings, and we shall patiently wait here. The glory of slaying the Beast is at hand!”
The man examined the diagram and then looked at Lovecraft with renewed respect. He spoke, “As I promised you yesterday, I will be honored to construct these Buckets myself. I will be back in about ten minutes. Please make yourselves at home, and explore our beautiful garden…” He did an ominous pause and with a deeper, theatrical voice said, “… and our graveyard.” Then he returned to his cheerful, professional demeanor, and gave Morton a small brass bell. “And if you would fancy coffee or an early taste of ice-cream,” he said with a wink, “just ring this bell and an assistant will be glad to serve you.” With that, he turned and dissapeared into the factory.
We all looked at each other in disbelief. Did the man had actually say “graveyard”? We all had heard it and still could not fathom it. Did the factory had a cemetery on its grounds? That sounded outrageously unsanitary, yet it exerted a queer attraction on us. Who were those interred there? Lovecraft hinted that the place was perhaps a burial ground for those who had perished in their confrontation against the Frozen Beast, the same challenge we were about to face. That was a sobering thought that made a chill run down my spine. Suddenly we were all in a taciturn mood.
But then Morton surprised us, taking a small box out from his coat pocket with a theatrical flourish. He opened the box and shewed three metal spoons, of beautiful antique making and polished to a mirror-like quality. He gave one to Lovecraft and another to me and said, “I purchased these spoons last year, after our visit to Maxfield’s. For ice-cream consumption, a noble metal is a far superior material than the common devices from these establishments." Lovecraft nodded approvingly, and we realized Morton had each spoon handle artistically engraved with our respective initials. We thanked him effusively, and in an admirable feat, Lovecraft quickly wrote on a paper napkin an impromptu sonnet, “To Mortonius, Esquire, upon his Gift of a Precious Silver Utensil” and gave it to him.
The ominous graveyard talk was, at least for the time being, forgotten.
Presently our contact man was back, pushing a brass tram with the three Buckets. He courteously arranged them in front of us around the table, and parked the tram next to it. We then had the chance to examine our challenges… Those were impressive confections of colossal size, heavy and overflowing with whipped cream and small chocolate pieces and multi-colored unfamiliar delights.
The man noticed our polished metal spoons and smiled approvingly. He said, “Gentlemen, I only have two suggestions for you before you begin. First, attempt to ingest as much as you can, as fast as you manage. Because after a few minutes, your stomach will send a signal to your brain imploring you to stop. Second, the spoon should go into your mouth with the ice-cream facing down, towards your tongue instead of your palate, to prevent numbing and discomfort. I must say you are about to make history and I am honored to be a witness. Good luck!”
Lovecraft picked up his spoon, smiling with a blissful, child-like delight at the prospect of that gargantuan icecream feast. He looked at us and only said, “Gentlemen…” And he began to carve spoonful after spoonful in a slow but deliberate manner, and consuming them with ease. Morton used a different, faster technique, as our contact man had suggested. I looked in awe at those two ice-cream champions… Morton, with winged feet like a sprinter; and Lovecraft, with the long-run endurance of the Marathon soldier. I soon realized I was in no way ready to keep up with them, so my choice was simply to explore the layers in my bucket, sampling the different iced flavors and the textures from the additional ingredients.
Back in Maxfield’s, Lovecraft had dominated the conversation, entertaining us with a flurry of anecdotes about the Italian origins of ice cream and the famous people who loved it. But this time the challenge seemed to require all his concentration. Morton, for his part, was eating quickly, so he had no time for idle talk. And I didn’t dare to interrupt them with small talk, so I watched in awe as both titans laboriously advanced against the monstrous frozen entities.
I had only barely finished the first layer of scoops in my bucket, when I noticed Morton had stopped his aggressive ingestion. His face was pale, and I feared he had a sudden indisposition. Lovecraft noticed that too, so he paused and asked him how he was feeling. Morton wryly smiled and said, “Well, friends, I admit defeat. There is still about half a layer of scoops here in my bucket, but I dread the thought of eating another spoonful…” He closed his eyes, and in obvious discomfort he leaned back on his chair and went very quiet.
I turned to Lovecraft and asked him about his progress against that frozen nightmare that had vanquished our friend. He said there was about one full layer of scoops remaining on his bucket, but now that Morton was out of the race, it was a matter of honor for him to finish it. With that, he methodically continued his assault.
I rang the brass bell and presently our contact man came to our table. He said a few words of encouragement to Morton, and was clearly in awe of Lovecraft and his slow, steady progress. I ordered coffee for me, but Morton declined it emphatically.
When coffee arrived a few minutes later, Lovecraft paused and remarked to our contact man that the Bucket ice-cream was of the finest quality, and some of the flavors were indeed more appealing than their equivalents from Maxfield’s. The man thanked him and said he would forward those compliments to Mr. Greenfield and Mr. Cohen, the creamery founders and general managers.
“Well, well,” asked Lovecraft with genuine surprise, “are you telling us the creators of this ice-cream masterpiece are from Semitic extraction?”
“Why, yes, of course”, the man replied, “They are both sons of Jewish immigrant families, which settled in Vermont sometime in the eighties. In fact, I am Jewish myself too… third generation here in Waterbury!” The man seemed puzzled by the question.
Lovecraft had a strange, thoughtful expression I haven’t seen on him before. He slowly consumed the last remainders of ice-cream and the soggy toppings at the bottom. Our contact man stood there, smiling quietly, while Morton and I watched Lovecraft finish the bucket, wondering about the forceful effect the man’s words had on him.
Presently he announced, “Gentlemen, that one was the very last bite!” He unfolded a napkin on the table, turned the Bucket upside down on top, and with a grin, he punched the bottom with the metal spoon, as an alpinist setting his flag at the conquered mountaintop. Our contact man started to clap, and Morton and I joined him in sincere tribute. Then the man said, “That was an impressive demonstration, Sir. You belong now to this factory’s lore, and your achievement will be properly remembered! Now, I realize you gentlemen need some time to recover but as soon as you feel capable, I would much appreciate if you join me for a tour of the gardens and the graveyard.”
I couldn’t resist and asked him, “Could you please explain what on Earth has a graveyard to do with a creamery?”
“Well,” the man said, “our factory prizes itself on providing the best ice-cream with the widest possible selection of flavors. Our sales numbers tell us the most popular and of course, the least requested ones. When the latter do not sell well for an extended period of time, they are discontinued… we don’t produce or sell them anymore. Since they are part of the history of the company, we memorialize them in a ceremony at our gardens. The cemetery is the burial ground of those flavors that, alas, could not capture their share of the public taste. Each grave has a headstone, with a proper epitaph. We had visitors that, after learning that one of their favorite flavors has passed away, went to the grave site and paid their respects, leaving a flower in remembrance.”
A factory employee then came and whispered something to our contact man, who apologized to us and hurriedly went inside the factory. I told my friends, “As soon as you feel ready to go, I want to explore that place!”
They nodded, and we talked for a few minutes as they recovered from the marathonic ice-cream ordeal. Lovecraft’s conversation was unusually sparse, but from the little he said, I realized he was still pondering about the creamery’s Jewish proprietors.
Presently Lovecraft and Morton decided they felt well enough for a walk, so I rang the brass bell. A young woman in a pristine white uniform came to our table, and with a courteous smile invited us to follow her to the garden. She would be our guide –she explained– because unforeseen circumstances in the factory prevented our contact man to join us.
We followed her through a wooden portal painted in white and blue, with a sign that said “Flavor Graveyard”. It was a beautiful day, and the headstones scattered across the lawn had a comical effect on us. Other patrons were there walking among the tombs, examining the grave slabs as if they were historians or genealogists wandering through a lost cemetery.
We realized it was a well-crafted publicity stratagem, nothing more; and yet, it was harmless fun for the creamery customers… families with children amongst them. But Lovecraft was still on a pensive mood. He stood there, tall and gaunt amidst the tombstones, and Morton asked him what was on his mind.
Finally, he said “I had always judged impossible for the Jewish character to create true, original beauty…” As if talking to himself, he muttered, “That magnificent ice-cream confection, this immaculate garden, this clever graveyard of flavors… everything here proves otherwise…” And then he went quiet.
Morton and I conferred and decided that, since Lovecraft seemed deeply affected, we should end our visit. We asked the guide to give our regards to our contact man, who was hindered by some emergency in the factory and could not come to say goodbye.
We walked towards the bus stop in Waterbury. Lovecraft was still in that somber mood and didn’t talk at all. We boarded the bus to Burlington, where they had lodging arrangements for another night. I was already thinking of the bus I had to take at midnight, the first leg of my arduous travel back to Minnesota, while my friends would keep exploring the area for a few more days. That put me in a dark mood, and so it was an unusually silent ride for the three of us.
At the bus station later that night, Lovecraft shook my hand, looked me in the eyes and said, “That cemetery of flavors we saw, was in fact a cemetery of prejudice. Think about it.”
I boarded and waved my friends good-bye. As the bus pierced the night, and all through the long journey to St. Paul, with several bus changes in between, I meditated on Lovecraft’s cryptic parting message.
In time, of course, it all became clear.
Only a few years later, after the cataclysmic world war, when the horrors of fascism and racism were laid out in plain sight for all the humanity to see, Lovecraft was already a changed man. Gone were his racial prejudices against blacks, Jews, oriental and aboriginals. Gone were his sympathies to totalitarian dictatorships. He wrote several well-known articles denouncing the outdated and anti-scientific racial theories he had gladly espoused in the early 30’s. His work turned more and more to the philosophical aspects of science-fiction themes, and his pieces were warmly received by critics and publishers.
Lovecraft is now recognized, of course, as one of the champions of the civil-rights movement in America, at least since the early 60’s when his health was already in decline. His articles and correspondence from that period shew his obsession with the complete eradication of racial prejudice in the public and private spheres. He never renounced his rigorous rationalism or his atheism, nevertheless his complete volte-face on racial matters had a few notable repercussions. Prominent New York City rabbis invited him to speak at their communities, and the photograph of a grinning Lovecraft shaking hands with a black Baptist minister became immensely popular.
He was perfectly aware that those activities would have horrified his old self, but as he wrote in a famous letter to Isaac Asimov, “my prejudices lie buried in a small Vermont town, and no necromancy can raise them again.” There was much discussion among scholars when his letters were published, but at the time, only Morton and I understood that line.
In 1964, when he was frail and in poor health, Lovecraft wanted to participate in a civil-rights march across Providence, but Sonia convinced him to stay home. When he later heard about young students trampled by horses and hauled off to jail, he lamented not having been there for moral support. A few weeks later, he passed away peacefully in his sleep and the world lost not only the absolute master of the weird, but a sensible, caring man.
Over the years, I have talked a few times with Derleth about the complete change of mind Lovecraft experienced after our expedition to Vermont. But I never had the chance to talk about it with him, or with Morton. All I can say is what I have written here. Two Jewish ice-cream entrepreneurs, effortlessly and unknowingly, demolished years of ingrained prejudice with a simple, sweet, frozen monstrosity. That prejudice lies buried –without a headstone– in that beautiful, sunny graveyard where today, laughing children chase each other among the flavor tombs, and patrons share an Ice-Cream Bucket… or as they call it nowadays, a “Lovecraft’s Vermonster”.
----
Inspired by Donald Wandrei’s “The Dweller in Darkness”, the chronicle of how Lovecraft, Morton and himself visited Maxfield’s, an ice-cream establishment in Warren, Massachussets. This piece was originally included in “Marginalia”, edited by Wandrei and August Derleth. The relevant bit is on David Haden’s fascinating book, Walking With Cthulhu: H.P. Lovecraft as psychogeographer, New York City 1924-26
__________
This is a chapter from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
[…] We arrived to St. Johnsbury after a long journey through beautiful New Hampshire, and for the night we rented a cheap, old shack on Webster St., not far from the town square. We were thrilled to be in Vermont again, this time with a clear purpose… to face, and conquer, the legendary Ice Cream Bucket. Or, as locals call it, The Frozen Beast.
Ever since our first visit to Maxfield’s, Morton and Lovecraft had developed a queer obsession with finding, and conquering, the most outrageous ice-cream desserts in the Northeast. Lovecraft in particular still grumbled about that fateful day in Warren, when he could try only twenty-eight flavors instead of the full thirty-two from the menu.
For months, we had heard rumors and whispers about people claiming to have seen the Beast from afar. Somewhere in the Green Mountains dwelled a hermit who once sent a remarkable letter to Lovecraft, vividly describing his dreams of a dairy monstrosity walking among the snowed peaks. And there was that disturbing St. Johnsbury’s Caledonian-Record news clipping about a man found on the road to Burlington, babbling madly and covered in a gelid substance which, when analyzed later, turned out to be melted ice-cream.
Rumors, old wives’ tales… But now, we were close to the truth. Only fifty miles separated us from the town of Waterbury, home of a creamery establishment called Benedict & Jeremiah, where the Beast had been first summoned into existence. That place was usually open to the general public but our source (a man whose name I will not mention here) had provided us with a telephone number for “special visitors”. So the three of us went to a postal office, and Lovecraft telephoned the man, as we huddled our heads close to the receiver.
After an exchange of pleasantries, the man on the other side of the line asked how many pilgrims would be in our party, and our names, and whether we would fancy a tour of the creamery workshop afterwards. He also mentioned that the usual choice for the few selected visitors was to sample a few favorite flavors. Apparently, our reputation of fearless ice-cream devourers had not preceded us, so Lovecraft asked him directly about the mythical Frozen Beast.
The line went silent for a moment. Then, the man spoke in an awed, respectful tone, “Ah, I see. But I would like to warn you first, Sir. Being worthy of The Bucket, or as you named it, the Beast, calls for the finest qualities in a man… Courage, determination, and of course a clear, strategic mind. Since you and your companions have come from far away to Vermont in your quest, I realize you are men of the highest calibre, and it will be my honour to personally prepare a Bucket for your party to share tomorrow. The Bucket is conceived for partaking among four, five or even six people. However, sharing one betwixt a party of three is not uncommon.”
Lovecraft replied, “That is very courteous of you, Sir, but to be perfectly clear, each of us would like to consume one Bucket.” I did not catch the man’s reply, but Lovecraft said, “Very well, we will be there at noon. Thank you very much Sir.” He was grinning mischievously, and that made Morton and I smile as well.
After the call, we returned to our lodging place and slept peacefully. In the morning we fortified ourselves with good coffee and biscuits, and took the bus to Burlington. On the way we saw a glimpse of the gilded domes of Montpelier shining in the distance. We got off in Waterbury at ten o’clock, which gave us time to explore the town before our noon appointment. Lovecraft, always the indefatigable, excitedly led the way looking for old steeples and windows and other architectural oddities, while Morton and I enjoyed the peace and quiet of the almost empty streets.
After a short walk up the road to Stowe, we reached the grounds of the creamery. Lovecraft announced our presence to a cheerful receptionist, and after a brief wait our contact man greeted us and led the way to a garden inside the factory grounds. We walked to a beautiful gazebo, and sat around an old-fashioned wooden table.
The man shewed us a list of flavors to choose, and proudly explained that a Bucket contained a mighty twenty ice-cream scoops. Morton dryly observed that since we had conquered a twenty-eight flavor marathon in Maxfield’s the previous year, a mere twenty-scoops was almost contemptible. The man, undaunted, replied that the Bucket also included a brownie, four whole bananas, three cookies, ten scoops of walnuts, four toppings of our choice, and four ladles of hot fudge, with a generous slathering of whipped cream on top.
Lovecraft seemed to be reassessing the challenge under this new light. Morton looked worried. We did not have considered the addition of alien ingredients to what we thought it was a pure ice-cream confectionery.
Presently Lovecraft spoke, “Very well my friends! We have come from faraway lands to conquer this challenge and we shall not be deterred. In fact, I believe we can use those elements to our advantage!” He then produced his travel notebook and pen, and proceeded to draw an extraordinary diagram of a Bucket, with several ice cream “geological substrata” (as he called them), and betwixt them, the additional unexpected ingredients in well-ordered layers.
He ripped the page and gave it to our contact man, saying “Here, please build for us three buckets according to these architectural specifications. Break the larger ingredients in minute pieces, and please use twenty different flavors for the scoops. We trust your judgement for the selection of toppings, and we shall patiently wait here. The glory of slaying the Beast is at hand!”
The man examined the diagram and then looked at Lovecraft with renewed respect. He spoke, “As I promised you yesterday, I will be honored to construct these Buckets myself. I will be back in about ten minutes. Please make yourselves at home, and explore our beautiful garden…” He did an ominous pause and with a deeper, theatrical voice said, “… and our graveyard.” Then he returned to his cheerful, professional demeanor, and gave Morton a small brass bell. “And if you would fancy coffee or an early taste of ice-cream,” he said with a wink, “just ring this bell and an assistant will be glad to serve you.” With that, he turned and dissapeared into the factory.
We all looked at each other in disbelief. Did the man had actually say “graveyard”? We all had heard it and still could not fathom it. Did the factory had a cemetery on its grounds? That sounded outrageously unsanitary, yet it exerted a queer attraction on us. Who were those interred there? Lovecraft hinted that the place was perhaps a burial ground for those who had perished in their confrontation against the Frozen Beast, the same challenge we were about to face. That was a sobering thought that made a chill run down my spine. Suddenly we were all in a taciturn mood.
But then Morton surprised us, taking a small box out from his coat pocket with a theatrical flourish. He opened the box and shewed three metal spoons, of beautiful antique making and polished to a mirror-like quality. He gave one to Lovecraft and another to me and said, “I purchased these spoons last year, after our visit to Maxfield’s. For ice-cream consumption, a noble metal is a far superior material than the common devices from these establishments." Lovecraft nodded approvingly, and we realized Morton had each spoon handle artistically engraved with our respective initials. We thanked him effusively, and in an admirable feat, Lovecraft quickly wrote on a paper napkin an impromptu sonnet, “To Mortonius, Esquire, upon his Gift of a Precious Silver Utensil” and gave it to him.
The ominous graveyard talk was, at least for the time being, forgotten.
Presently our contact man was back, pushing a brass tram with the three Buckets. He courteously arranged them in front of us around the table, and parked the tram next to it. We then had the chance to examine our challenges… Those were impressive confections of colossal size, heavy and overflowing with whipped cream and small chocolate pieces and multi-colored unfamiliar delights.
The man noticed our polished metal spoons and smiled approvingly. He said, “Gentlemen, I only have two suggestions for you before you begin. First, attempt to ingest as much as you can, as fast as you manage. Because after a few minutes, your stomach will send a signal to your brain imploring you to stop. Second, the spoon should go into your mouth with the ice-cream facing down, towards your tongue instead of your palate, to prevent numbing and discomfort. I must say you are about to make history and I am honored to be a witness. Good luck!”
Lovecraft picked up his spoon, smiling with a blissful, child-like delight at the prospect of that gargantuan icecream feast. He looked at us and only said, “Gentlemen…” And he began to carve spoonful after spoonful in a slow but deliberate manner, and consuming them with ease. Morton used a different, faster technique, as our contact man had suggested. I looked in awe at those two ice-cream champions… Morton, with winged feet like a sprinter; and Lovecraft, with the long-run endurance of the Marathon soldier. I soon realized I was in no way ready to keep up with them, so my choice was simply to explore the layers in my bucket, sampling the different iced flavors and the textures from the additional ingredients.
Back in Maxfield’s, Lovecraft had dominated the conversation, entertaining us with a flurry of anecdotes about the Italian origins of ice cream and the famous people who loved it. But this time the challenge seemed to require all his concentration. Morton, for his part, was eating quickly, so he had no time for idle talk. And I didn’t dare to interrupt them with small talk, so I watched in awe as both titans laboriously advanced against the monstrous frozen entities.
I had only barely finished the first layer of scoops in my bucket, when I noticed Morton had stopped his aggressive ingestion. His face was pale, and I feared he had a sudden indisposition. Lovecraft noticed that too, so he paused and asked him how he was feeling. Morton wryly smiled and said, “Well, friends, I admit defeat. There is still about half a layer of scoops here in my bucket, but I dread the thought of eating another spoonful…” He closed his eyes, and in obvious discomfort he leaned back on his chair and went very quiet.
I turned to Lovecraft and asked him about his progress against that frozen nightmare that had vanquished our friend. He said there was about one full layer of scoops remaining on his bucket, but now that Morton was out of the race, it was a matter of honor for him to finish it. With that, he methodically continued his assault.
I rang the brass bell and presently our contact man came to our table. He said a few words of encouragement to Morton, and was clearly in awe of Lovecraft and his slow, steady progress. I ordered coffee for me, but Morton declined it emphatically.
When coffee arrived a few minutes later, Lovecraft paused and remarked to our contact man that the Bucket ice-cream was of the finest quality, and some of the flavors were indeed more appealing than their equivalents from Maxfield’s. The man thanked him and said he would forward those compliments to Mr. Greenfield and Mr. Cohen, the creamery founders and general managers.
“Well, well,” asked Lovecraft with genuine surprise, “are you telling us the creators of this ice-cream masterpiece are from Semitic extraction?”
“Why, yes, of course”, the man replied, “They are both sons of Jewish immigrant families, which settled in Vermont sometime in the eighties. In fact, I am Jewish myself too… third generation here in Waterbury!” The man seemed puzzled by the question.
Lovecraft had a strange, thoughtful expression I haven’t seen on him before. He slowly consumed the last remainders of ice-cream and the soggy toppings at the bottom. Our contact man stood there, smiling quietly, while Morton and I watched Lovecraft finish the bucket, wondering about the forceful effect the man’s words had on him.
Presently he announced, “Gentlemen, that one was the very last bite!” He unfolded a napkin on the table, turned the Bucket upside down on top, and with a grin, he punched the bottom with the metal spoon, as an alpinist setting his flag at the conquered mountaintop. Our contact man started to clap, and Morton and I joined him in sincere tribute. Then the man said, “That was an impressive demonstration, Sir. You belong now to this factory’s lore, and your achievement will be properly remembered! Now, I realize you gentlemen need some time to recover but as soon as you feel capable, I would much appreciate if you join me for a tour of the gardens and the graveyard.”
I couldn’t resist and asked him, “Could you please explain what on Earth has a graveyard to do with a creamery?”
“Well,” the man said, “our factory prizes itself on providing the best ice-cream with the widest possible selection of flavors. Our sales numbers tell us the most popular and of course, the least requested ones. When the latter do not sell well for an extended period of time, they are discontinued… we don’t produce or sell them anymore. Since they are part of the history of the company, we memorialize them in a ceremony at our gardens. The cemetery is the burial ground of those flavors that, alas, could not capture their share of the public taste. Each grave has a headstone, with a proper epitaph. We had visitors that, after learning that one of their favorite flavors has passed away, went to the grave site and paid their respects, leaving a flower in remembrance.”
A factory employee then came and whispered something to our contact man, who apologized to us and hurriedly went inside the factory. I told my friends, “As soon as you feel ready to go, I want to explore that place!”
They nodded, and we talked for a few minutes as they recovered from the marathonic ice-cream ordeal. Lovecraft’s conversation was unusually sparse, but from the little he said, I realized he was still pondering about the creamery’s Jewish proprietors.
Presently Lovecraft and Morton decided they felt well enough for a walk, so I rang the brass bell. A young woman in a pristine white uniform came to our table, and with a courteous smile invited us to follow her to the garden. She would be our guide –she explained– because unforeseen circumstances in the factory prevented our contact man to join us.
We followed her through a wooden portal painted in white and blue, with a sign that said “Flavor Graveyard”. It was a beautiful day, and the headstones scattered across the lawn had a comical effect on us. Other patrons were there walking among the tombs, examining the grave slabs as if they were historians or genealogists wandering through a lost cemetery.
We realized it was a well-crafted publicity stratagem, nothing more; and yet, it was harmless fun for the creamery customers… families with children amongst them. But Lovecraft was still on a pensive mood. He stood there, tall and gaunt amidst the tombstones, and Morton asked him what was on his mind.
Finally, he said “I had always judged impossible for the Jewish character to create true, original beauty…” As if talking to himself, he muttered, “That magnificent ice-cream confection, this immaculate garden, this clever graveyard of flavors… everything here proves otherwise…” And then he went quiet.
Morton and I conferred and decided that, since Lovecraft seemed deeply affected, we should end our visit. We asked the guide to give our regards to our contact man, who was hindered by some emergency in the factory and could not come to say goodbye.
We walked towards the bus stop in Waterbury. Lovecraft was still in that somber mood and didn’t talk at all. We boarded the bus to Burlington, where they had lodging arrangements for another night. I was already thinking of the bus I had to take at midnight, the first leg of my arduous travel back to Minnesota, while my friends would keep exploring the area for a few more days. That put me in a dark mood, and so it was an unusually silent ride for the three of us.
At the bus station later that night, Lovecraft shook my hand, looked me in the eyes and said, “That cemetery of flavors we saw, was in fact a cemetery of prejudice. Think about it.”
I boarded and waved my friends good-bye. As the bus pierced the night, and all through the long journey to St. Paul, with several bus changes in between, I meditated on Lovecraft’s cryptic parting message.
In time, of course, it all became clear.
Only a few years later, after the cataclysmic world war, when the horrors of fascism and racism were laid out in plain sight for all the humanity to see, Lovecraft was already a changed man. Gone were his racial prejudices against blacks, Jews, oriental and aboriginals. Gone were his sympathies to totalitarian dictatorships. He wrote several well-known articles denouncing the outdated and anti-scientific racial theories he had gladly espoused in the early 30’s. His work turned more and more to the philosophical aspects of science-fiction themes, and his pieces were warmly received by critics and publishers.
Lovecraft is now recognized, of course, as one of the champions of the civil-rights movement in America, at least since the early 60’s when his health was already in decline. His articles and correspondence from that period shew his obsession with the complete eradication of racial prejudice in the public and private spheres. He never renounced his rigorous rationalism or his atheism, nevertheless his complete volte-face on racial matters had a few notable repercussions. Prominent New York City rabbis invited him to speak at their communities, and the photograph of a grinning Lovecraft shaking hands with a black Baptist minister became immensely popular.
He was perfectly aware that those activities would have horrified his old self, but as he wrote in a famous letter to Isaac Asimov, “my prejudices lie buried in a small Vermont town, and no necromancy can raise them again.” There was much discussion among scholars when his letters were published, but at the time, only Morton and I understood that line.
In 1964, when he was frail and in poor health, Lovecraft wanted to participate in a civil-rights march across Providence, but Sonia convinced him to stay home. When he later heard about young students trampled by horses and hauled off to jail, he lamented not having been there for moral support. A few weeks later, he passed away peacefully in his sleep and the world lost not only the absolute master of the weird, but a sensible, caring man.
Over the years, I have talked a few times with Derleth about the complete change of mind Lovecraft experienced after our expedition to Vermont. But I never had the chance to talk about it with him, or with Morton. All I can say is what I have written here. Two Jewish ice-cream entrepreneurs, effortlessly and unknowingly, demolished years of ingrained prejudice with a simple, sweet, frozen monstrosity. That prejudice lies buried –without a headstone– in that beautiful, sunny graveyard where today, laughing children chase each other among the flavor tombs, and patrons share an Ice-Cream Bucket… or as they call it nowadays, a “Lovecraft’s Vermonster”.
----
Inspired by Donald Wandrei’s “The Dweller in Darkness”, the chronicle of how Lovecraft, Morton and himself visited Maxfield’s, an ice-cream establishment in Warren, Massachussets. This piece was originally included in “Marginalia”, edited by Wandrei and August Derleth. The relevant bit is on David Haden’s fascinating book, Walking With Cthulhu: H.P. Lovecraft as psychogeographer, New York City 1924-26
__________
This is a chapter from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
How I Fed Your Mother
“Kids, I’m going to tell you an incredible story. The story of how I fed your mother.”
Fourteen eyes stared at me, and I knew I had their full attention. The scouts were sitting around the fire, close to our tents on the center of the forest clearing. Millions of twinkling diamonds scattered across the black velvet Oregon sky. The waxing moon tinted the woods with a dreamlike silver patina.
The perfect night for a creepy story.
“It was dark, and it was cold, and it was exactly one month ago.” I began, in my best spooky voice. “We came to this forest with Danny, my childhood friend, and we set our camp not far from here, closer to the lake, the same lake we went to see this morning with you, kids.”
And I told them how Danny and I had dinner around the fire, and how we talked and told jokes, and went to sleep in our tents, and how Danny’s screams woke me up in the middle of the night. I told them how I got out of my tent and saw Danny dissapear into what I thought it was a hole in a big tree... and how I watched in horror those pale, throbbing tentacles holding the bleeding arms and legs ripped from my friend’s body.
A few of the younger kids were scared already, but the rest seemed unsensitized to that gory stuff. Of course, these days they can find worse things in the net and in their video games.
Time to crank the things up a bit. I poked the fire and went on, raising my voice for dramatic effect.
“And I knew I was in the presence of the Mother of the Woods… She stood before me, like a giant twisted spruce made of eyes and antlers and tree branches and mouths and black fur and horns and reptile scales and hooves, oh God those hundreds of hooves clicking on the ground… And I saw Danny’s bones hanging from Her huge maw… What could I do? What would you have done, kids? I prayed to Her, that’s what I did. I didn’t know if She could understand me, but I fell on my knees and begged her to spare me, please, I cried, spare me and I will bring you a much better sacrifice. I threw myself on the dirt and pleaded to Her, don’t eat me, Mother, I want to serve you forever.”
At this point I was yelling hysterically. I paused and poked the fire again. Now all the kids were watching me, waiting, holding their breath. Good, good.
“And then, those white tentacles dropped Danny’s broken pieces to the ground with a sickening, liquid noise, and wrapped around my waist and my chest... With great force they raised me from the ground and pulled me up, closer and closer, and then pushed me inside Her maw, and I thought it was the end.”
The kids were frightened now, I could tell, but I didn’t want them to break into tears. I tried to decompress a bit.
“But I am here now, right?” I asked them with a smile. “Do you want to hear the end of the story?”
A few of them nodded. Only a few.
“The Mother of the Woods didn’t devour me. My body passed through Her, slowly, as in a dream. And I wasn’t scared anymore, because I could feel Her love, how She cared for me and how She was feeding me as I was feeding her. I was Her food, and She was nurturing me.”
I let them think about it for a moment.
“And then, I felt how She was birthing me, how I was emerging from Her body, and how Her hooves moved out of the way to make room for my reborn form. Soon it was over. I laid there, covered in slime and looking at my Mother as She turned around and disappeared into the forest. I could hear Her voice in my head as She walked away. And Her voice whispered to me, ‘remember your promise’.”
I paused again, fighting the tears.
“I buried the remains of my friend, with his tent and all his things, deep in the forest. And I erased all my tracks, and told the police and Danny’s family a bunch of lies. What could I have told them, kids? The truth?”
I took a deep breath and calmed myself a bit.
“And that, kids, is how I fed your Mother”, I said, and went silent.
One of the older kids said, “But you said that monster was YOUR mom! Not mine! Or from any of us!” A few of the kids laughed and one howled, “Your mom is a monster! Hahahahaha!”
I stayed silent until their laughter died, and then said, “Seems that you didn’t understand the point of the story, kids. She is the Mother of the Woods. And the Mother of everything, and everyone, who walks in the forest! My Mother, your Mother, yours, and yours too!” I pointed at them as I said it, but they kept giggling and looking at me with mocking grins.
I slowly removed my hiking boots and stood there, next to the fire. I wasn’t wearing socks, and it only took them a few seconds to understand what they were seeing.
“Now, kids, it’s time for Mother’s goodnight kiss.”
I clicked my hooves on the ground, and from the edge of the clearing, Mother answered.
__________
This is a chapter from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
Fourteen eyes stared at me, and I knew I had their full attention. The scouts were sitting around the fire, close to our tents on the center of the forest clearing. Millions of twinkling diamonds scattered across the black velvet Oregon sky. The waxing moon tinted the woods with a dreamlike silver patina.
The perfect night for a creepy story.
“It was dark, and it was cold, and it was exactly one month ago.” I began, in my best spooky voice. “We came to this forest with Danny, my childhood friend, and we set our camp not far from here, closer to the lake, the same lake we went to see this morning with you, kids.”
And I told them how Danny and I had dinner around the fire, and how we talked and told jokes, and went to sleep in our tents, and how Danny’s screams woke me up in the middle of the night. I told them how I got out of my tent and saw Danny dissapear into what I thought it was a hole in a big tree... and how I watched in horror those pale, throbbing tentacles holding the bleeding arms and legs ripped from my friend’s body.
A few of the younger kids were scared already, but the rest seemed unsensitized to that gory stuff. Of course, these days they can find worse things in the net and in their video games.
Time to crank the things up a bit. I poked the fire and went on, raising my voice for dramatic effect.
“And I knew I was in the presence of the Mother of the Woods… She stood before me, like a giant twisted spruce made of eyes and antlers and tree branches and mouths and black fur and horns and reptile scales and hooves, oh God those hundreds of hooves clicking on the ground… And I saw Danny’s bones hanging from Her huge maw… What could I do? What would you have done, kids? I prayed to Her, that’s what I did. I didn’t know if She could understand me, but I fell on my knees and begged her to spare me, please, I cried, spare me and I will bring you a much better sacrifice. I threw myself on the dirt and pleaded to Her, don’t eat me, Mother, I want to serve you forever.”
At this point I was yelling hysterically. I paused and poked the fire again. Now all the kids were watching me, waiting, holding their breath. Good, good.
“And then, those white tentacles dropped Danny’s broken pieces to the ground with a sickening, liquid noise, and wrapped around my waist and my chest... With great force they raised me from the ground and pulled me up, closer and closer, and then pushed me inside Her maw, and I thought it was the end.”
The kids were frightened now, I could tell, but I didn’t want them to break into tears. I tried to decompress a bit.
“But I am here now, right?” I asked them with a smile. “Do you want to hear the end of the story?”
A few of them nodded. Only a few.
“The Mother of the Woods didn’t devour me. My body passed through Her, slowly, as in a dream. And I wasn’t scared anymore, because I could feel Her love, how She cared for me and how She was feeding me as I was feeding her. I was Her food, and She was nurturing me.”
I let them think about it for a moment.
“And then, I felt how She was birthing me, how I was emerging from Her body, and how Her hooves moved out of the way to make room for my reborn form. Soon it was over. I laid there, covered in slime and looking at my Mother as She turned around and disappeared into the forest. I could hear Her voice in my head as She walked away. And Her voice whispered to me, ‘remember your promise’.”
I paused again, fighting the tears.
“I buried the remains of my friend, with his tent and all his things, deep in the forest. And I erased all my tracks, and told the police and Danny’s family a bunch of lies. What could I have told them, kids? The truth?”
I took a deep breath and calmed myself a bit.
“And that, kids, is how I fed your Mother”, I said, and went silent.
One of the older kids said, “But you said that monster was YOUR mom! Not mine! Or from any of us!” A few of the kids laughed and one howled, “Your mom is a monster! Hahahahaha!”
I stayed silent until their laughter died, and then said, “Seems that you didn’t understand the point of the story, kids. She is the Mother of the Woods. And the Mother of everything, and everyone, who walks in the forest! My Mother, your Mother, yours, and yours too!” I pointed at them as I said it, but they kept giggling and looking at me with mocking grins.
I slowly removed my hiking boots and stood there, next to the fire. I wasn’t wearing socks, and it only took them a few seconds to understand what they were seeing.
“Now, kids, it’s time for Mother’s goodnight kiss.”
I clicked my hooves on the ground, and from the edge of the clearing, Mother answered.
__________
This is a chapter from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
September 25, 2017
The (In)famous Cthulhu Pie !
This is an outtake from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
Ask a thousand aficionados who have spent ten minutes around Lovecraft online social forums, and their answer will be the same. Yes, they have seen the meme, many times. The picture of a blueberry pie with a top crust purportedly shewing the visage of Cthulhu, its vaguely batrachian face sprouting tentacles all over. Two excrescences in place of eyes, a whole berry inside each one, complete the dramatic effect.
American illustrator Sandy Yoo originally created the pie in 2013. The inspiration came from her young son, who had been reading Lovecraft and was clearly in the mood for an eldritch dessert. Sandy’s website (alas, now defunct) used to have the complete story and several links to featured articles on the memetic pie, which by this time has a life of its own. Luckily, Sandy preserved the original video recipe here, so you might check it out if you want to replicate the original non-euclidean dough horror.
My version, however, mashes her concept with the traditional Latin American “pasta frola”, a shortbread pie filled with quince paste and topped with a lattice crust. Keep reading and learn how to replace the lattice with some serious eldritch pastry.
I made a crude hand drawing of a winged, six-eyed octopoid –actually, a pentopoid– and took its picture. Then used the image as background on a Powerpoint slide, traced a nicer version on top with the Arch tool, scaled the picture for A4 paper size and printed 2 slides, one with the final aspect for reference, and another with deconstructed shapes –body and wings– for tracing over the dough.
Here is my final template. Use it as a springboard for your own ideas… because Cthulhu speaks to each of us differently in our dreams, and each of us has unique perceptions of His visage.
Now, the pie construction.
Ingredients
- 125 g butter
- 180 g sugar
- 250 g self-rising flour
- 1 egg + 1 yolk (for dough)
- 1 egg white (for eggwash)
- 1 orange (for juice and zest)
- 500 g quince paste
- Optional : 1 shot glass of sweet white / port wine
Wear your Sabbath-best cultist apron. In a bowl, mash butter at room temperature with the sugar, then add the egg, the yolk, finely grated zest from half the orange, and mix everything until it looks creamy. Add ¾ of the flour, kneading by hand and adding the rest of the flour gradually until you get a smooth dough. Sprinkle some flour on top and around, cover the bowl with a dishcloth and let it sleep, dreaming undead in the fridge until the stars are right or 30 minutes have passed, whichever occurs first.
Preheat oven at 300°F. In a deep microwave-safe dish, mash the quince paste with the filtered juice of the orange, using a fork. Optionally, replace the orange juice with a little sweet white wine. Cover with a flat dish and nuke at half-power for 30 seconds. Mash with the fork and nuke again for 30 seconds. It should now look like a thick red cream, but if there are still though bits, repeat the nuking one more time. Let it cool while the dough is resting. Alternatively, you can soften the quince paste on the stove at low heat instead of the microwave.
Reserve 1/3 of the dough. On a lightly floured surface, roll 2/3 of the dough until evenly flat and 3 mm thick. Butter and flour the bottom and sides of a 12” round pie dish. Lay the dough on the bottom of the dish and build the crust. It will crack fairly easily but that’s easy to fix. Fill the crust with the softened quince paste, making it as level as possible.
Now the tricky part begins.
Over a floured plastic bag, roll the reserved 1/3 of the dough until evenly flat and 3 mm thick. Thinner would be better, but makes it harder to handle without cracking.
Cut the paper templates, put them on top of the dough, and carefully trace the figures with a pointy knife. Don’t worry if you break a tentacle, you can fix it later. See next two pictures, they may look a bit clumsy but who cares, right? Right.
Repeat with the wings, making them a bit larger than the template. Arrange the wings over the filling. Roll thin strips of dough for the wing details (see picture below). Use the paper template as a reference to place the wings.
Of course, wings are simple shapes and they should separate from the plastic without breaking. The tentacles… different story. Remove the paper from the pie (duh!), position the dough head on top of the pie and carefully unroll the plastic from underneath the traced shape, trying to get everything in one piece and –hopefully– in the right place. If it ends a bit off like in my attempt, just leave it there, because the shape will instantly stick to the filling, and moving it around is out of the question. Another way to do it is just flip everything –dough and plastic– on top of the filling and hoping for the best.
Fix any cracks that may have appeared, and smooth the edges of the shapes with a knife. Roll very thin strips of dough for those unholy details around the eyes.
Looking good, Old One!
You might remember eons ago –when we started making this pie– we used an egg plus one yolk. Beat the leftover egg white with a little water, and brush the eggwash all over the pie (crust and filling) until nicely glazed.
The oven should be on the low-medium range when you send in the pie on the middle rack. After 15-20 minutes, raise the temperature a bit and start checking every two minutes. When it begins to golden, turn off the oven. Test the edges of the pie with a toothpick for doneness. Leave it a couple of minutes in the oven if needed. Then take it out and let it rest for about an hour before eating.
The result is a Wilcoxian nightmare. I present you, The Horror In Dough:
Every part of it looks wider after baking, of course. But making thinner tentacles is no easy task. One possibility would be to roll them separately from the head, and place them one by one over the filling. Thinner means more, longer tentacles for the same area, which seems nice but I don’t think it’s worth the effort. If you make it, let me know!
---
Ask a thousand aficionados who have spent ten minutes around Lovecraft online social forums, and their answer will be the same. Yes, they have seen the meme, many times. The picture of a blueberry pie with a top crust purportedly shewing the visage of Cthulhu, its vaguely batrachian face sprouting tentacles all over. Two excrescences in place of eyes, a whole berry inside each one, complete the dramatic effect.
American illustrator Sandy Yoo originally created the pie in 2013. The inspiration came from her young son, who had been reading Lovecraft and was clearly in the mood for an eldritch dessert. Sandy’s website (alas, now defunct) used to have the complete story and several links to featured articles on the memetic pie, which by this time has a life of its own. Luckily, Sandy preserved the original video recipe here, so you might check it out if you want to replicate the original non-euclidean dough horror.
My version, however, mashes her concept with the traditional Latin American “pasta frola”, a shortbread pie filled with quince paste and topped with a lattice crust. Keep reading and learn how to replace the lattice with some serious eldritch pastry.
I made a crude hand drawing of a winged, six-eyed octopoid –actually, a pentopoid– and took its picture. Then used the image as background on a Powerpoint slide, traced a nicer version on top with the Arch tool, scaled the picture for A4 paper size and printed 2 slides, one with the final aspect for reference, and another with deconstructed shapes –body and wings– for tracing over the dough.
Here is my final template. Use it as a springboard for your own ideas… because Cthulhu speaks to each of us differently in our dreams, and each of us has unique perceptions of His visage.
Now, the pie construction.
Ingredients
- 125 g butter
- 180 g sugar
- 250 g self-rising flour
- 1 egg + 1 yolk (for dough)
- 1 egg white (for eggwash)
- 1 orange (for juice and zest)
- 500 g quince paste
- Optional : 1 shot glass of sweet white / port wine
Wear your Sabbath-best cultist apron. In a bowl, mash butter at room temperature with the sugar, then add the egg, the yolk, finely grated zest from half the orange, and mix everything until it looks creamy. Add ¾ of the flour, kneading by hand and adding the rest of the flour gradually until you get a smooth dough. Sprinkle some flour on top and around, cover the bowl with a dishcloth and let it sleep, dreaming undead in the fridge until the stars are right or 30 minutes have passed, whichever occurs first.
Preheat oven at 300°F. In a deep microwave-safe dish, mash the quince paste with the filtered juice of the orange, using a fork. Optionally, replace the orange juice with a little sweet white wine. Cover with a flat dish and nuke at half-power for 30 seconds. Mash with the fork and nuke again for 30 seconds. It should now look like a thick red cream, but if there are still though bits, repeat the nuking one more time. Let it cool while the dough is resting. Alternatively, you can soften the quince paste on the stove at low heat instead of the microwave.
Reserve 1/3 of the dough. On a lightly floured surface, roll 2/3 of the dough until evenly flat and 3 mm thick. Butter and flour the bottom and sides of a 12” round pie dish. Lay the dough on the bottom of the dish and build the crust. It will crack fairly easily but that’s easy to fix. Fill the crust with the softened quince paste, making it as level as possible.
Now the tricky part begins.
Over a floured plastic bag, roll the reserved 1/3 of the dough until evenly flat and 3 mm thick. Thinner would be better, but makes it harder to handle without cracking.
Cut the paper templates, put them on top of the dough, and carefully trace the figures with a pointy knife. Don’t worry if you break a tentacle, you can fix it later. See next two pictures, they may look a bit clumsy but who cares, right? Right.
Repeat with the wings, making them a bit larger than the template. Arrange the wings over the filling. Roll thin strips of dough for the wing details (see picture below). Use the paper template as a reference to place the wings.
Of course, wings are simple shapes and they should separate from the plastic without breaking. The tentacles… different story. Remove the paper from the pie (duh!), position the dough head on top of the pie and carefully unroll the plastic from underneath the traced shape, trying to get everything in one piece and –hopefully– in the right place. If it ends a bit off like in my attempt, just leave it there, because the shape will instantly stick to the filling, and moving it around is out of the question. Another way to do it is just flip everything –dough and plastic– on top of the filling and hoping for the best.
Fix any cracks that may have appeared, and smooth the edges of the shapes with a knife. Roll very thin strips of dough for those unholy details around the eyes.
Looking good, Old One!
You might remember eons ago –when we started making this pie– we used an egg plus one yolk. Beat the leftover egg white with a little water, and brush the eggwash all over the pie (crust and filling) until nicely glazed.
The oven should be on the low-medium range when you send in the pie on the middle rack. After 15-20 minutes, raise the temperature a bit and start checking every two minutes. When it begins to golden, turn off the oven. Test the edges of the pie with a toothpick for doneness. Leave it a couple of minutes in the oven if needed. Then take it out and let it rest for about an hour before eating.
The result is a Wilcoxian nightmare. I present you, The Horror In Dough:
Every part of it looks wider after baking, of course. But making thinner tentacles is no easy task. One possibility would be to roll them separately from the head, and place them one by one over the filling. Thinner means more, longer tentacles for the same area, which seems nice but I don’t think it’s worth the effort. If you make it, let me know!
---
August 24, 2017
The Feastival - A Lovecraftian Passover story
This is an excerpt from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
I was far from home, and the spell of the Black Sea was upon me. In the twilight I fancied I heard it pounding on the rocks, even when the coast was several miles away. And my fathers had called me to the old shtetl beyond, which laid just over the hill where the twisting willows writhed against the clearing sky and the first stars of evening. I pushed on through the shallow, new-fallen snow along the road that soared lonely up to where Aldebaran twinkled among the trees; on toward the very ancient shtetl I had never seen but often dreamed of.
It was the Passover, that some men call Easter though they know in their hearts it is older than Bethlehem and Jerusalem. It was the Passover, and I had come at last to the ancient village where my people had dwelt and kept the festival in the elder time when festival was forbidden; where also they had commanded their sons to keep festival once every year, that the memory of slavery and deliverance might not be forgotten. Mine were an old people, and were old even when the Greeks settled this land twenty-six centuries ago and named it Odyssos. And my people were strange, because they spoke another tongue before they learnt the tongue of the original settlers.
And now we were scattered, after centuries of pogroms and gas chambers and persecution; and while many had found safe haven in that tiny sliver of Middle East sands, and others in the far Western lands from whence I came, just a few of us still kept the rituals of mysteries that few could understand. I was the only one who came back that night to the old shtetl as legend bade, for only the poor and the lonely remember.
Then at the hill’s crest I saw Odessa in the distance, outspreading frostily in the gloaming, and the Black Sea shores behind the city; but I didn’t stop because the hour was getting late. I looked down at the foot of the hill and saw the snowy roofs and the labyrinth of crooked streets of the shtetl; and small-paned windows gleaming out in the cold dusk to join Orion and the archaic stars. And I knew I had arrived to my ancestral home.
As the road wound down the slope, I listened for the merry sounds of a village at evening, but did not hear them. I had seen an old map of the shtetl, and I knew where to find the home of my people. It was told that I should be known and welcomed; so I hastened through the road and turned left on the second intersection after the public well. The old map still held good, and I had no trouble. I was glad I had chosen to walk, for the village had seemed very beautiful from the hill; and now I was eager to knock at the door of my people, the second house on the right on that snowy street, with a small wooden outhouse on the side and a quaint garden in the front. Though it pleased me, I would have relished it better if there had been footprints in the snow, and people in the streets.
There were lights inside the house when I came upon it. When I knocked at the door I was half afraid. Some fear had been gathering in me, perhaps because of the strangeness of my heritage, and the bleakness of the evening, and the queerness of the silence in that aged town. And when my knock was answered I was afraid, because I had not heard any footsteps before the door creaked open. But I was not afraid long, for the slippered old man in the doorway had a familiar air that reassured me; and he pronounced the ancient welcoming formula of my people, and when I answered with the traditional reply in the old tongue, he smiled warmly.
He beckoned me into the dining room, lit by many candles in handsome silver holders. A table was already set for three, covered in a beautiful white linen tablecloth; it was clear they had been waiting for me to begin with the rites. I saw a doorway leading to a kitchen, from whence came a wonderful aroma, and an old woman standing by the stove greeted me with a smile and apologized for not coming, because she was very busy with dinner preparations. All our conversation took place in the old tongue of my greatparents; a tongue I had never spoken before, yet it flowed from my lips like wine.
The old man took my coat, and we cleaned our hands in a beautiful old washbowl; and we covered our heads, and the old couple did the blessings and broke the ritual flatbread; and we left the house door ajar as it was the custom; and by turns they narrated the ancient story of deliverance, reading from an antique, leather bound book written in another, even older tongue; and they sang the old songs, and I sang with them. I am not a young man, yet I was the youngest at the table; so I sang the traditional questions that the children of our people asked their elders in the old days, and the old couple sang in reply. And the ritual continued and the face of that old man shewed joy; and the old woman gazed at him in adoration; and we smiled at each other as we chanted.
And the old woman brought dinner saucers to the table, rejecting our help with a smile… A heaping plate of fragrant baked chicken thighs and breasts; a delicate white bowl of chicken soup of intoxicating aroma, with spheres of the mystical matzhoh powder floating inside; and the crown jewel of that magnificent repast… a loaf of that immemorial stuffed fish of which I had heard my grandfather speak in awe.
And as the night grew we relished on that toothsome meal, and the old couple reminisced about the ancient times of their youth, and I told stories of the Western land that was my home. The baked chicken was mouth-watering; the soup was magnificent and the old woman beamed as I helped myself of a second serving; but the stuffed fish was pure perfection… a marvel of simplicity and flavor that after the first bite transported me to an otherworldy realm of sensations.
And after the feast we sang more melodies from that leather-bound volume; and the old man opened the front door and we all stood in the small garden in silence, watching the crystal-clear night sky and smiling in content at each other.
And then we returned inside, and the old man brewed perfumed cups of tea in a beautifully engraved bronze samovar; and I thanked them for their hospitality and for that dinner fit for a king; and I made special compliments about that delicious stuffed fish. And the old couple graciously accepted my compliments; and we kept talking in that strange, melodic tongue of my ancestors that I hadn’t spoken ever before or since.
And when I felt tired, and said that I should leave, the old couple had none of it; and presently they beckoned me to a small room where they had already made a quaint, comfortable bed; and I took my boots off and laid on those lavender-scented sheets, and said good-night to that old couple that smiled at me from the doorway; and soon I was drifting into a peaceful, contented sleep without dreams.
A strange noise startled me. I blinked and looked around, and realized I was laying on the grass of a pasture field, with a few cows roaming nearby. The sun was up and there was no trace of the old couple, the house, or the shtetl. I guessed fatigue had overcome me the night before, and I had fell asleep at that grass field. And I felt sad, because my dream was the most beautiful I ever had, and I longed for the company of the old couple.
I got up, wore my boots and my coat, oriented myself and started walking towards the hill in the direction of Odessa.
And when I reached the top of the hill, and saw Odessa in the distance, a cold wind gust made me put my hands in my coat pockets, and there I found a folded piece of paper; and I unfolded it and saw scribbles in what I recognized as the old tongue of my people; but I could not read it.
And I meditated about it as I walked towards Odessa; and when I arrived there, I went to a coffee place and searched the Internet for the meaning of those old characters; and realized the scribbles were the stuffed fish recipe, that the old woman from my dream had left in my coat pocket, as a parting gift from her world that is no more.
---
I was far from home, and the spell of the Black Sea was upon me. In the twilight I fancied I heard it pounding on the rocks, even when the coast was several miles away. And my fathers had called me to the old shtetl beyond, which laid just over the hill where the twisting willows writhed against the clearing sky and the first stars of evening. I pushed on through the shallow, new-fallen snow along the road that soared lonely up to where Aldebaran twinkled among the trees; on toward the very ancient shtetl I had never seen but often dreamed of.
It was the Passover, that some men call Easter though they know in their hearts it is older than Bethlehem and Jerusalem. It was the Passover, and I had come at last to the ancient village where my people had dwelt and kept the festival in the elder time when festival was forbidden; where also they had commanded their sons to keep festival once every year, that the memory of slavery and deliverance might not be forgotten. Mine were an old people, and were old even when the Greeks settled this land twenty-six centuries ago and named it Odyssos. And my people were strange, because they spoke another tongue before they learnt the tongue of the original settlers.
And now we were scattered, after centuries of pogroms and gas chambers and persecution; and while many had found safe haven in that tiny sliver of Middle East sands, and others in the far Western lands from whence I came, just a few of us still kept the rituals of mysteries that few could understand. I was the only one who came back that night to the old shtetl as legend bade, for only the poor and the lonely remember.
Then at the hill’s crest I saw Odessa in the distance, outspreading frostily in the gloaming, and the Black Sea shores behind the city; but I didn’t stop because the hour was getting late. I looked down at the foot of the hill and saw the snowy roofs and the labyrinth of crooked streets of the shtetl; and small-paned windows gleaming out in the cold dusk to join Orion and the archaic stars. And I knew I had arrived to my ancestral home.
As the road wound down the slope, I listened for the merry sounds of a village at evening, but did not hear them. I had seen an old map of the shtetl, and I knew where to find the home of my people. It was told that I should be known and welcomed; so I hastened through the road and turned left on the second intersection after the public well. The old map still held good, and I had no trouble. I was glad I had chosen to walk, for the village had seemed very beautiful from the hill; and now I was eager to knock at the door of my people, the second house on the right on that snowy street, with a small wooden outhouse on the side and a quaint garden in the front. Though it pleased me, I would have relished it better if there had been footprints in the snow, and people in the streets.
There were lights inside the house when I came upon it. When I knocked at the door I was half afraid. Some fear had been gathering in me, perhaps because of the strangeness of my heritage, and the bleakness of the evening, and the queerness of the silence in that aged town. And when my knock was answered I was afraid, because I had not heard any footsteps before the door creaked open. But I was not afraid long, for the slippered old man in the doorway had a familiar air that reassured me; and he pronounced the ancient welcoming formula of my people, and when I answered with the traditional reply in the old tongue, he smiled warmly.
He beckoned me into the dining room, lit by many candles in handsome silver holders. A table was already set for three, covered in a beautiful white linen tablecloth; it was clear they had been waiting for me to begin with the rites. I saw a doorway leading to a kitchen, from whence came a wonderful aroma, and an old woman standing by the stove greeted me with a smile and apologized for not coming, because she was very busy with dinner preparations. All our conversation took place in the old tongue of my greatparents; a tongue I had never spoken before, yet it flowed from my lips like wine.
The old man took my coat, and we cleaned our hands in a beautiful old washbowl; and we covered our heads, and the old couple did the blessings and broke the ritual flatbread; and we left the house door ajar as it was the custom; and by turns they narrated the ancient story of deliverance, reading from an antique, leather bound book written in another, even older tongue; and they sang the old songs, and I sang with them. I am not a young man, yet I was the youngest at the table; so I sang the traditional questions that the children of our people asked their elders in the old days, and the old couple sang in reply. And the ritual continued and the face of that old man shewed joy; and the old woman gazed at him in adoration; and we smiled at each other as we chanted.
And the old woman brought dinner saucers to the table, rejecting our help with a smile… A heaping plate of fragrant baked chicken thighs and breasts; a delicate white bowl of chicken soup of intoxicating aroma, with spheres of the mystical matzhoh powder floating inside; and the crown jewel of that magnificent repast… a loaf of that immemorial stuffed fish of which I had heard my grandfather speak in awe.
And as the night grew we relished on that toothsome meal, and the old couple reminisced about the ancient times of their youth, and I told stories of the Western land that was my home. The baked chicken was mouth-watering; the soup was magnificent and the old woman beamed as I helped myself of a second serving; but the stuffed fish was pure perfection… a marvel of simplicity and flavor that after the first bite transported me to an otherworldy realm of sensations.
And after the feast we sang more melodies from that leather-bound volume; and the old man opened the front door and we all stood in the small garden in silence, watching the crystal-clear night sky and smiling in content at each other.
And then we returned inside, and the old man brewed perfumed cups of tea in a beautifully engraved bronze samovar; and I thanked them for their hospitality and for that dinner fit for a king; and I made special compliments about that delicious stuffed fish. And the old couple graciously accepted my compliments; and we kept talking in that strange, melodic tongue of my ancestors that I hadn’t spoken ever before or since.
And when I felt tired, and said that I should leave, the old couple had none of it; and presently they beckoned me to a small room where they had already made a quaint, comfortable bed; and I took my boots off and laid on those lavender-scented sheets, and said good-night to that old couple that smiled at me from the doorway; and soon I was drifting into a peaceful, contented sleep without dreams.
A strange noise startled me. I blinked and looked around, and realized I was laying on the grass of a pasture field, with a few cows roaming nearby. The sun was up and there was no trace of the old couple, the house, or the shtetl. I guessed fatigue had overcome me the night before, and I had fell asleep at that grass field. And I felt sad, because my dream was the most beautiful I ever had, and I longed for the company of the old couple.
I got up, wore my boots and my coat, oriented myself and started walking towards the hill in the direction of Odessa.
And when I reached the top of the hill, and saw Odessa in the distance, a cold wind gust made me put my hands in my coat pockets, and there I found a folded piece of paper; and I unfolded it and saw scribbles in what I recognized as the old tongue of my people; but I could not read it.
And I meditated about it as I walked towards Odessa; and when I arrived there, I went to a coffee place and searched the Internet for the meaning of those old characters; and realized the scribbles were the stuffed fish recipe, that the old woman from my dream had left in my coat pocket, as a parting gift from her world that is no more.
---
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