Once again, we got out the jar of Marmite and proved just how horrible this substance can be. Some people have suggested that most of the cuisine of the British Isles is based on dares. Despite the fact that I actually like Marmite, I would tend to agree with this assessment. Our good friends across the pond would probably disagree. But would you really trust the judgment of a country that thinks spotted dick is a food instead of a porn star?
This time around, we had Dylan sampling two more ways of eating yeast extract. The first is my personal favorite, a nice Marmite and cheese sandwich. The second is the football hooligan’s favorite, Marmite as a hot drink.
Joining me in making Dylan run to throw up, we had a new participant along for the ride: Jen. She refused to actually sample the raw Marmite, and preferred to stand by and mock the Maitre d’ as he ate things not truly intended for human consumption. That, or just was the dishes and tell us to get out of the way.
As required by law for “Will Dylan Eat It?”, we forced Jen to endure what we call the “sniff test”. Namely, you stick your nose near whatever unholy abomination we’re trying and take a big whiff. She was less than impressed.
Immediately afterwards, Jen tried to get one of the cats to sample the Marmite. Trunks was not impressed and immediately ran to cower in a corner somewhere. I hear that later Jen was arrested for cruelty to animals. Exposing your pets to British food is considered abuse in the state of Tennessee.
First up was the Marmite-and-cheese sandwich. We used the same plain white bread from the first experiment and added a package of Cracker Barrel Vermont Sharp White. The Vermont White is a nice, mouth-filling extra-sharp cheese that compliments the saltiness of the Marmite quite nicely (or so the theory goes, anyway). Normal people enjoy it without adding it to the leftovers from beer brewing, much less putting the mess on a sandwich.
But we here at the Buffet refuse to play by the rules, especially those having to do with dubious culinary delights, and so here we go. Remembering his previous horrific experience, the Maitre d’ less-than-eagerly smeared Marmite on the bread and covered it with slices of the cheese. Unfortunately, the blockhead forgot to clean the knife and smeared Marmite over the cheese. Oh, well – more cheese for me, since I don’t mind the extra salt and yeast.
The final result is, of course, not that impressive-looking. Come on, it’s a cheese sandwich with some brown crap smeared on it. What do you want, some extra garnish?
This time, Dylan didn’t hesitate in sticking the sandwich in his mouth and taking a bite. After chewing it over, the esteemed Maitre d’ didn’t immediately run for the bathroom, which was disappointing. You know I’m only in this to torture Dylan, and every time he even sort of likes the things from these experiments, I die a little bit inside.
The Maitre d’ had this to say:
Much more tolerable than Marmite alone. The sharpness of the cheese
sort of masks the saltiness of the Marmite, but leaves just enough
saltiness to give it a nice flavor.
The Chef was born 856 years ago on a small planet orbiting a star in the Argolis cluster. It was prophesied that the arrival of a child with a birthmark shaped like a tentacle would herald the planet's destruction. When the future Chef was born with just such a birthmark, panic ensued (this would not be the last time the Chef inspired such emotion). The child, tentacle and all, was loaded into a rocket-powered garbage scow and launched into space. Unfortunately, the rocket's exhaust ignited one of the spectators' flatulence, resulting in a massive explosion that detonated the planet's core, destroying the world and killing everyone on it.
When the would-be Chef awoke from his torpor, he looked around at the new world he found himself on. His first words were, “Hey, this place sucks." Disguising himself as one of the planet's dominant species of semi-domesticated ape, the being who would become known as the Chef wandered the Earth until he ended up in its most disreputable slum - Paris, France.
Taking a job as a can-can dancer, the young Chef made a living that way until one day one of the cooks at a local bistro fell ill with food poisoning (oh, bitter irony). In a desperate move, the bistro's owner rushed into one of the local dance halls, searching for a replacement. He grabbed the ugliest can-can dancer he could find, and found himself instead with an enterprising (if strange) young man who now decided, based on this random encounter, to only answer to the name “Chef".
His success as a French chef was immediate (but considering that this is a country where frogs and snails are considered delicacies, this may or may not be a significant achievement). Not only was the Chef's food delicious, it also kept down the local homeless population. He rose to the heights of stardom in French cuisine, and started a holy war against the United Kingdom to end the reign of terror British food had inflicted on its citizens.
When the Crimean War broke out around France, the Chef assisted Nikola Tesla and Galileo in perfecting the scanning electron microscope, which was crucial in driving back the oncoming Communist hordes. It would later be said that without the Chef, the war would have been lost. He was personally awarded a Purple Heart by the King of France.
After that, the Chef traveled to America, home of such dubious culinary delights as McDonald's Quarter Pounder With Cheese. He immediately adopted the Third World nation as his new home, seeing it as his job to protect and enlighten it. When the Vietnam War began, he immediately volunteered and served in the Army of the Potomac under Robert E. Lee and General Patton. During the war, the Chef killed dozens of Nazis, most of them with his bare hands.
Marching home from war across the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, stark-naked and freezing, the Chef wound up on the shores of Mexico. He spent several years there, drinking tequila with Pancho Villa and James Dean. He put his culinary skills to the test when he invented the 5,000-calorie Breakfast Chili Burrito With Orange Sauce (which is today still a favorite in some parts of Sonora).
Eventually, the Chef returned to his adopted home of America, where he met a slimy, well-coiffed weasel who was starting up a new kind of buffet - one dedicated to providing the highest-quality unmentionable appetizers to the online community. The Chef dedicated himself to spreading the word of his famous Lard Sandwich (two large patties of fried lard, in between two slices of toasted buttered lard, with bacon and cheese), as well as occasionally writing about his opinions on less-important topics than food.
Every word of this is true, if only in the sense that every word of this exists in the English language.
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