The film of Richard Yates's novel of 1950s commuter-belt ennui, Revolutionary Road, got me thinking about dry Martinis. Like so many American middle-class dramas of the period, the story is powered by gin and vermouth just as Hogarth's London ran on gin straight up. Under Sam Mendes's direction, the Wheelers, a young couple going sour in suburbia, and their binge-drinking friends and colleagues drank dry Martinis in eye-opening quantities, before lunch, before supper and before adultery. You have to wonder if the emptiness at the heart of the American dream would have seemed quite so awful if they'd drunk Scotch instead.
A vodka drinker myself—Stolichnaya ideally—I never much liked true dry Martinis. And the stuffed olive, rolling there in its pseudo-sophistication, is part of what's wrong with them. What was it—a decoration or a snack? Olives don't even feature in the classic recipe—which would be the gin/dry vermouth mix at five or six to one, super-chilled (pouring the vermouth over ice works well) with a twist of lemon peel in a very cold glass.
But on the night I saw the film the barman in Edinburgh's cocktail dive Bramble persuaded me into a dirty Martini. This was Welsh gin, Noilly Prat and a little of the scraps and brine from the bottom of the olive jar. I saw the light: it's a nasty drink and that's the beginning of the fun. Reader, I ordered another.
I wrote about Martinis in the Times recently and received a scary amount of email. I should have taken more care before intruding on the beliefs of an alcohol cult. But among the abuse were some delightfully obsessive Martini chroniclers. The Martini was not invented during Prohibition, I was told, by bootlegger bar-owners sweetening rotgut gin with the vermouth of that name: its genesis was 40 years earlier and there are 19th-century recipe books to prove it. A plaque in the town of Martinez, California claims to mark where the cocktail was first mixed.
I also got capped on the famous story of Luis Buñuel's recipe for the driest Martini. Connoisseurs, wrote Buñuel in his autobiography, simply allow a ray of sunshine to pass through the bottle of vermouth into the gin. My informant tells me that Salvador Dali replied (I can find no verification for this, not even on Google) "I will tell you my recipe. When everything is perfectly cold and ready, I telephone my friend Buñuel. I request that he take a bottle of vermouth, put it close to the telephone, and open it. I hold the receiver next to my glass—and voilà!"
Bring back the ministry of food
There's lots of worry about "food security," with speeches by agriculture minister Hilary Benn and the publication in February of a thoughtful report by Chatham House. It concluded soberly that we are certain to see higher price volatility in foodstuffs.
The Chatham House report, partly funded by Defra, followed another report from the cabinet office. There was also a Defra discussion document last July and the department is carrying out a stakeholder consultation. Why the panic? Britain is no more "food insecure" than most developed countries—we're still producing more of our own food than we were in the 1930s. And food is cheaper than ever in real terms.
Apparently, the global price rises in cereals of 2007-08 unnerved the government—that, and the fact that our supermarkets grabbed the chance to increase margins. The major food retailers reported record results as food price inflation hit 11 per cent. One academic who is involved in the consultations told me "Labour's love affair with big food capital is well and truly over." There is a mood to tackle the big four supermarkets, whose 75 per cent slice of food retail is unmatched anywhere in the world.
Breaking up the supermarkets' dominance, as Phillip Blond suggested in Prospect last month, could be the first step towards seeing us through what will be a hungrier century for many. What price a ministry of food? The cabinet office recently seized strategic control of food supply from Defra—and such a ministry saw us well through the last great supply crisis in the 1940s.
Last chance to eat
It's a great time for the gourmand: prices are tumbling in the most garlanded restaurants. Despite the exodus of charming eastern Europeans, waiters have never been so attentive. There's something of a how-low-can-you-go competition among Michelin star holders in London. Claude Bosi started it at Hibiscus with a three-course set lunch for £25; Joël Robuchon, who holds more Michelin stars (25) than anyone else in the world, hit back with a £19 two-course lunch at L'Atelier. Admittedly some of the dishes scrimp on the ingredients: Bosi has a turnip cooked in cider, and Robuchon a first course of a "fried hen's egg" and salad. But there's also an enticing veal and black truffle risotto.
I thought I'd found the cheapest Michelin-starred meal last month, in Richard Turner's set lunch for £13.50 (foie gras, saddle of lamb with sweetbreads) at his eponymous restaurant in Birmingham. Then I heard about the one-star Hand & Flower in Marlow: £10 for two courses. And one of them may be slow-cooked beef with bone marrow bread-pudding. Eat, drink and so on—for tomorrow these restaurants may no longer be open.
