Forcemeat

These names are confusing, let's just say I'm fond of making exotic spreads. The Vietnamese guy in Columbus, North Market, great food, wonderful sandwiches John Thorne turned me onto, says that I make a country pate, he likes them. I told Pegi I'd make one for the Dwight Lenox jazz concert next Friday. Must be today, because it needs to age and I won't have time later in the week, one last week from hell before a break. So I zip into town, rain, rain, rain, the driveway is a joke, barely controlled slide. I have a rabbit (French, domestic) in the freezer that I need to use. Get my act together. I smother-fry the rabbit in chicken broth, let it cool, bone it out, a pound and a half of meat, I get a pound and a half of chicken livers, and a pound and a half of mushrooms, three different kinds and throw in some morels. Caramelize an onion and a bunch of scallions, add six ounces of pecan pieces, black pepper, some really hot sauce, some allspice. I can tell, even warm, that this will be very good. Oh, a stick and a half of butter to bind the thing together, wine and chicken stock to loosen it enough to run through the blender and then into molds. A messy job and it takes forever, three hours to put it together and another hour to clean up. But I can't buy this anywhere, I'm the only one that makes it, I've painted myself into a corner. You'll notice I took a book with me, and did it deliberately, fenced myself thus. I make four pounds and three-quarters, half a pound for me, a quarter pound for Jim., the rest for the benefit. I'm the judge of this. The jury. By dint of all those nights I should have died. I offer nothing either way. At best a loss-leader, something you could bury in static, another loaf of bread. What you thought you meant. I'm just doing dishes, I don't claim anything, What is. In the back room, we nod to each other, bundle crows as if they were a commodity, wheat futures, pork bellies, something , I'm a total shithead, I don't get nothing. Worse than that, what I thought made sense didn't.