FICTIONAL FOODS EATEN IN CHILDRENS’ BOOKS 1: Stuff in the larder in the Faraway Tree

FICTIONAL FOODS EATEN IN CHILDRENS’ BOOKS
1: Stuff in the larder in the Faraway Tree

As a spin-off from Tom’s Publog articles (one and two here) I thought it was worthwhile savouring some of the items you could not actually get. Enid Blyton was well aware of the importance of celbratory foodstuffs in her books, you cannot help but think of the midnight feasts in Mallory Towers & St Clare’s to see quite how important they were. This may well be due to the period in which they were written, during rationing where heady days of fizzy pop and even sweets were a treat. Outside her more real world books (not that the middle-class kids of the Famous Five or the boarding schools ever crossed over with my world) was the fantasticaly foodstuffs found in the Faraway Tree.

Made either by Silky the fairy or Moonface the – well – moonfaced geezer, were sweets which were esoteric, exotic and sometimes a bit scary. Silky’s signature dish was Pop Biscuits, which actually sounded quite nice. Biscuits which you munched on for a bit and all of a sudden went ‘pop’ and filled your mouth with a beautiful honey like liquid. The pop was apparently part of the fun, and akin to the thumb in mouth pop which accompanies the music hall weasle. Silky’s was a good place to eat.

Much more frightening was Moonface’s confection of choice Toffee Shock. I was never a big toffee fan as a child anyway, normal toffees lasted long enough to precipitating jaw ache for little pleasure. Toffee Shock were much more extreme, in as much as the more you chewed the bigger they got. This continued until the pretty much filled your mouth at which point they would disappeared with a bang. Perhaps this would be the slimmers food of choice, but frankly having my mouth bunged up by something that keeps growing is not my idea of fun.

There were also fruits which change flavours running through exotics such as gooseberry to raspberry and some of the lands at the top of the Faraway Tree were rammed with party foods. But after the toffee shock I would be wary about putting anything from the Faraway Tree in my mouth.

Pete Baran in The Brown Wedge • No Comments

FOODS EATEN IN CHILDRENS’ BOOKS #2: Pine Needles

FOODS EATEN IN CHILDRENS’ BOOKS #2: Pine Needles

Pine needles seem to work as a kind of Moomin hay – they form their hibernation beds as well as serving as the staple diet. The preferred Mooomin drink – raspberry juice – lives on mostly as a cocktail ingredient, or blended with nasty cranberry – but pine needles have a culinary history of their own. They have health benefits – the ancient Egyptians used pine oil as a cure-all and the Aztecs used a flowers-and-needles composite as a deodorant. Pine Needle Soup “saved the pilgrims from scurvy” and was eaten to survive in WW2 prison camps. They can also serve as a garnish. Our house was littered with pine needles for most of January: we failed to take cooking advantage, and the rabbits refused to touch them.

Tom in Pumpkin Publog • No Comments

More PopNose

More PopNose to your right. PN15 is a sort-of Coxsone Dodd tribute, PN16 is robot romance.

Tom in FT /New York London Paris Munich • No Comments

TANYA’S ROUND OF RUBBISH – “Banned From The Pubs”

TANYA’S ROUND OF RUBBISH – “Banned From The Pubs”

Peter and The Test Tube Babies found themselves in a spot of boozer difficulty.

Banned from pubs go on on your way
Banned from pubs no punks they say
Banned from pubs you lot get out
Banned from pubs no punks they shout

I have to say my heart is with the pubs in this dispute. If only their anti-punk jurisdiction extended to, say, the whole country. As it is perhaps the pub is the safest place for the punks. If their hands are occupied by holding beer and their mouths by drinking it then they can’t play or sing. No change there then. But beyond the evil of punk rock a far greater menace lurked, a menace which has a direct bearing on the Round Of Rubbish. Reader, prepare yourself: I am speaking of PUB ROCK.

Tanya Headon in I Hate Music • No Comments