Food & drink memories

There’s no memory quite as evocative as a food or drink memory. It does so much more than just bring the tastes flooding back.

I’ve recently been reading Nigel Slaters wonderful autobiography Toast where he links just about every moment of childhood to a particular food or drink item. They range from sweets or chocolate that he saved up his pocket money to buy, through to meals cooked for him by parents or grandparents. Whatever the memory that’s being recounted it’s food or drink that’s at the centre of it.

It’s a great way to tell a life story and got me to thinking about some of the things that I would list.

7 Up* Floats

I remember these as an exotic childhood treat when I lived in Malta. 7 Up poured over ice with a generous scoop of ice cream floated on top. As the drink was always served very cold it meant that much of the ice cream survived to the bottom of the glass and could then be eaten with a long handled spoon. To the ten year old me this felt like the hight of sophistication. As soon as I think of them I’m back at a cafe by a Maltese beach.

Chocolate Angel Delight with Maltesers.

Angel Delight was a powder that you mixed with milk to make a mouse like dessert. I’m using the past tense as I don’t remember this since childhood but it might still be available. The reason I have such fond memories of it is that it bought out the sweet tooth that my mother always had. Not content with the richness of the chocolate version she would add a packet of Maltesers and mix them in. This meant that every second or third spoonful would include a chocolate coated crunch. Just writing about that is enough to make me smile.

Egg Nog

My memory of egg nog is very different from the dessert that Wikipedia has just shown me. In my world it was the mixture of Advocaat and lemonade that used to be my grandmothers favourite Christmas tipple. A vivid yellow, very sweet drink that often had a cherry floating on top. Being allowed to have one of these at Christmas, probably mixed at 99% lemonade to 1% Advocaat, was always a thrill.

Marmite 

If the previous ones are memories locked in childhood, this is one that’s continued on. From almost as far back as I can remember there is the rich salty taste of Marmite. It might be on toast first thing in the morning, it might be in a crusty bread sandwich with cheese late at night. Whenever it is, life feels better if there’s Marmite.

Dad cooking on a Sunday

During my childhood my mother suffered from severe migraines. When they struck she was bed ridden for most of the day. If it was the weekend it meant the novelty of dad to the rescue with cooking. I’t wasn’t that he couldn’t cook, just that me and my sister seldom saw him do it and always thought of the kitchen as mums domain. Unfortunately I’m struggling to remember exactly what he cooked but I know that as children we found them exciting Sundays.

The first cup of coffee on a trip to France

I’m jumping ahead a few years with this one. It’s hard to remember now but prior to the coffeeshop boom of the last few years a good cup was quite a hard thing to find in the UK. As a result if you were lucky enough to get to France there was never any doubt on priority number one. A cafe, a table and a cup that tasted of everything that you wanted France to be. If I close my eyes I’m there now, signalling to the waiter for a refill

As someone who thinks an awful lot about food I’m sure this is a theme that I’ll be returning to.

* I was reading the history of 7 Up (as you do) and was fascinated to see that until 1948 the recipe included lithium citrate which is a mood stabilising drug. Perhaps the addition of ice cream has the same affect.