Stuffed Turkey

I sipped my calvados slowly. The burning sensation of those distilled apples warming me gently on that cold winter morning. The complex flavours of the cider and the French oak caressed my taste buds. Calvados is my favourite digestif. A pleasant contrast to the more common cognac or armagnac. The courageous efforts of those lone Spanish sailors have left us to this day a splendid drink. I empathise with them. Then as now England was practising state terrorism. Then it was shiny gold in South America, now black gold in the Middle East. Francis Drake then, Tony Blair now, the same combination of obsequiousness to the monarch and ruthless, cunning exploitation of those less vicious than they.

The monarch of Spain sent his brave seaman on a terrible voyage, the extreme perils of which he had no idea. To die drowned in the perpetual storms of the icy English seas, or, after landfall, expire of pneumonia from the never abating drizzle. One ship and one ship alone understood the hopelessness of the mission. A boat from Marbella, the El Salvador, foretold that the Brits would not come, so numerous, to their dire town if the treacherous isles were not even worse. So they shipwrecked their boat on the shores of fair France and brought their knowledge of distilling to the cider growers of Normandy. Great men of foresight, worthy of their honorary French citizenship.

Their deeds live on in the name of the drink, but also the name of the department ‘Calvados’, created by Napoleon. And there lies a bone of contention in the collective throats of the French. At the end of the Second World War the English invaded France in order to set up a coca-cola distribution network for the Americans. They soon came to Calvados and its capital Caen, a delightful city. For three months they bombarded that city with every type of armament available. Why? The English say the French lacked respect and served soggy croissants. The French don’t deny the croissants weren’t very good. Besides the American wheat they had to use, the fast food specialists from across the channel wanted the croissant immediately in order to make spam sandwiches. Now everybody knows that the crisp outer coat of a croissant can only be achieved if the dough is left to rise slowly in a cold room. The feeling in France is that it is too far fetched that the English worried about the quality of their food. The croissant enigma is a red herring. The real cause of the perfidious attacks on Caen was a rancorous reaction towards the descendants of the one galleon that got away.

I was diverging, my mind was wandering from the terrible task afore me. My Chinese 15 euro timepiece kindly sold to me by Edouard Leclerc showed that it was time to commence the journey to Tours airport. But I had no plan. The day would have to be won by French flair. That envy of the world, as the cliff top approaches and the view of the murderous rocks below is revealed. Just at that moment comes an astounding stroke of brilliance and the instant is saved. But could I do it, was I French enough? Or was I an English turkey lined up for a Christmas stuffing?