In the Devil's Garden_ A Sinful History of Forbidden Food Part 1

In the Devil's Garden.

A Sinful History of Forbidden Food.

by Stewart Lee Allen.

Introduction:

ON SIN, s.e.x, AND FOR BIDDEN FOOD.

Jackson was lying on the kitchen counter allowing his father to change his diapers when a mysterious silver fountain rose up from between his thighs. Jackson's eyes popped open in amazement-did I do that? What a splendid effect! What a glorious sensation! The eighteen-inch geyser hung glittering for an instant. Then it collapsed, to break directly over his father's head and splash down his back. The crowd of relatives burst into applause. Jackson's mother, Paula, rushed over to give her boy a congratulatory kiss. Even Troy (his father) shook his hand. I mention all this because, while flapping his little arms in triumph Jackson came upon a pale green grape bouncing across the blue tile countertop. He immediately popped the fruit into his mouth. Paula's coo changed to a gasp of horror. No, Jackson! she screeched, No, no, no! You don't want to eat that! Bad! She yanked the forbidden fruit out of Jackson's maw and his jubilation was turned to grief.

The lesson my nephew learned that day was simple. p.i.s.s on your father, spit at your mother, but don't eat that that. And that that is the topic of this book, forbidden foods and their meaning, from chocolate to foie gras to the potato chip, from the Garden of Eden until today. It took Jackson's little adventure to bring home to me how profound our feelings are on this matter. Life, after all, is at heart an act of eating and so when we make a dish taboo, there is usually an interesting story to tell. The Bible used a tale of forbidden food to define all of human nature, and since then our religious and political leaders have been manipulating the notion so vigorously it has come to flavor every emotion we have about what we eat. We now judge a dish largely by how guilty we feel about eating it-at least judging from today's advertising-and if it is not considered "sinful" we find it less pleasant. is the topic of this book, forbidden foods and their meaning, from chocolate to foie gras to the potato chip, from the Garden of Eden until today. It took Jackson's little adventure to bring home to me how profound our feelings are on this matter. Life, after all, is at heart an act of eating and so when we make a dish taboo, there is usually an interesting story to tell. The Bible used a tale of forbidden food to define all of human nature, and since then our religious and political leaders have been manipulating the notion so vigorously it has come to flavor every emotion we have about what we eat. We now judge a dish largely by how guilty we feel about eating it-at least judging from today's advertising-and if it is not considered "sinful" we find it less pleasant.

It's a situation that has led to the criminalizing of hundreds of common dishes throughout history, and, since we ban things because of their a.s.sociation with a particular sin, I've organized this book into sections corresponding with the famous Seven Deadly Sins: l.u.s.t, gluttony, pride, sloth, greed, blasphemy, and anger. Within each section are the stories of delicacies tabooed for their a.s.sociation with a vice that the society in question found particularly abhorrent. The first chapter deals with l.u.s.t, in honor of Eve's illicit snack and the ensuing roll in the hay. Food and s.e.x are a heady combination; a quarter of all people who lose the ability to taste dinner also lose their s.e.x drive, and Freud believed all humans experience their first s.e.xual and culinary thrill simultaneously when they begin suckling on their mother's nipple. Our l.u.s.t for aphrodisiac foods has led to the extermination of entire species and the fall of empires, per the curious tale of how hot chocolate became a risque player in the French Revolution.

The book continues sin by sin to cover everything from how the first recorded image of G.o.d relates to certain taboos in Asia and the West, to how modern corporations manipulate our subliminal hunting/violent urges to make junk food more appealing. Since whom we invite for dinner can be as important as what we serve, there are stories on how these rules have played a part in events like the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Disputes between "chefs," like the one that split Europe in half, make an appearance. There are also recipes. A plate of Joel Robuchon's famously sensual mashed potatoes should give the flavor of the sloth-like ecstasy that led the English to try to ban the root in the 1800s. The ancient Roman dish gives a taste of the gluttonous decadence that Caesar tried to stamp out when overindulgence was threatening the world's mightiest empire.

These food taboos were so important to our ancestors that they often starved to death rather than violate them, and at least half of the world's current population-from cow-crazy Hindus to kosher Jews to young Western vegetarians-still live with severe dietary restrictions on a daily basis. For many, these laws are crucial in defining themselves in relations.h.i.+p both to G.o.d and to their fellow humans, and fundamentally shape the societies in which they live. Even in the West, where outright bans are rare, food taboos still operate below the surface. Many scholars believe that psychological diseases like anorexia, which kills tens of thousands of people a year, stem in part from the complicated social psychosis left by ancient dietary laws. And sometimes when we ignore these rules, catastrophe has resulted; at least one of the greatest calamities of the twenty-first century is directly related to our violating deeply held taboos against cannibalistic activities.

What struck me while writing this book was the surprising extent to which people have judged, fought, and slaughtered others because of what they had for dinner. These laws about forbidden food give more than a unique perspective on history. They tell us quite a lot about the nature of pleasure and can turn the daily meal into a meditation on humanity's relations.h.i.+p to the delicious and the revolting, the sacred and the profane.

But getting back to that first apple . . .

[image]l.u.s.t"And when Eve saw that the tree was good for food and that it was pleasant to the eye, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave pleasant to the eye, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband, and he did eat. And the eyes of them both also unto her husband, and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. . . ." were opened, and they knew that they were naked. . . ."Genesis, 3:812[image]l.u.s.t MENU[image]APeRITIFBlue ChocolateSALADESalade de Jardin Late-harvest Eden apples tossed with fig leaves.

Served with Paradise vinaigrette.

ENTReEFruits des Homme Cold, poached sea cuc.u.mber served with Sambian mayonnaise.

PLAT PRINc.i.p.aUXPate aux Mon Pet.i.t Chou Homemade lingamini smothered in love apple and screaming basil.

DESSERTChocolat du Barry Louis XV pastry topped with well-whipped cream.

Eaten with the left hand.

THREE p.e.n.i.s LIQUEUR WILL BE SERVED IN THE LIBRARY.

First Bite

It was still dark out when we left the monastery. Dawn was breaking a midnight blue etched with icy rain. Ocean waves crashed against the cliffs below. To the left and farther up the trail loomed the solitary Mount Athos.

"Some Christmas," I grumbled when George and I finally found a sheltering cave. I handed him a soggy cracker. "It is the twenty-fifth, right?"

"Yes," he said. George was a Greek fellow I'd met in a refuge run by an exceptionally grumpy monk. "But don't wish any of the monks here a good Christmas! The people of Mount Athos believe Christmas doesn't come until January, and they don't like to be reminded that the rest of the world is celebrating it on the wrong day."

Mount Athos is a six-thousand-foot-tall mountain that stands at the tip of a peninsula near the Greek-Turkish border. Surrounded on three sides by the Aegean Sea and on the fourth by roadless forests, it's controlled and run by the Greek Orthodox Church, which has kept out almost all foreign and modern influences since the eleventh century. Military patrols search all visitors. Non-Greek males are allowed in on a strictly limited basis, and there have been no females, human or animal, allowed on the mountain for a thousand years. The only inhabitants are hundreds of robed monks who live in cliff-hugging monasteries exactly as their predecessors did twelve hundred years ago. There's no electricity, no roads, no cars. Foods not specifically mentioned in Christian writings are avoided. Even time is different on Mount Athos because the monks follow the ancient Julian calendar, which, among other things, places the birth of Christ in mid-January instead of on December 25. Aside from farming, which is done by hand, the main activities are chanting, prayer, and creating illuminated ma.n.u.scripts.

It's a perfectly preserved slice of medieval Europe, the ideal place to find out how the apple came to grow in the Garden of Eden. The Old Testament does not reveal the exact ident.i.ty of the Fruit of Forbidden Knowledge, and how the apple came to be identified with the evil fruit remains a mystery. George and I were trying to reach a monastery on the other side of the mountain where I'd been told there was a monk with opinions on the subject.

After our breakfast, George and I continued up and over the sea cliff, then headed toward the mountain. The rain turned to snow, and soon we found ourselves hiking through a landscape covered in silver ermine. Bunches of crimson holly berries encased in ice glittered on the leafless trees. It was like walking into a Noel fairy tale, so perfect and clean and clear, Christmas before all the lies. But as morning progressed, the snowfall turned into a blizzard. The trail disappeared, then the trees, then the mountain. All I could see were whirling flakes of snow, and even they dissolved into a surreal void as my gla.s.ses became encased in inch-thick ice. The snow was up to our knees. Then my head b.u.mped into something. It was George. He was clawing at his face and shouting. It took awhile for me to realize he was saying that his eyes had frozen shut.

I defrosted them by cupping my hands over his sockets, but it was clear that the mountain did not want any visitors that day, and so we turned around and started back the way we had come. We were, of course, hopelessly lost, and it was only by chance that after some more wandering we discovered a rundown shack with a plume of smoke rising from its chimney. In a few minutes we were warming ourselves by a little coal stove and being clucked over by two grandpa monks with their beards tucked into their belts. They were hermits-the so-called "crazy of G.o.d"-who refuse the comfort of monastic life and live alone in the crudest of conditions. These two had "married" when they had grown too old to survive alone. I've never met a cuter couple. The quiet one prepared us a meal of raw onions, bread, and a homemade sherry while George explained our quest. The other monk pulled out a tiny red apple.

All of nature, he said in Greek (George translating), reflects the intent of the Creator: the shape of the clouds, the sound of the leaves, the flavors of the fruit on the trees. The monk thrust a knife into the apple. He pointed to the green opalescent drops dotting the tarnished steel. Come, he said, please taste. George and I dabbed our fingers into the liquor and placed it on our tongues. The first flavor was a scintillating, honeylike sweetness, followed by a tongue-curling tartness. Sweet flavors are lures meant to distract the faithful from the word of G.o.d, said George. That's why every meal in Mount Athos is accompanied by a reading from the Bible, to keep the brothers from dwelling on the pleasures of the food before them, and treats like chocolate are avoided. So the apple's initial sweetness was a sign of seductive intent. The tart aftertaste indicated diabolic influence, because bitter flavors indicate poison, and all poisons were thought by medieval scholars to be the work of the Devil. Some view the apple's bittersweet savor as a literal allegory of the temptation of Eve; the sweet first bite represents the Serpent's "honeyed tongue" while the astringent aftertaste foreshadows humanity's ejection from paradise.

The monk sliced two thin wedges from the apple and handed them to George and myself. See how the skin is red like a woman's lips? he said. And the flesh, how white it is, like teeth and skin. He told us to take a bite. Crisp and delicious. This, too, was considered an evil sign, because most fruits soften as they grow ripe. The apple, however, actually grows harder, an "unnatural" behavior that alchemists like Vincent de Beauvais claimed was "a sign of great deviltry . . . and of an immoral, cruel and misleading nature." Our friend sliced the apple in half, vertically, and pointed to the seeds. You see? he said: There, within the heart of the fruit, is the sign of Eve. There was no doubt that from this angle the apple's core looked vaguely like female genitalia. Hardly compelling, I thought. But the monk was not finished. He pulled out another apple and cut it in half, this time horizontally. Do you see the star? he asked. Sliced this way, the seeds that had looked like a v.a.g.i.n.a now outlined a five-pointed star, the pentagram, the ultimate symbol of Satan. The design was no larger than a dime but unmistakable. Even more alarming, at least to a religious fanatic, was how the seed design was highlighted by minute cavities of browned, charred fruit surrounding each pip. This is simply the result of iron-containing chemicals reacting with the air, but it really did look as if someone had magically burned the sign of Lucifer into the apple's heart.

"In the fruit trees are hidden certain of G.o.d's secrets," wrote the famous medieval mystic St. Hildegard von Bingen, "which only the blessed among men can perceive." Hildegard was describing the scientific philosophy of the Dark Ages, a discipline derived from the Platonic belief that all earthly objects are shadows cast by the true beings in the World of Ideas. Plato had been speaking in abstractions when he laid out this scenario, but medieval Christians had a.s.sumed his World of Ideas referred to their Heaven. They reasoned, therefore, that all earthly objects were symbols sent by G.o.d to communicate His intent. The priests' job was similar to that of a Jungian psychiatrist: they interpreted G.o.d's hidden "messages" and explained them to the unenlightened ma.s.ses. The apple's seductive colors, its two-faced flavor, its suggestively feminine core, and, above all, the hidden pentagram, were interpreted as signs that it was the fruit that had grown on the Tree of Forbidden Knowledge.

The hermit laughed after he had explained. But the Bible never identifies the evil fruit, he said; it was the Roman Catholics who put the apple there. The Greek Church sees the forbidden fruit only as a symbol of pride and carnal desire. He pointed; these are only apples, my friend, which by G.o.d's will are now divided into four pieces, one for each of us. He handed the wedges around with a smile.

Now eat eat.

Enveloped in Sweet Odor For years after my Christmas on Mount Athos I puzzled over the hermit's comment that the naming of the apple as the forbidden fruit was a "lie of the Pope." I knew, of course, that the Greek Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church had been bitter enemies for almost a thousand years. So his remark could have been just a spurious attack on an old enemy. But another possible explanation can be found in the maps of pre-Christian Europe. The Old World at that time can be roughly divided into two groups. South of the Italian-Austrian border lived the Mediterranean race, a dark-complexioned people who, among other things, were lovers of the grape. Wors.h.i.+pers, really, because the vine provided their preferred intoxicant, wine, which was used as a mystical tipple by everyone from the pagan Dionysian cults to the modern Roman Catholics. North of this imaginary border lived a bunch of barbarians often called the Celts. Since grapes did not thrive in their climate, they revered the apple. Instead of wine, their priests, the Druids, are believed to have used an alcoholic cider in their ceremonies. They even called their paradise Avalon, or Isle of the Apples, presumably with a cider press on the premises.

The Dionysian Mediterraneans merged their beliefs with Christianity to form the Roman Catholic Church. The Celts did the same with their Druid faith to create a brand of Christianity called the Celtic Church. Needless to say, the two groups loathed each other. Celtic monks would neither eat nor pray with Roman priests and considered utensils used by them to be contaminated. The Vatican, in turn, declared Celtic rituals to be heresy and threatened to execute the Celtic missionaries who were beginning to dominate western Europe. By the fourth century, the situation was threatening to split Christian Europe in half.

All of a sudden, the Tree of Forbidden Knowledge began sprouting apples.

One Apple down from all of those upon the fatal tree Enveloped in sweet odor, recommended it For pleasing sigh, and offered it to Eve.

This description of Eve's first insidious bite was written by the Roman poet Avitus around A.D. 470, near the height of the Celtic/Roman conflict. It could have been coincidence that the Romans chose that particular moment to use the Celt's sacred fruit to epitomize all evil knowledge. But there are a number of things peculiar about their selection. First, biblical writings indicated that the forbidden fruit was a fig. Second, the Romans actually invented the word that Avitus used to describe the forbidden fruit. The word is pomum pomum, based on Pomona, the pagan G.o.d of harvest. They could have stuck with the word the earlier Greek Bibles had used, malum, malum, which meant both which meant both evil evil and and fruit fruit. Ideal, really. Why change it? We'll never know for sure, but the obvious allegory in naming the Forbidden Fruit after a pagan deity would have been to remind new Christians that the older, non-Christian religions were heresy, i.e., forbidden knowledge.

Christians are notorious for baptizing pagan deities to cash in on their good karma. This, however, does not appear to have been a typical case of a.s.similation, because the Romans turned the existing myths and emotions about the apple upside down. The Celts believed that apples contained the essence of a divine wisdom that transported the diner to a kind of paradise. Yet the Christian myth clearly stated that apple-inspired wisdom led straight to h.e.l.l. This wasn't a.s.similation, it was attack, and apparently so successful that they repeated the stunt one thousand years later in the New World. The Aztecs of Mexico believed humanity had once lived in a paradisiacal garden where people ate flowers. The xochitlicacan xochitlicacan flowers in the original Aztec myths were thought to impart divine wisdom in the most positive sense, just as Celtic mythology had characterized the apple. When Spanish missionaries arrived in the 1500s, however, they began suppressing Aztec beliefs and teaching a new version of the fall of man that replaced Eden's apple with a flower. According to accounts from the time, the Indians said it was the destruction of these sacred flowers and plants, often used to make ritual beverages, that broke the heart of their culture. flowers in the original Aztec myths were thought to impart divine wisdom in the most positive sense, just as Celtic mythology had characterized the apple. When Spanish missionaries arrived in the 1500s, however, they began suppressing Aztec beliefs and teaching a new version of the fall of man that replaced Eden's apple with a flower. According to accounts from the time, the Indians said it was the destruction of these sacred flowers and plants, often used to make ritual beverages, that broke the heart of their culture.

Medieval Christians took their symbols much too seriously to have done all this while unaware of the repercussions. Particularly someone like Avitus. His poem, "The Fall of Man," was among the first dramatizations of the Bible aimed at the general population and was so popular it earned him the nickname of the "Christian Virgil." Since Avitus lived in the Celtic north, he would have realized with what fruit the word pomum pomum would be identified. In fact, the Christians were so preoccupied with the hold the Celtic apple had on the popular imagination they created a bizarre series of myths that described the apple's power actually draining into the body of Christ. In these stories, probably created around the eighth century, Christ is crucified on an apple tree. Then a "wild apple," representing the Celtic faiths, is nailed into the same tree and its juices are allowed to seep into the Messiah. The end of the tale describes Christ growing out of the apple tree's foliage like a nature spirit. (This kind of propaganda was not that uncommon, and, in fact, some Islamic scholars did the same thing about five hundred years later when they identified the Catholic grape as the Fruit of Forbidden Knowledge.) would be identified. In fact, the Christians were so preoccupied with the hold the Celtic apple had on the popular imagination they created a bizarre series of myths that described the apple's power actually draining into the body of Christ. In these stories, probably created around the eighth century, Christ is crucified on an apple tree. Then a "wild apple," representing the Celtic faiths, is nailed into the same tree and its juices are allowed to seep into the Messiah. The end of the tale describes Christ growing out of the apple tree's foliage like a nature spirit. (This kind of propaganda was not that uncommon, and, in fact, some Islamic scholars did the same thing about five hundred years later when they identified the Catholic grape as the Fruit of Forbidden Knowledge.) The Christian defamation of the apple did not end its consumption, but it did create a valuable tool to teach new converts in northern and western Europe of the dangers of heretic thought. Every peasant munching a McIntosh from then on received a visceral reminder of how the fruit wors.h.i.+ped by his grandfather had d.a.m.ned him to earthly purgatory. Its bittersweet flavor was a lesson in how sweet and tempting the teachings of non-Catholic churches might, at first, appear. It also changed the popular perception of the apple. The Celts had a.s.sociated apples with the glorious wisdom from the sun (the Celtic word for apple, abal, abal, is believed to derive from the name of the sun G.o.d Apollo). By the time the Christians were done, scholars had a.s.signed it to "the jurisdiction of Venus" and l.u.s.t. It became a low-cla.s.s love charm sometimes a.s.sociated with venereal disease. is believed to derive from the name of the sun G.o.d Apollo). By the time the Christians were done, scholars had a.s.signed it to "the jurisdiction of Venus" and l.u.s.t. It became a low-cla.s.s love charm sometimes a.s.sociated with venereal disease.

The apple's most telling transformation can be seen in the story of King Arthur and Merlin, a myth cycle that is in many ways the aborted New Testament of Celtic Christianity. In the original version, Merlin's supernatural powers were consistently a.s.sociated with the abal abal. He prophesied while standing beneath a tree dripping with crimson fruit, and his most famous writing, The Apple Tree, The Apple Tree, is an ode to the apple's crucial role in resurrecting the Druid faith after its destruction by the Romans. "The sweet apple tree loaded with the sweetest fruit," goes an early version of the poem, "growing in the lonely wilds of the woods of Cleyddon! All seek thee but in vain until Cadwaladr comes to oppose the Saxons. Then shall the Britons be again victorious, led by their graceful and majestic chief [Arthur]; then shall be restored to every one his own; then shall the founder of the trump of gladness proclaim the son of peace, the serene days of happiness." The apple orchard in Merlin's poem refers to Avalon, Isle of the Apples, where King Arthur is said to lie sleeping until his countrymen's hour of greatest need. The poem is thought to have been penned in the fifth century, around the time that the real King Arthur led a rebellion against the Romans and Avitus wrote his version of the tale of Eden. But when the official Christian version of the Arthur myth was put on paper seven hundred years later, the apple's role was again reversed. In this version, written in the twelfth century by the devout Geoffrey of Monmouth, the Druid priest/wizard Merlin is said to have been "driven mad and foaming at the mouth" by eating apples, which are described as being full of "the poisonous delights of women." Later versions tell of his being dragged into h.e.l.l where his true father, Satan, awaited. The Vatican eventually banned the use of apple cider from its religious ceremonies. is an ode to the apple's crucial role in resurrecting the Druid faith after its destruction by the Romans. "The sweet apple tree loaded with the sweetest fruit," goes an early version of the poem, "growing in the lonely wilds of the woods of Cleyddon! All seek thee but in vain until Cadwaladr comes to oppose the Saxons. Then shall the Britons be again victorious, led by their graceful and majestic chief [Arthur]; then shall be restored to every one his own; then shall the founder of the trump of gladness proclaim the son of peace, the serene days of happiness." The apple orchard in Merlin's poem refers to Avalon, Isle of the Apples, where King Arthur is said to lie sleeping until his countrymen's hour of greatest need. The poem is thought to have been penned in the fifth century, around the time that the real King Arthur led a rebellion against the Romans and Avitus wrote his version of the tale of Eden. But when the official Christian version of the Arthur myth was put on paper seven hundred years later, the apple's role was again reversed. In this version, written in the twelfth century by the devout Geoffrey of Monmouth, the Druid priest/wizard Merlin is said to have been "driven mad and foaming at the mouth" by eating apples, which are described as being full of "the poisonous delights of women." Later versions tell of his being dragged into h.e.l.l where his true father, Satan, awaited. The Vatican eventually banned the use of apple cider from its religious ceremonies.

In the end, however, it was the apple that had the last laugh. The Celts revered all trees-not just apples-and their priests used groves of oak and ash as places of meditation. It is these sacred groves that are the source of the trees we drag into our living rooms every Christmas, loving the forest smell that spreads through our homes, and admiring the globes that hang upon their branches: sacred abals abals every one of them, stylized, commercialized, but as red and green as any Pippin or McIntosh, our homage to an ancient vision of paradise. every one of them, stylized, commercialized, but as red and green as any Pippin or McIntosh, our homage to an ancient vision of paradise.

Likeness of a Roasted Crab All anyone can definitively say about the Celts' sacred apple juice is that it was probably similar to the tipple called Lamb's Wool. The name is a corruption of the Celtic lama nbhal lama nbhal or or la la mas ubhal mas ubhal, or Feast of the Apple Gathering, which was held in the fall, and the drink's curious wooly texture, which comes from using mashed roasted apples, toast, and sometimes eggs. It seems to be an attempt to re-create the texture of the original drink, which might have been an alcoholic porridge similar to the fruit beers still served in parts of Africa. These are as much food as drink and, like Lamb's Wool, are traditionally served in a bowl.

The drink's religious antecedents are clear from the accompanying rite known as "wa.s.sailing," a custom that may have once included the sacrifice of a young boy. It's still extant in parts of Great Britain, where people fling some of the drink on the roots of the oldest apple tree in the area while shooting guns and shouting, "Here's to thee, old Apple Tree/Whence thou may'st bud/and whence thou may'st blow/Hats full, Caps full/Bushel bags full!/And my pockets full too!/Huzzah!"

6 apples 2 quarts hard cider, or a mix of cider and ale Up to 1 14 cup honey or 1 12 cup brown sugar 18 teaspoon ground nutmeg 14 teaspoon cinnamon 14 teaspoon ground allspice

Core the apples and roast at 400 F for 45 minutes, or until they are soft and beginning to burst. Put the cider/ale into a large pot and dissolve the honey or sugar in small increments, tasting for desired sweetness. Add spices. Simmer for about ten minutes. Lightly mash apples and add one to each mug and pour hot cider on top. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Serves six.

Love Apple The naming of the humble apple as the Fruit of Forbidden Knowledge is the most unlikely bit of propaganda the Christians have ever cooked up. Everyone knew that so sinful a fruit would be a voluptuous pearl glistening amid a tangle of tropical greenery, and that it would grow in a land far, far, far away where naked bodies and free s.e.x were as common as flies. It would come from Eden, in short, which every educated person of the 1400s could find by looking at a map-there it was, right next to India. Christopher Columbus was so sure of Eden's location that he brought two crew members fluent in Chaldee and Hebrew, the languages thought most likely spoken by the Garden's inhabitants, just in case his s.h.i.+ps wound up south of their destination in Asia. When he b.u.mped into South America, Columbus mistakenly identified the Orinoco River in Venezuela as the gateway to Eden, but refused to sail up it lest the flaming cherubim G.o.d had hired as security guards attack his s.h.i.+ps.

So when Columbus brought a particularly luscious new-comer back from the New World, everyone jumped to the obvious conclusion. We call it the tomato, but most Europeans originally dubbed it poma amoris poma amoris, or the love apple. The Hungarians came straight out and named it Paradice Appfel Paradice Appfel, the Apple of Paradise. The tomato was everything the Forbidden Fruit ought to be-a s.l.u.t-red fruit oozing lugubrious juices and exploding with electric flavors. Clearly an aphrodisiac. But what made it particularly terrifying to the Europeans was its similarity to a plant called the mandrake, also known as Satan's Apple or the Love Apple. It's basically the fruit from h.e.l.l and has the distinction of being the aphrodisiac with which Leah seduces Jacob in the Bible, saying, "Thou must come in unto me, for surely I have hired thee with thy son's mandrakes."

Herbalists in the fifteenth century were well aware that the mandrake had natural narcotic powers. No real problem there. What really earned the plant its ghastly reputation was the way its roots resembled a withered, shrunken human body (or p.e.n.i.s, depending on your personal obsession). Medieval Europeans believed the roots were alive, demon sprits that whispered secrets in their owner's ear, and Joan of Arc's alleged possession of a mandrake root was one of the crimes that sent her to the stake. Witches claimed mandraks grew best beneath gallows trees, where the s.e.m.e.n dripping down from executed criminals produced appropriate fertilizer, and that when cut the plant emitted bloodcurdling shrieks that drove bystanders insane. The only safe way to harvest a specimen was to tie a black dog to the stem, block your ears with wax, and lure Fido toward you with fresh donkey meat until the shrieking plant was torn from the soil. The dog, of course, expired in drooling agony.

Both the tomato and the mandrake belong to the nightshade family. Both have bright red or yellow fruit. But although people have bred them together to produce narcotic tomatoes, they're quite different from each other. The general population, however, considered them one and the same, and called both love apples for centuries. This confusion was reinforced by a maze of stories that seemed to connect the two plants to Eden. For instance, medieval writers believed that mandrakes were G.o.d's first attempt to make humans (hence those weird roots). This meant they originally came from Eden, which the popular imagination by the 1600s had firmly located in the tomato's native South America. This fit rather nicely with the belief that the Italian name for the tomato, pomodoro pomodoro (literally, golden apple), referred to the golden apples that grew in the Pagan Greek Garden of the Hesperides. It seems Christian scholars had decided that The Garden of Hesperides-a walled enclosure guarded by spirits-was actually Eden, and that its magical fruit was actually Eve's famous snack. One popular tale even told how two elephants representing Adam and Eve were thrown out of paradise for eating mandrakes. Some people went so far as to claim that the tomato was actually Eden's (literally, golden apple), referred to the golden apples that grew in the Pagan Greek Garden of the Hesperides. It seems Christian scholars had decided that The Garden of Hesperides-a walled enclosure guarded by spirits-was actually Eden, and that its magical fruit was actually Eve's famous snack. One popular tale even told how two elephants representing Adam and Eve were thrown out of paradise for eating mandrakes. Some people went so far as to claim that the tomato was actually Eden's other other forbidden fruit: When an obscure Jewish-Portuguese immigrant named Dr. Siccaary brought tomatoes to North America in the early 1700s, he peddled them as being from Eden's Tree of Eternal Life, claiming that "a person who should eat a sufficient abundance of these apples would never die." forbidden fruit: When an obscure Jewish-Portuguese immigrant named Dr. Siccaary brought tomatoes to North America in the early 1700s, he peddled them as being from Eden's Tree of Eternal Life, claiming that "a person who should eat a sufficient abundance of these apples would never die."

[image]

Medieval people believed the believed the mandrake root was mandrake root was the first attempt to the first attempt to create humanity and create humanity and came from the came from the Garden of Eden. Garden of Eden.

So cautious Christians snubbed the tomato for at least 150 years, and it wasn't until the early 1700s that it began to gain acceptance, mainly in Italy, as a decorative puree or garnish. But the rest of the West continued to drag its feet. They claimed tomatoes made your teeth fall out. Its smell was said to drive people insane. Many Yanks thought them just too ugly to eat. In the 1880s, the daughter of a well-known British botanist named Montague Alwood wrote that the highlight of an afternoon tea at her father's house had been the "introduction of this wonderful new fruit-or is it a vegetable?" As late as the twentieth century writers like Henri LeClerc still cla.s.sed tomatoes with mandrakes as an "evil fruit . . . treacherous and deceitful."

Christian trepidation did not derive solely from the love apple's connection to the mandrake. The fruit's intrinsic morality was also in doubt. Consider the potato. Both it and the tomato arrived in Europe from the Americas at the same time. Both were a.s.sociated with the mandrake. But what a different reception the potato received! Dull, brown, heavy-on-the-belly, the elite immediately fell in love with it-but only for the peasants. They spent the next two hundred years shoving it down the throat of every proletarian they could lay their white gloves on. This was particularly true in Catholic countries, where the tuber seemed to have a halo floating over its scrubby little head, possibly because its Inca name, papa papa, is also the word for "pope" in Italian. Literally translated, papa papa, the potato, became "the pope's fruit," or the "pope-ato," and everybody sang its praises, like the Catholic officials who pleaded with the Vatican's morality czar to make the peasants "try and try again this delectable food."

Meanwhile, their brethren were putting the tomato on their lists of "disapproved dishes." "There is nothing more evil," wrote the well-known Catholic moralist Abbot Chiari during the tomato sauce naissance naissance of the mid-1700s, "than [the growing habit] of foods that are covered in drugs [spices] from America." The fact that the tomato first gained wide acceptance as a sauce was another strike against the fruit. That it was often not meant to be eaten, but only to glorify a dish, was even worse. "Man is, by nature, not a sauce eater," wrote the influential St. Clement of Alexandria in the third century, and he wasn't referring to a lack of spoons. Sauces were considered insidiously Satanic because they glorified the act of eating, which led to gluttony, which in turn led to every one of the deadly sins of l.u.s.t, pride, greed, etc. The tomato's unearthly brilliance, its zesty flavor, its lugubriously dripping succulence, were all anathema to the clergy. It "inflamed pa.s.sions" in ways that the grubby brown potato could hardly be accused of doing. The potato's chaste nature was further proven by its method of as.e.xual reproduction: it has no seeds but instead creates offspring directly from its body. Botanical Immaculate Conception. The Love Apple, dripping unctuous juices and seeds, soft and delicious, inviting the unwary to bite deep into its harlot-red flesh and let the juices flow, was an entirely different cla.s.s of being: immoral, lascivious, and decidedly un-Christian. This was serious stuff back then. When a foreign princess introduced the fork to Venice in the eleventh century, local religious leaders called divine wrath down upon her for the nicety. When she died of a particularly vicious disease, prelates sermonized that it was the "punishment of G.o.d" for the way she'd tried to glorify eating by conveying "morsels to her lips by means of little golden forks with two p.r.o.ngs." of the mid-1700s, "than [the growing habit] of foods that are covered in drugs [spices] from America." The fact that the tomato first gained wide acceptance as a sauce was another strike against the fruit. That it was often not meant to be eaten, but only to glorify a dish, was even worse. "Man is, by nature, not a sauce eater," wrote the influential St. Clement of Alexandria in the third century, and he wasn't referring to a lack of spoons. Sauces were considered insidiously Satanic because they glorified the act of eating, which led to gluttony, which in turn led to every one of the deadly sins of l.u.s.t, pride, greed, etc. The tomato's unearthly brilliance, its zesty flavor, its lugubriously dripping succulence, were all anathema to the clergy. It "inflamed pa.s.sions" in ways that the grubby brown potato could hardly be accused of doing. The potato's chaste nature was further proven by its method of as.e.xual reproduction: it has no seeds but instead creates offspring directly from its body. Botanical Immaculate Conception. The Love Apple, dripping unctuous juices and seeds, soft and delicious, inviting the unwary to bite deep into its harlot-red flesh and let the juices flow, was an entirely different cla.s.s of being: immoral, lascivious, and decidedly un-Christian. This was serious stuff back then. When a foreign princess introduced the fork to Venice in the eleventh century, local religious leaders called divine wrath down upon her for the nicety. When she died of a particularly vicious disease, prelates sermonized that it was the "punishment of G.o.d" for the way she'd tried to glorify eating by conveying "morsels to her lips by means of little golden forks with two p.r.o.ngs."

Both forks and tomatoes eventually carried the day. Ironically, the last place to embrace the tomato was America, the Land of Ketchup. The hero of the tomato was named Robert Johnson, and when he announced in 1820 that he was publicly going to eat one of the devilish fruits, people journeyed for hundreds of miles to his town in New Jersey to watch him drop dead. He mounted the courtyard steps around noon and turned to the throng. "What are you afraid of?" he snarled. "I'll show you fools that these things are good to eat!" Then he bit into the tomato. Seeds and juice splurted forth. Some spectators fainted. But he survived and, according to local legend, set up a tomato-canning factory.

The Ketchup with a Thousand Faces Yes, people fell screaming in horror as Robert Johnson bit into the bloodred tomato. There was panic in the streets. Until a few years ago his derring-do was celebrated every August in New Jersey with a reenactment of his feat. The problem is that it never quite happened. Andrew Smith is probably America's leading love apple historian and in his opus The Tomato in America The Tomato in America he doc.u.ments over five hundred versions of the Hero Who Ate the Tomato fable. Thomas Jefferson saves the day in one version, a West African slave in another. The French, of course, have registered numerous claims. Not that Johnson's role is totally false; it's just suffered an awful lot of improvement. he doc.u.ments over five hundred versions of the Hero Who Ate the Tomato fable. Thomas Jefferson saves the day in one version, a West African slave in another. The French, of course, have registered numerous claims. Not that Johnson's role is totally false; it's just suffered an awful lot of improvement.

Equally fallacious is the belief that tomatoes and ketchup are forever joined at the hip. To the ancient Romans, ketchup was a kind of fermented fish sauce called garum garum made by leaving salted fish intestines, heads, and blood in the sun to ferment for about two months. It was probably similar to contemporary Thai fish sauces and, in fact the word made by leaving salted fish intestines, heads, and blood in the sun to ferment for about two months. It was probably similar to contemporary Thai fish sauces and, in fact the word ketchup ketchup apparently derives from a Vietnamese version called apparently derives from a Vietnamese version called ketsiap ketsiap. In Europe garum garum evolved into a kind of pickle juice containing anchovies. It wasn't until the 1800s that someone tossed in a couple of tomatoes, but there were still lots of variations until the American government outlawed all fermented ketchup in 1906, thus inadvertently giving birth to the thick, supersweet goo with which the gullible now drown their dinners. evolved into a kind of pickle juice containing anchovies. It wasn't until the 1800s that someone tossed in a couple of tomatoes, but there were still lots of variations until the American government outlawed all fermented ketchup in 1906, thus inadvertently giving birth to the thick, supersweet goo with which the gullible now drown their dinners.

The true heyday of ketsiap ketsiap/kecap/ketchup/catsup/catchup diversity was the 1800s. There were lobster-flavored ketchups, peach, walnut, beer, horseradish, and mushroom. There's a good sampling of these recipes in Smith's books, but the most divine version is still being made in the Caribbean out of bananas. This stuff is incredible: sweet, hot, and luscious. I learned the following recipe from a Senegalese cook in Paris who claimed it was native to his land, but it's more commonly a.s.sociated with Jamaica. Follow the same sterilization procedures you would for making pickles or jams, and keep it refrigerated.

1 dried ancho chile 6 very ripe bananas, peeled and cut into chunks 113 cups cider vinegar, divided 12 cup raisins, preferably golden 13 cup coa.r.s.ely chopped onions 2 garlic cloves 23 cup tomato paste 2 cups water 14 cup light corn syrup 12 cup dark brown sugar 12 teaspoon chili pepper 2 teaspoons ground allspice 12 teaspoon ground cinnamon 12 teaspoon grated nutmeg Big pinch ground cloves 1 1 12 teaspoons salt Big pinch black pepper 6 tablespoons dark rum

Soak ancho chile in warm water for 15 minutes. Remove the stem and seeds. Puree the bananas with 1 12 cup vinegar and put into a heavy saucepan. Puree raisins, onions, garlic, ancho chile, tomato paste, and remaining vinegar in same processor (no need to wash) and add to saucepan. Add 2 cups water. Stir and bring mixture to simmer over medium heat, then reduce temperature to low and simmer uncovered for one hour. If mixture gets too thick, add water as necessary. Add the corn syrup and sugar and all the spices, including salt and pepper, and simmer for another thirty to forty minutes, or until it leaves a thick coating on the back of a spoon. Stir in the rum. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Puree again and strain it through a fine sieve to remove solids. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.

Venomous Green Some people like to grow flowers. Some like cacti. I grow herbs. Right now I'm looking at my little basil bush. It stands only about six inches tall, but it smells divine-sweet and deep green. I water it carefully, and, when I pluck a few leaves for my tagliatelle tagliatelle, I make sure to scream obscenities at its fuzzy little head just like the Italians used to. It just tastes soooo soooo much better that way. much better that way.

Basil was brought to Europe by Alexander the Great when he returned from a war near India around the fourth century B.C. With the plant came a little tale about a girl named Vrinda. It's a complicated story full of jealous G.o.ds and demons and angelic seductions, but in the end our heroine, Vrinda, discovers her husband has been killed. This so distresses her that she throws herself on her husband's funeral pyre and is burned alive. The Hindu G.o.ds commemorated this psychotic act of devotion by turning her charred hair into a sweet-smelling plant named tulsi tulsi, or basil, which they order their priests to revere. Some Indian courts still make people take the oath by placing their hand over a basil bush, just as we swear by placing our hand on the Bible, and millions of devout Hindus begin their day with a prayerful circ.u.mambulation around the household tulsi tulsi plant. In the evening they leave a sacred b.u.t.ter lamp burning by its side. plant. In the evening they leave a sacred b.u.t.ter lamp burning by its side.

The basil bush Alexander the Great brought to Europe went through a variety of genetic modifications. So did the story of Vrinda. First the G.o.ds were lost. Then Vrinda's horrible suicide was deleted. By the final version, Vrinda had become a girl named Lisabetta who, unable to bear parting with the body of her dead lover, cuts off his head and buries it in a pot containing a basil bush. Lisabetta waters it faithfully with her tears until she dies of a broken heart. The plant, thanks to the nutrients afforded by its special fertilizer, grows so large that people make pilgrimages to visit it. It's the same basic story line-girl loves boy/boy gets killed/girl goes crazy/plant makes the headlines- only transformed by European values. While the Hindus focused on love and devotion, the Euro-Barbarians were more interested in madness and decapitation. This more morbid flavor is in tune with the Mediterranean view of true love as a "grave madness, a powerful force that knocked people off balance and caused them to do dangerous and terrible things," according to historian Margaret Visser. In his poem "Isabella," the poet Keats underlines this att.i.tude by writing that the dead lover's rotting head gave the plant a particularly pleasant fragrance.

Whence thick, and green, and beautiful it grew, So that it smelt more balmy than its peers Of basil-tufts in Florence: for it drew (nourishment) . . .

From the fast moldering head there shut from view

This connection between basil and insanity led the Europeans to rename tulsi tulsi as as basilic.u.m basilic.u.m, a reference to the mythical scorpion, the basilisk, which they claimed grew in the brain of those who had smelled the plant. Hence the curious Italian custom of "going mad" and screaming obscenities when plucking its leaves. They may have been on to something about the plant's unsettling effect. The oil lamp that Hindus light next to their basil plants represents not only Vrinda's undying love, but also her body writhing in the flames of her husband's pyre-a love sacrifice that started the tradition, called sati sati, of burning widows alive with their dead husbands. It's still practiced today in parts of India, not always voluntarily. Part of the tradition calls for the widow to die with a sprig of basil clasped in her hand.

Tulsi Ki Chai Basil is considered too sacred to be used much in Indian cooking. There is, however, a fragrant tea called tulsi ki chai which is thought to ward off colds. The following recipe was given to me by Bhoopendr Singh, of the small town of Orchha in Madhya Pradesh.

To make: Bring about two cups of fresh water to a rolling boil. Add a half cup of whole basil leaves. Lower heat and let brew for about four minutes. Add two teabags, or the equivalent in loose tea, and approximately 6 teaspoons of sugar. Bring to a quick boil and remove from heat. Crush one or two basil leaves and add to each cup. Pour tea over leaves and serve. This is usually served black, but if you want milk, you should add it with the tea and sugar. Please note that tea in India is usually lightly spiced with cloves, pepper, and nutmeg, so you could use one of the chai tea leaf blends now available in lieu of regular tea. Makes two cups.

The Ecstasy of Being Eaten The first story about Adam and Eve consists of dinner followed by s.e.x, and writers have been fixated on the combination ever since. Some studies claim that dinner precedes 98 percent of all literary seductions. If true, you'd expect the Chinese novel Dream of the Red Chamber Dream of the Red Chamber, with its 971 dinner scenes, to be an outright orgy. You'd be disappointed (it's a rather stiff read), but that's because writers tend to sublimate. Nineteenth-century Russian author Nikolai Gogol wrote obsessively about food, but most agree he was really thinking about s.e.x, which he never, ever, wrote about or, apparently, experienced. His story "The Fair at Sorochintsky" transforms a tryst between an unfaithful wife and a priest into a feast of lewdly shaped delights. "Here is my offering to you, Afansy Ivanovic," cries the woman, bouncing into the priest's chamber. "Here are curd donuts, wheaten dumplings and cakes!" The priest wolfs down the treats while eyeing her suggestively open blouse. "Though indeed, Kharonya Riniforovna," he leers, "my heart thirsts for a gift from you much sweeter than any buns or donuts!" In another story, a couple expresses their shared love by feeding each other night and day. There's smoked sturgeon and kasha and fruit jelly and stewed pears and sausage and pancakes and blinis and sour cream and mushrooms and sage tea and watermelon and, of course, fish head pie. They rack up eleven huge meals every day, and the husband's last words to his dying wife are, "Won't you like a little something to eat, Pulcheria Ivanovna?" After his wife's death, her favorite dishes make him cry.

Gogol obviously had food issues-he eventually starved himself to death-but his muddling of s.e.x with eating is quite understandable because they're so d.a.m.n similar. During both we allow a warm (or at least reheated) creature to enter our bodies. Before we begin a feast, our mouths produce thick saliva without which our taste buds would be unable to function, just as before beginning s.e.x, a female produces a rush of mucus that facilitates her having, or at least enjoying, intercourse. During the act itself-of eating, that is-our lips flush and swell with blood in much the same way the c.l.i.toris and p.e.n.i.s do during s.e.x. All three, along with the tongue, are cla.s.sified as "specific erogenous zones" because of their mucocutaneous nature and the density and sensitivity of their nerve endings.

So it's really no surprise that we're constantly muddling together the acts of s.e.x and eating. What's interesting is the way the different genders go about it. Where Mr. Gogol makes the kitchen into an arena of bawdy adultery, Willa Cather makes it the "heart and center of the house" full of "the fragrance of old friends.h.i.+ps, the glow of early memories." Kitchens, to Cather, are temples of domestic love, "like a tight little boat in a winter sea." Her famous novels set during the American pioneer era are fine examples of how female authors tend to write about eating as an act of sharing that is also quite s.e.xual. In One of One of Ours Ours, an old German widow feeds a man with an excitement that is deliciously lascivious.

"I been lookin' for you every day," said Mrs. Voigt when she brought his plate. "I put plenty good gravy on dem sweet per-taters, ja."

"Thank you. You must be popular with your boarders."

She giggled. "Ja, all de train-men is friends mit me . . . I ain't got no boys mein own self, so I got to fix up liddle tings for dem boys, eh?"

She stood nursing her stumpy hands under her ap.r.o.n, watching every mouthful he ate so eagerly that she might have been tasting it herself. . . .

Even when being raunchy most women authors have a different tone than their male peers. In Dorothy Allison's collection Trash Trash, the writer remembers her lovers not only by what they ate, but also by the s.e.x they performed using ingredients from the evening meal. Eggplants dominate this lewd yarn, but it's still all about soul love. "I remember women by what we ate together," she writes, "by what they dug out of the freezer after we'd made love for hours. I only had one lover who didn't want to eat at all. We didn't last long."

It seems a woman's take on eating is the same as s.e.x-a shared experience that tends to fill you up. In a study comparing 489 food stories told by children between three and five years of age, sociologist Carole Counihan found that girls were twice as likely to describe eating in terms of a shared experience. Boys tended to see it as an act of killing and devouring. No wonder they later seem to find the whole thing less than satisfying when they grow up. In The Gift of an Apple The Gift of an Apple, Tennessee Williams compares eating to "an act of love . . . draw out the final sweet moment. But it can't be held at that point . . . it has to be finished. And then you feel cheated somehow." Ernest Hemingway agreed. In A Moveable Feast A Moveable Feast the ultimate macho says writing reminds him of s.e.x because both leave him "empty." His cure for this depletion, an aphrodisiacal plate of oysters washed down with a good white wine, helps. "As I drank their cold liquid from each sh.e.l.l and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and make plans." the ultimate macho says writing reminds him of s.e.x because both leave him "empty." His cure for this depletion, an aphrodisiacal plate of oysters washed down with a good white wine, helps. "As I drank their cold liquid from each sh.e.l.l and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and make plans."

This sense of emptiness Hemingway and Williams kvetch about might have something to do with the male tendency to eat one's mate. "No, on thy flesh I will feed," wrote one Elizabethan poet, setting the stage for centuries of skin-like-whipped-cream, cheeks-like-peaches, lips-like-cherries metaphors, a genre Margaret Atwood spoofed in The Edible Woman The Edible Woman when she had the housewife character bake a cake shaped like her body so her husband could more conveniently consume her. The eighteenth-century author whose obsession with pain, love, and food gave us the word when she had the housewife character bake a cake shaped like her body so her husband could more conveniently consume her. The eighteenth-century author whose obsession with pain, love, and food gave us the word s.a.d.i.s.t s.a.d.i.s.t , The Marquis de Sade, would have appreciated the thought. His , The Marquis de Sade, would have appreciated the thought. His 120 Days of Sodom 120 Days of Sodom is the crown jewel of the let's-eat-the-girls genre and includes one scene in which two bound waifs are placed side by side in front of a succulent meal-since they can't get a bite, they wind up eating each other. Human flesh, we are told, is the ultimate aphrodisiac. But the marquis recommends a simple breakfast: a plain omelet served piping hot on the b.u.t.tocks of a naked woman and eaten with "an exceedingly sharp fork." is the crown jewel of the let's-eat-the-girls genre and includes one scene in which two bound waifs are placed side by side in front of a succulent meal-since they can't get a bite, they wind up eating each other. Human flesh, we are told, is the ultimate aphrodisiac. But the marquis recommends a simple breakfast: a plain omelet served piping hot on the b.u.t.tocks of a naked woman and eaten with "an exceedingly sharp fork."

The King's Chocolate There were two items that the Marquis de Sade requested most fervently during his stay in the dungeons of the Bastille prison. The first were replacements for the mahogany d.i.l.d.os he kept breaking while amusing himself. The other was "chocolate . . . black like the Devil's a.s.s." The eighteenth-century n.o.bleman considered these items complementary because chocolate replenished his s.e.xual fluids that, in consort with those super-strong d.i.l.d.os, enabled him to achieve his ten daily o.r.g.a.s.ms. Indeed, it was a chocolate-fueled s.e.x-and-whips orgy that landed de Sade in prison in the first place. But his real sin, as we shall see, was to feed chocolate, called Theobroma Theobroma, or the Food of the G.o.ds, to the lower cla.s.ses and women.

The first culture to fall down in awe before the bonbon was the Olmec people of Central America around 1500 B.C. It might have been the Mayans. We really don't know; h.e.l.l, we don't really know if the "Olmecs" even existed. All we know for certain is that chocolate was revered by almost all early Central American cultures. Cacao beans, the fruit from which chocolate is derived, were used as money. An egg cost three beans. A dalliance with a hooker set you back twelve. The Aztec ruler Montezuma kept a billion pods in his treasury, and archaeologists have discovered caches of counterfeit chocolate currency, porcelain cacao beans so artfully done that n.o.body realized they were fake until a scientist tried to cut one open. The pleasure of actually consuming chocolate, however, was restricted to the ruling cla.s.ses, who enjoyed it with an after-dinner smoke much as we do liqueurs today. There were superexcellent tlaquetzallis tlaquetzallis, or blue-green chocolates. There were red chocolates flavored with anchiote, pink chocolates, orange ones, black and white chocolates. Many were flavored with wild honey or blue vanilla or "mad with flowers." There was also an alcoholic drink made from the sweet pulp surrounding the pod. None of this stuff resembled the dark, gleaming bodies we now so avidly devour. Back then, chocolate was a drink, served cold, honey-thick, and redolent of hot chili peppers. Milk and sugar were unknown.

The only time commoners were allowed a drop of this nectar was when they were about to die. Peasants marked for sacrifice took a tall gla.s.s of itzpacalatl itzpacalatl, a chocolate drink mixed with human blood, just before the priests ripped out their still-beating hearts. The drink was said to render the victims docile, but it also had symbolic significance because the Aztecs believed that the cacao pod represented the human heart, and its liquor, blood. Its long-standing reputation as a powerful aphrodisiac made it particularly taboo for women and priests. Emperor Montezuma, on the other hand, apparently took fifty gla.s.ses a day and imbibed a special brew before braving his army of wives.

Although these early Americans believed cacao incited both violence and l.u.s.t, it is the love connection that has stuck through time. "Chocolate," wrote the English poet Wadsworth "t'will make Old Women Young and Fresh/Create new Motions of the Flesh/and cause them to long for You-Know-What/If they but Taste CHO-CO-LATE!" Scientists say this is nonsense, because while chocolate contains stimulants like caffeine and theobromine, the amounts are too small to have any significant effect (aside from which, the only s.e.xual enhancement attributed to caffeine is it tends to make sperm swim more vigorously). The euphoria-inducing compounds phenylethylamine and serotonin are present in even smaller amounts.

Despite this scandalous reputation, the cacao champagnes of the Aztecs first became popular with European ladies living in the New World, who liked to take a gla.s.s during Ma.s.s. When the local bishop realized what his followers were sipping, he condemned it as "a d.a.m.ned agent from the witch's brew." He then tried to throw them out of church, but a sword fight broke out, after which everybody decided to observe Ma.s.s at home until the priest came to his senses. Which he soon did, in a manner of speaking; someone poisoned him. Appropriately, it seems the poison was administered via the priest's own hot chocolate. According to the seventeenth-century traveler Thomas Gage, who was in the Mexican highland area of Chiapas where the scandal broke out, the lady suspected of being the killer claimed that since the priest was "clearly an enemy of chocolate in the church" it was really no surprise that it had not agreed with him. This femme fatale then set her sights on Gage, also a priest, and began sending him him presents of chocolate. When Gage failed to respond to these blandishments, she sent him a more direct message-an oversized plantain (banana) in whose peel she'd carved a heart stuck with "two of blind cupid's arrows." Gage returned the plantain with his own message carved below, presents of chocolate. When Gage failed to respond to these blandishments, she sent him a more direct message-an oversized plantain (banana) in whose peel she'd carved a heart stuck with "two of blind cupid's arrows." Gage returned the plantain with his own message carved below, Fruta tan fria, amor no cria, Fruta tan fria, amor no cria, which is to say, "Fruit so cold, takes no hold." The spurned woman then threatened to slip him a dose of "Chiapas chocolate," and Gage fled the area. which is to say, "Fruit so cold, takes no hold." The spurned woman then threatened to slip him a dose of "Chiapas chocolate," and Gage fled the area.

The battle lines were drawn. A few religious leaders urged all monks to abstain from the dreadful stuff. This irked the Franciscan order, by then making a pretty penny from exporting it to Spain, which then ruled that hot cocoa could even be enjoyed during the fast of Lent. They commissioned paintings of angels offering steaming mugs to fasting saints, urging them yes, yes, take a sip! "Oh Divine Chocolate!" the poets rhapsodized, "They grind thee kneeling/Beat thee with hands praying/and drink thee with eyes to Heaven!" When Marie-Therese of Austria (who was actually Spanish) introduced cocoa to the French royalty around 1661, everyone had a hissy fit. Her husband, Louis XIV, banned her from drinking it in public, lest it corrupt the morals of the French ladies, but this was soon overcome and chocolat chocolat, by now made with milk and sugar and scented with jasmine, became standard court rations. When the puritanical Madame Maintenon came into power, it was again briefly banned amid reports that habitues were giving birth to coal-black babies. The next Louis put his mistress, Madame de Pompadour, on a diet of creamy truffle soup and hot chocolate in order to "heat up" her amorous appet.i.tes. Pompadour, however, merely grew fat and was demoted to the King's "confidential adviser," a code for her increasingly desperate attempts to find women able to satisfy the king's peculiar s.e.xual appet.i.tes-a quest that would end only with the entrance of the harlot-princess-s.l.u.t divine, dominatrix b.i.t.c.h, Madame du Barry.

The Aztecs had been proven right: their sacred brew had become the Food of the G.o.ds, or at least the demagogue aristocrats who were the deities of eighteenth-century Europe. By the era of Madame du Barry, Europe had divided into three cla.s.ses, each of which was identified with a particular brew. Peasants still preferred beer. The hardworking middle cla.s.s had adopted stimulants like coffee and tea. The aristocrats, to whom work was a dirty word, doted on chocolate. "Chocolate appears as the status beverage of the ancien regime ancien regime," wrote contemporary historian Wolfgang Schivelbush. It's a connection recorded in numerous paintings that depict marquises and marchionesses lounging in bed over a cup of cocoa, or in literary characters like Monsignor, whose fastidious chocolate ritual was used by Charles d.i.c.kens