So, I Had a Dream

There are cultures in which the Shamans divide "little Dreams" from "BIG Dreams." I had what I would describe as a little one ... a very little one ... and that following the day that Woody Allen's 100 year old analyst (from Crimes and Misdemeanors and from behind the couch), Marty Bergmann, finally passed on. Will dream analysis ever be the same?

In the Dream, I was doing a "Soup Clinic" .... teaching people how to think of soup. This, in and of itself, in my family might be a source of amusement -- yielding laughter. It's my firstborn who is the one in the family with a flair for cuisine ... haute and otherwise. When he was a youngster -- c. 35 years ago -- a family friend gave him the gift of cooking lessons with a local Chef who drove a big Mercedes and spoke with a heavy German accent ... just heavy enough to overuse cream and have some local TV shows. Since  then, Firstborn has mercilessly criticized his father's soups ... in the large? accusing his Papa of allowing, on occasion, soups to wander beyond a simmer into a boil. Now, I'm getting hot! "A boil on his head for accusing his Dear Ole Dad of such wanton sins and misdeeds."

But back at the Dream. Apparently, I had accepted the Gospel of the Firstborn and was warning the people I had been describing from the Grocery Store (see past 3 or 4 postings) of the near-Mortal Sin of Boiling Soup. It was, let me add, not a pretty scene. Firstly, Firstborn was off in the wings (was this being televised?) looking unappreciatively and disapprovingly of Il Papa's techniques. Not saying a word but with that look on his face ... as if to say: "you MUST be kidding."

Buffy and Burton were asking why I didn't have bottles full of Saffron. "We have bottles of Saffron ... full bottles." And then there were the dissatisfied and the unhappy. One was scowling and the other was demanding that I repeat everything ... repeatedly. I woulda called a manager ... Oh! but we really weren't in a Grocery Store!

Me? I was explaining that the most important two things to do with soup were, after vowing to never allow a soup to boil:

A. Pre-panfry any vegetables -- only fresh! -- that are to enter the sacred soup pot.

B. After the panfrying of vegetables is complete, carefully ... CAREFULLY .... with a wooden spoon of curved wooden spatula remove every bit of the cooked vegetables and guarantee their delivery into the pot. Nothing ... lemme repeat ... NOTHING may remain in the frypan.

Then, I left explaining that my Prep-Chef would "close" and pointing to Firsatborn.

The dream ended with all participants complaining by gesture or word that that Ole Man was using equal amounts of dried peas, barley and rice, destroying the flavor of each.

I woke up in a sweat with an impatiently disgruntled GuntherDog waiting to be escorted downstairs for his morning toillette.

And this nightmare? this occurred after the three dining grandspawn all seemed to be thrilled with not only my vegan pesto to satisfy their little vegetarian personnas, but with my cassoulet, kugel, and fruit compote, to boot.

I can only imagine the Dream that might have followed rejection of my cuisine.

How DID Julia Child sign off!?