B is for Bachelors

“… and the wonderful dinners they pull out of their cupboards, with such dining-room aplomb and kitchen chaos.”

M.F.K Fisher spent some of her life with a partner, and much of her life without, but B is for Bachelors remains an unapologetic love letter to the pursuit of romance.

Regardless of their significance, Fisher introduces us to the lovers who left their mark, reserving the highest praise for any individual who could titillate her palate. 

There’s the “highly expert bachelor-cook,” who, due to a preoccupation with his lemon sauce, I’m almost certain was a friend with benefits. The greying statesman who found out the hard way that very expensive liquor - old Scotch, vintage Burgundies, and fine cognacs - will only get you so far. And I’ve still not recovered from the dinners in Bel Air. Under the watchful gaze of “eager brown eyes,” Fisher, lit only by the muddy glow of burning cigarettes, describes each course with increasing arousal. I had to take a pause before dessert as Fisher's words began to reverberate with the sultry undertones of a late-night call to Babestation.

Meanwhile, I once declined the offer of a man who wanted to host me at his one bed in Walthamstow, as I was unable to shake the nagging sensation that he wanted to harvest my organs. 

Fascinated by love's many guises, Fisher considered dating in just as high regard as its potential outcomes. She relished in the discovery of people’s peculiarities, and the trust placed in this process is likely why Fisher met such a diverse array of characters on her travels. 

But as my lifetime began, and Fisher’s ended, the art of dating had warped into a cat-and-mouse game of suspicion and doubt. Societal structures placed more and more emphasis on the individual, so strangers became outsiders, and then outsiders became threats. In subsequent decades, this trend has only intensified, with Fisher’s wide-eyed sanguinity now considered a naive worldview reserved only for the golden age of Hollywood.

Of course, the overwhelming majority of 1940s social attitudes are best left for the history books, but why must we now paint every potential suitor as an opportunistic devil waiting to take advantage of our affection? Forget trusting the process. We don’t trust anyone.

With optimism, openness, and trust all falling by the wayside, the necessary ingredients to fall in love have been disemboweled from the early stages of dating. This slow erosion of faith has had seismic consequences for how we relate, often all but guaranteeing that deep connection is kept firmly at bay. 

But no casualty provides more insight into the current state of courtship than the death of the dinner date. 

Whether it be the silent dance of desire performed over Escargots in Pretty Woman, Danny and Sandy making googly eyes over a milkshake, or - although the ratio of pasta to sauce still haunts me to this day - the spaghetti in Lady and the Tramp, there was a time where our perception of dating was shaped primarily by two people sitting opposite each other.

Fast forward to today and the mere suggestion of food prompts reactions of sheer horror. “Um, let’s just have sex first and then see if we’re peckish.” 

It’s difficult to unpick this dichotomy, where the most personal of physical acts is treated with blasé nonchalance, but eating a meal with someone is your idea of hell. On the one hand, it’s a positive reflection of how we have liberated our bodies from outdated relationship expectations, but it’s also a prime example of how we have become trapped in distant, transactional bubbles.

If Fisher’s love life is anything to go by, then we must break free from our self-imposed emotional quarantines. She understood that vulnerability is the key to any meaningful relationship, and therefore exposed herself to conditions that revealed, not hid, who she was. The success Fisher found through gastronomic dating - which, by any measure, was wild, varied, and filled with sex! - exemplifies the strength of this ethos. So, in the same spirit, I call upon us all to run towards the unparalleled intimacy of the table and embrace its ability to unravel the compatibility of any two individuals.

This even applies if that table is proverbial, as it was during my ill-advised appearance on The Guardian’s Blind Date. 

Aside from the thrill of having a three-course meal paid for by a newspaper, it was at the very least an opportunity to embarrass myself on a national platform.

Months went by after sending off my application, before one day an email popped into my inbox from the Guardian’s resident cupid, Nina Trickey, letting me know that she’d found me a match.

“Thanks for agreeing to be part of our special video Blind Date while we navigate these unsettling COVID-19 times.”

I don’t think I agreed to that small, but very important, detail Nina. Alas, instead of being whisked off to some god-awful restaurant, I ended up with £50 worth of Deliveroo vouchers, a Zoom link, and a reminder to wash my hands before and after eating. 

Things weren’t off to a great start when the heartthrob I had been promised turned out to be a banker turned personal trainer who had left his sense of humour in Canary Wharf. “Don’t do anything you wouldn’t normally do in this type of situation!” Nina said with a cautionary flare of her eyes. “What on earth does she mean by that?” I thought worryingly, as my eyes strained to make sense of the pixelated blob sat in front of me.  

There were early red flags, including the fact that my date opened with a stony admission that he was hoping for someone in their thirties. However, it was his philosophy at the table that told me everything I needed to know about his character.  

After finding the only Italian restaurant open within a five-mile radius, I naturally indulged in a 16-inch prosciutto and mascarpone pizza, cheesy garlic bread, tiramisu for two, and a bottle of cheap red. My date opted for a low-calorie, low-fun pumpkin grain bowl, of which he managed an egregious two bites. 

If M.F.K Fisher had a date lined up in the middle of the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic, she would’ve had dessert. In fact, I would bet my life savings on her ordering her favourite, Riz à l'impératrice, an elaborately moulded rice pudding made up of rich Bavarian cream and candied maraschino fruits.

But no, even when presented with a once-in-a-generation opportunity to show that the dinner date must remain a transcendent force in our dating culture, some would prefer to shun the potential for connection concealed in every bite. I can feel Fisher turning in her Bavarian cream grave as we speak. 

Thankfully, one passage in 1949’s B is for Bachelors has stood the test of time. It’s an analysis of dating so evergreen that it stops me short of abandoning Fisher’s assessment of epicurean courtship. 

“Since few of them under seventy-nine will bother to produce a good meal unless it is for a pretty woman,” Fisher says of men, “their approach to gastronomy is basically sexual.”

An Alphabet for (Modern) Gourmets brings M.F.K Fisher’s seminal 1949 anthology, An Alphabet for Gourmets, into the 21st century with an updated A to Z on all things food. Contrasting the generational differences, and timeless similarities between centuries, Ben Drinkwater offers a witty and thought-provoking exploration of life’s most storied ritual.

Words: Ben Drinkwater

Artwork: Laura Sheppard