Last Days of the Bus Club (3 page)

It was about three days later when the phone rang again. ‘Chris, it’s David. I been thinking about your place ever since that lunch, and I’ve come to the conclusion that we’ve got to do it. My man would never forgive me if we don’t. It’ll be the best part of the show. I know I said it couldn’t be done, but I reckon it can. Can you give us a couple of options for next month?’

And thus it was that I embarked upon yet another career, mercifully short this time, as a guest television cook.

What, I wondered, ought one to make for the delectation of Rick, not to mention the foodies who would be
watching
? Some ecological dish perhaps, composed of our own home-grown ingredients and cooked in a sustainable way, using almond shells and dried rosemary. Fish was the thing of David’s man, but fish is one of the things that don’t grow on the farm. I crossed fish off the list.

Over the coming weeks I tried various things out on Ana and Chloé, many of them heavily loaded in favour of the cucumber, for we were suffering from a glut of cucumbers that year. But you can only eat so many cucumber dishes, and we were pushing the limits: cucumber soup, cucumber sorbet, cucumbers fried, curried, baked and stuffed, even a detestable cucumber lemonade. But, as Ana pointed out, the viewers were hardly going to make a big effort to tune in to find out how to cook a cucumber.

I abandoned the cucumber and cast about for something a bit sexier and more televisual. The pomegranate is of course about as televisual as a thing can be, but there’s only so much you can do with one, beyond eating its seeds. Pomegranate syrup is good, but the preparation of it makes for rather tedious viewing.

Then, a week before we were due to receive David and his man, the hunters rang me to say that there was to be a
montería
that Sunday morning, and that we ought to keep the sheep shut in the stable because of the risk from the hunting dogs that they always, without fail, seem to leave behind them. Just a few hours later, they rang again, bubbling with manly pride, to say that, through some bizarre circumstances, they had actually managed to find a boar and shoot it, and that if I wanted some I could go up and collect it.

My heart went out first to the ill-starred boar, who had so badly misjudged his Saturday-night ramble as to be discovered on the hill on the Sunday morning, and then it occurred to me: of course, boar. There would be a
deliciously
appropriate irony in cooking one up on the telly. What a way to get my own back for the years of ravages that we had suffered at the hands – or, more accurately, the snouts – of the boar population. Accordingly, I set off up the hill to fetch the main ingredient in a dish that was already taking shape in my mind.

It took about forty-five minutes to find the hunters. There were two of them, a beefy young lad and a tough wiry man, both wearing hunters’ garb and forage hats. Neither of them were friendly; this was manly business. We roped the dead beast up, and set off through the rosemary, taking up the strain to drag it behind us. It stayed exactly where it
was. We took a breather and tried again but still it resisted the combined might of the three of us; boars are heavy
creatures
, and this was a big one. There was no way we could move it, so the thin man took out his hunting knife and set about dismembering it. With considerable skill, and a knife that was heavy as an axe and razor-sharp, he took off the head, flayed the bristly skin from the flesh, and cut the rest of it into two halves.

These we hoisted onto our shoulders, slimy with blood and wobbling with fat, and started through the thick
undergrowth
down the hill.

The lad carried the head – which was no mean feat, as it was slippery with congealing blood and must have weighed the best part of twenty kilos – while the military-looking man and me carried a side each, and the sides weighed even more. The pair of them were young and very fit and I hobbled and stumbled to keep up with them, making constant adjustments to the gruesome load that slipped and slid constantly from my grip. Eventually, casting
squeamishness
aside, I carried it over my head, my hair now caked in gore and grease. The viewers would not want to see this aspect of the meal, I thought to myself, as I staggered and twisted my knee a little.

I hung that side of boar in the old kitchen, where there were fewer flies than in the stable. The hunters promised to ring me when they had the results of the trichinosis test, certifying its safety, and departed.

You have to be cautious with eating wild boar, and a sample of meat must be examined under a microscope to establish that it is free from disease. Everyone has to do this as a matter of routine. And, of course, it wouldn’t do to kill a TV chef. Fortunately the result came through
as negative, so I butchered the meat and froze it, leaving enough out for a substantial stew for Mr Stein.

The big day came. I had prepared the stew of boar the night before. Stews, as I’m sure you know, get better and better by the day, and I figured that, with all the other stuff that would be going down on the morrow, it would be advisable to have at least a part of the job already done. This is what I did: first of all I browned those chunks of boar. I zapped them in hot, hot oil so they seared in a matter of seconds. This, the searing, is one of the important things to get right for the success of your stew. After the first batch is browned, you need to tip away the liquid that has gathered in the pan, and start again; otherwise, the next batch will be boiled rather than seared … and boiled boar is what you don’t want. If you want to use those juices later, which is no bad thing, you can add them to the onions once you have zapped them in a little oil after the meat.

I took the meat out of the pan and added a load of sliced onions, a heap of garlic, a couple of red-hot headbanger chillies and some bay leaves, all from the garden. Then there was half a bush of rosemary from the hill and the grated peel of a few oranges and lemons. Once this lot was fizzing away nicely, I tipped in the seared meat, and a couple of tins of tomatoes, fresh from the larder … I know there were tomatoes in the garden, but it saves a lot of messing about taking the skins off and, besides, tinned tomatoes are delicious at any time of the year. And finally a tin of tomato puree, and a couple of squares of black chocolate … not for pudding, but for that nice thick black
slimy Mexican texture. Hell of a stew, I thought to myself as I sucked the wooden spoon.

Russell, our English neighbour from La Herradura, the next farm down the river, had been wheedled into bringing the crew across the river and up to the farm in his Range Rover. It was a rough old Range Rover, but I think he had been up half the night polishing it and mucking out its
typical
farm car interior.

In a flurry of dust the car rolled up beneath the house and Rick Stein and the crew disembarked. We all shook hands and said how pleased we were to meet one another, and without further ado David swung into action.

‘Russell, take Rick back down the hill and drive up again. Rick, you get out of the car and come up to the steps where you shake hands with Chris and Ana. Got it? Off you go.’

Russell and Rick backed down the drive while David pushed us into position.

‘Right. When Rick comes up, you go down the steps and act like this is the first time you’ve ever met. OK?’

The sun shone; Russell drove up again; Rick got out; the dogs barked; Ana and I sashayed down the steps; we all oozed inane enthusiasm and bonhomie; Rick said again that he was really pleased to meet us and handed us an enormous string of garlic in a purple fishnet bag; Ana and I reached out together to grab it …

‘CUT! Hold it there. Only one of you wants to go for the garlic. You look like you’ve never seen a string of garlic in your lives. We’ll do it again. Russell, back down the hill. Ana, Chris, back up the steps.’

Rick clambered back into the car clutching the garlic and Russell backed off down the hill again. Ana and I and Bumble and Bao bounced back up the steps. Once again,
Russell drove up; the dogs barked; the door opened and out rolled the string of garlic. ‘CUT! One more time, please. Hang on to that garlic will you, Rick.’

I muttered to Ana that I thought the string of garlic was a bit of a crap present. After all, we grew our own garlic; we had heaps of it. ‘Yes, but he doesn’t know us, does he? And don’t be ungracious; it’s very nice of him.’

‘QUIET! Back down the hill, Russell, Rick. Ana, Chris, back up the steps … Go!’

We went back up the steps, followed by the dogs, who were starting to get confused. Rick got in the car again; Russell rolled backwards.

‘Let’s see if we can’t get it right this time,’ said David.

Up came Russell in the car; Rick got out, clutching the garlic; the dogs looked on in silence; Rick said yet again that he was really pleased to meet us; we all looked at one another for a bit. ‘The garlic, Rick. Hand over the garlic,’ admonished David. ‘Hallo, Rick,’ I said. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you.’ I held out my hand to shake, but Rick was still proffering the garlic. I shook the garlic … ‘CUT!’

Down the hill went Russell and Rick. Ana and I went back up the steps with the dogs, me holding the garlic. ‘Chris, give the garlic back to Rick, will you?’

Followed by the dogs, I walked down the track to where Russell and Rick were waiting for the signal, and handed over the garlic. Rick grinned at me wanly.

‘One more time. Everybody ready? Roll.’

Finally we got it nearly right. It went something like this: Russell and Rick arrived; the dogs barked; Ana and I walked down the steps; Rick got out of the car with the garlic, and said goodbye to Russell; Rick said for the fifth or sixth time how pleased he was to meet us and handed the garlic to Ana,
who received it graciously; we all shook hands and I said, ‘Rick Steen, good to meet you; I’ve heard a lot about you.’

‘It’s Stein, Chris. Rick Stein, not Rick Steen,’ said David. ‘We’ll do it one last time.’

And so we did and this time we got it, as I think one says in the film world, in the can.

As you may imagine, we were all feeling a little tired after completing this scene, and we had hardly started the session yet. There was considerable scope for more
cock-ups
, I thought, when we got onto the real business. But for now what was needed was a little alcohol. We served some beers and wines and offered around some roasted almonds and capers and pots of home-grown olives,
Arbequinas
and
Acebuches
, which we reckoned Rick would not have come across before – they’re tiny with very little flesh, and most people would think that they’re not worth the trouble, but take it from me, they are.

The load lightened and we all had a giggle about what had just happened, and started to get to know one another a little. I had boned up enough on Rick’s work to know he was a man after my own heart when it came to sustainable fishing and the rustling up of food, but he was an easy guest too, unassuming and with a ready charm. The cameraman and sound recordist wandered about the place getting what they called ‘atmospheric stuff’, while the rest of us got into the mood for cookery. I slipped on a clean apron and with a whetstone whipped up an edge on some knives. Ana went down to the vegetable garden with Rick and the camera to get some home-grown vegetable shots.

The meal plan was as follows: we would start with some lightly fried lambs’ balls, dusted with beaten egg and breadcrumbs, and fried in oil and butter with a hint
of chilli and thyme. You don’t often get lambs’ balls in Britain, so I figured that this would be a rare treat for the visitors. A tabouleh would be next, a mountain of mint and parsley chopped up with tomatoes, chilli and ginger and bulghur wheat, lemon juice, and perhaps a small red onion finely chopped and soaked for half an hour in icy water to take the worst of the kick out of it. If anybody fancied it, there would be some yoghurt with garlic, chilli (I put chilli in everything, as a consequence of having once visited Mexico), ginger and fresh coriander, to slop on the tabouleh.

Then would come the pièce de résistance, the thick red meaty stew accompanied by the lightest creamiest
aligote
– mashed potato with cheese and garlic – and finally, to dazzle the senses, Ana’s floral salad, one of the most beautiful dishes that ever graced a table. It would certainly look good on the telly, we thought.

We all repaired to the kitchen to get this stuff on the move. Amid the clashing of knives and the bubbling and steaming of pots, I liberally bestowed cookery hints upon the patient Rick, who did his level best to assume an amused interest. I told him for example, that I thought people were far too fussy about food hygiene and, as a species, it was not doing us any good. ‘You’ve got to eat a peck of dirt before you die,’ I ranted. ‘What possible harm can come from a handful of bluebottles on your meat? If meat is dangerously off, the smell is so bad you can’t get near it …’ and other singular and questionable
pronouncements
. ‘Lemon squeezers are for pussycats,’ I told him, squeezing a lemon through my hand and filtering the pips with my fingers. I think he took note of this particular hint for future use.