• Recipes
  The Apprentice's Pot au Feu Creamy Morning Eggs Alexandre's Omelette Raviole de Fois Gras Monkey Brains Cocktail Chef's Own Sweet and Sour, Hot and Cold Eggs Ris de Veau aux Morilles Colette's Seven Hour Lamb

From Chapter Twenty-Five

"Monkey brains! You actually ate monkey brains?" the pretty blonde shrieked, openmouthed. The table erupted in laughter. Alexandre beamed.

"Sounds thoroughly delightful," the fiancé said. "You see my pet, the world would be a very dangerous place indeed without restaurant critics. Intrepidly, they forge ahead, swinging their knives and forks fearlessly, clearing a safe path for us timid souls. Let's drink to their courage!"

It was a dinner party for eight at the apartment of one of Capucine's university classmates. Now a management consultant, she lived with her boyfriend in a small but masterfully decorated flat on the rue des Francs Bourgeois near the place des Voges, in the pricey heart of the Marais. Despite the crushing hours of her job she nurtured her social life with the intensity of an intern caring for a patient on life support. She made a point of having at least two carefully orchestrated dinners every month each complete with eucalyptus branches artfully laid over starched linen napkins and exotic aspics prepared by the local traiteur. Like most Paris diners en ville, the guests rarely arrived until after nine and usually remained at the table until one or two in the morning exchanging meticulously crafted epigrams.

This is not going to be anyone's daily tipple, but it does respond to the love we all had for our chemistry sets when we were little and it's a great ice breaker or Halloween drink. For the effect to work, a steady—preferably sober—hand is essential.