The Habits Of A Lunchtime

Television killed the art of conversation. Wrong. The art of conversation, the British art of conversation, never existed, especially not at meal times. Its absence is wrapped up in British habits of a lunchtime or a dinnertime.

The British on holiday at meal times are a morose bunch. They are long-faced and impatient. Service is criticised for its slowness, but this is an excuse to disguise the fact that meal times are suffered rather than enjoyed.

Nations are defined by their eating habits: the habits of what is eaten; when it is eaten; how it is eaten; where it is eaten; why it is eaten; and what is said (or isn't said).

The British meal time was traditionally a purely functional occasion. It was a utilitarian intrusion, characterised by social awkwardness and by the consumption of food which, at best, was no more than unremarkable. It was the same on the rare occasions that the British ventured out to eat. The tables were silent, the food was hopefully rather better than rank.

Things changed with the gathering pace and numbers of cookery shows and celebrity chefs. From Fanny Craddock through the Galloping Gourmet to Floyd, Delia, the boys Rhodes and Oliver and to Ramsay, a nation has acquired an appreciation of cuisine. But this is pretty much all it has acquired. A nation of shepherd's pie eaters still marks its meal times with dutiful muteness while the TV shows them food being prepared, discussed, rated, reality-ed and celebritised by celebrities other than chefs themselves; food they are unlikely to ever attempt themselves.

On holiday there isn't the box with celebrity chefs to fill the silence. Or there may be at the Brit bar which will serve up pie and chips with peas; the telly of a Brit bar is a comfort blanket for the non-communicative.

Meal times as social occasions is a largely alien concept to the British; about as alien as the concept of meal time is to the Mallorcans and Spanish, or indeed the concept of time full stop. The notion of mediodía and therefore lunch can mean pretty much whatever you want it to mean. It almost never means midday, which comes as a shock to those who are the most rigid adherents to time - the Germans, for whom midday and lunch means midday. It doesn't mean one minute past midday.

Such rigidity is what rules the eating habits. It is the complete opposite of a Mallorcan haphazardness by which meals seem to simply happen. A Mallorcan lack of rigidity is what governs everything else surrounding the meal. It is rarely anything other than a noisy and protracted affair. It is an event in its own right. There can be a theatrical element to it, such as with the presentation of a paella or fideua. The taking of tapas is totally contradictory to the set-piece style of the British main course and dessert and is a style of eating that demands and was in no small part brought about by a social dimension to meals.

The British have never really understood the ethos of meals as events. The inconsequentiality of eating extends to the fact that the British never invented a good wish before a meal. They had to borrow one from the French. "Enjoy your meal" is a ludicrous and recent Americanism, about as ludicrous as the literal translation of bon appétit to "good appetite" that one can encounter in a Mallorcan restaurant.

Climate as much as a non-rigid attitude to meal time has influenced differing eating habits. One might call this the alfresco factor. Eating outside, especially on long, warm evenings, requires a degree of affability and sociability. The alfresco factor is arguably the most significant in having created the differences in eating habits between northern and southern Europe, not so much in terms of what is eaten (though clearly there are differences) but in the nature of the meal.

The meal as social event is celebrated at fiestas. The alfresco evening supper is a feature of them. To the disgust of many in Alcúdia this year's supper was dropped from the fiesta programme, a curious decision that could have been only marginally based on finance as it was the norm for people to pay. And they did pay. In great numbers. Three thousand or so would sit down in the market square.

The food at such suppers is never grand, but it doesn't have to be because it is the event itself which matters. Not grand maybe, but a mix of trempó, tumbet and pa amb oli doesn't taste at all bad on a sultry summer evening. This is what they had at a supper in the enclave of Ses Casetes des Capellans in Playa de Muro the other night. A thousand people having a meal together in even this tiny little place. And was there conversation? Above the noise of the talking, who could tell.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.