Dying in an Italian restaurant on a Friday night, let’s say I’m talking about Madrid, has all the cruelty in the world. The flames were apparently started by a blower, used for the Inferno pizza, and ended up igniting the ceiling ornaments. Two young people – a customer and a waiter – lost their lives there.
What does a blower paint in a restaurant room? And an ‘Amazonian’ decoration? They certainly do not anticipate anything good…
The tragedy coincides with a revival of the flamjejats -which one will continue to call flambejats, even if it is a Gallicism-, banished by the nouvelle cuisine, stage Paul Bocuse, who saw in this spectacle of fire, choirs and dances an anachronism to Banish from dining rooms. Anyone who wants Fallas should go to Valencia!
A few days ago, after enjoying the work Confessions of an artist by Andreu Rifé at the Romea theater in Barcelona – an exercise in honesty about creation and how much we copy each other -, we went, author and friends , to dinner at l’Estevet. I was surprised that they flambéed a dessert (I could swear it was rum flan). I did not dislike the ritual and it was a pity that there were no women at the table, because the flaming was a way of impressing the ladies in the days when they invited the gentlemen, who we will not call gentlemen in view of their pyrotechnic intentions of ‘these dinners.
There are many things left over in restaurants, besides a blower and the Amazon ornaments, an affront to the brothers and sisters of the Amazon (they wouldn’t do it). I don’t need to explain the dishes because the dishes speak for themselves. I hate the designer cutlery, which always end up sliding and hopefully don’t end up in the crotch, which is no place for stains. I don’t like the flower petals, the soybean stalks and the vegetable ornament that alters the flavor of the dish or makes it look ridiculous.
I already understand that there are those who want to turn a dinner into an “experience”, perhaps to have a topic of conversation or to impress the companion (in that case, don’t talk about it anymore). What I never imagined was that this and other beasts would lead to the death of two human beings…
