Take a large dollop of chorizo and stick it in your tortilla – ethnic cooking with Medders

‘CHOREETHO!’ ‘Bless you’ ‘Eh? Why bless me?’ ‘I thought I heard you sneeze.’ ‘No, I was just practising my Spanish. Choreetho!’ ‘It still sounds like a sneeze. What are you talking about?’ ‘You know the nice spicy Spanish sausage? Well that’s a choreetho. Not shoreezo, mind you, but choreetho.’

‘Oh, you mean chorizo, Medders.’

‘Well I believe it’s rendered choreetho down Valladolid way. Pop it in your omelette or, should I say, stick it in your tortilla.’

‘I may make a paella tonight.’

‘You said pie-ella, dearest. We who are fine tuning our Castilian would rather have it pie-eh-yah.’

‘Paella.’

‘No, listen carefully. It’s pie-eh-yah. Try it please. Pie. Eh. Yah.’ ‘No, you listen carefully. I am going to pour myself a large glass of Rioja and drink it slowly while you cook dinner instead. I really don’t mind whether we have tortilla, or paella, or egg and chips. I shall be eating it, not pronouncing it.’

Conversation stalls while Hermione rootles around for a corkscrew and Medders starts chopping the onions…

‘What had you thinking about chorizo anyway, Medders?’

‘It was Neven Maguire.’

‘Neven? The chubby-cheeked chef from Monaghan? He’s quite cute.’

‘That’s the one, except he’s a Cavan man.’

‘I associate Neven with traditional Irish soda bread and black pudding rather than your paella – sorry, pie-eh-yah. I picture him serving tea and brack to guests in his conservatory.’

‘These days he’s more likely to be found dishing up Bay of Biscay oysters with Asturian cider. He’s on the telly, traipsing around Spain on a sort of culinary pilgrimage.’

‘Wow! That’s great timing. We’re stuck at home in lockdown while Neven is pottering up the Pyrenees or ambling around Andalusia.’

‘All the celebrity chefs are travelling these days, darling. You can scarcely turn on the TV without seeing Jamie scooting across Italy on a Lambretta or Gordon bleeping about the United States.’ ‘The great gastronomic escape.’

‘And it’s not just because of the virus. When you think about it, Irish diners are very cosmopolitan these days, sweetypie.’ ‘How do you mean?’

‘Well, look at little old provincial Our Town. We have two Chinese restaurants, two Indian, two Italian and a Portuguese. Then the takeaways specialise in pizza, chow mein, or kebabs. No one is offering coddle or boxty bread.’

‘That’s true. And we’ve one hotel famous for Thai cuisine while the other offers a Tex-Mex experience complete with fiery fajitas.’ ‘I can’t get enough of those hot jalapeno peppers.’ ‘Meanwhile, supermarkets have every variety of curry sauce, with a wide selection of fresh pasta and fifteen different types of olive.’ ‘Maybe it’s time for a Gaelic revival in the kitchen…’ Medders disappears, returning twenty minutes later blowing dust off a glossy hardback – ‘The Irish Heritage Cookbook’.

‘Gosh! That must be five years in the attic. It was relegated to allow ‘Biriyani for Beginners’ room on the recipe book shelf.’ ‘Well here it is again. Let’s have a look... Jugged kippers!’ ‘Kidney and bacon soup. Never heard of it.’

‘Pears with Cashel Blue cream and walnuts. Sounds posh.’ ‘Brown soda scones.’

‘Come again?’

‘Brown bread scones.’

‘You said skonns.’

‘What’s wrong with that?’

‘It’s skohns.’

‘Skonns. I insist.’

‘Skohns. It has to be skohns.’

‘Skonns.’

‘Skohns.’