MODERN STEREOTYPES
Grandpa Charlie has cooked one of his famous Sunday lunches for his grandchildren. The chicken is perfectly roasted, he’s made bread sauce with a touch of nutmeg, the potatoes have been crisped in goose fat.
It is a feast. But not as modern children know it. Esme and Persephone are vegetarian, horrified to see a dead bird on the table. Joe is vegan and cannot eat anything that had a face or a mummy. Or dairy, so that’s the bread sauce out, cooked so lovingly in full-cream milk.
Ollie is gluten-free and allergic to nut and, after the Pret a Manger Mishaps, no sesame seeds on the carrots. His symbiotic relationship with his mobile phone has revealed that we throw away 40 per cent of the food we don’t eat. “No risk of that with the labrador around,” says Grandpa cheerfully.
“You didn’t use plastic bags when you went shopping, did you, Grandpa?” asks Esme, beset with anxiety for turtles. “Certainly not, darling, I use my old sailing bag.”
If he doesn’t put butter on the veg, to appease the vegan, and no chestnuts with the Brussels sprouts – because it is dubious whether the chestnut is a nut and can, according to Ollie and Google, spark a latex intolerance, then there are two edible things on the table. He assures Persephone that both are organic and keeps schtum about the goose fat – with any luck they’ll think it is olive oil.
Charlie is fond of his grandchildren, but they don’t come down to the country much, as they’re always doing extra Mandarin or “personalised learning” at weekends. It seems to Grandpa that ponies would be much jollier than all these exams. He wonders also if, were they living in a time when food was not in such abundance – strawberries year round, beans from Kenya (not that Joe would touch anything that had done air miles, of course) – they would eat up and put up.
Remember Nanny and “If you don’t clear your plate we’ll send it to the poor in India”? Ollie tells him nowadays there’s a website called Food Cowboy “rescuing leftover cuisine”.
None of the children will write a thank-you letter.