Sometimes there's little space between classic and cliche. Though in the complete OED I bet it amounts to at least 100 pages. The food world seems far more interested in novelty than the established, so what are classics now too often find themselves labelled cliches. How arrogant and short-sighted.
That thoughtlet came to mind last night as we ate what were the best crab cakes I've ever cooked, and it's something I've had a go at often. The outside crispy, the inside quenelle light and (important this) with the crab flavour central, they were simple, quickly done and delicious.
But they were not ground-breaking, so had they been served to a restaurant reviewer I'm sure the phrase 'gastro-pub cliche' would have appeared. That in itself suggests the reviewers in themselves have become cliches.
To quote Montaigne (has anyone else noted the great man quoted far more often of late than for many years?) 'The art of dining well is no slight art.' Chasing the new tends to make it so, however.
For anyone who wishes to know, the cakes were just three slices of stale ciabatta whizzed to crumbs, two tins (yes, tins) of white crab meat, 1/2 tsp of sweet smoked paprika, salt, pepper, and two beaten eggs. Formed into crab patties (when was the last time Montaigne and Spongebob made it into the same piece?) and fried over a moderate heat in a little olive oil they puffed up a treat, were toothsome, and tasty. But no guava, fermented Peruvian bogie-juice, or crushed dung beetles, so what was the point?
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