Bubble and Squeak

The menus are fascinating in the dining room.  We met one set of travelers, a man, his wife, her sister and a friend – something like our configuration, who told us they never go to the dining room.  Too rich for them, they said.  We tried to figure out if that meant there was too much fat in the foot – but that couldn’t be, given what we have seen in the ship’s buffet outlet, where they prefer to eat.   The day we spoke to them, we told them at on the menu was featuring British food.  Here is what the explanation on the menu said:  sausage, bacon, chicken, lamb, and bubble and squeak, all on the same plate.  Wyona ordered the dish.  I go with John Gilchrist's analysis of British Cuisine:  when you find a good restaurant for British cuisine, give him the name of it, and he will put it on the list of places he takes people when he does his courses on the cuisines of the world.  At any rate – what does too rich mean when we had read the day before, a dish that offered bacon, sausage and lamb, all on one side of a plate, vegetables on the other. We asked the waiter what bubble and squeak meant and he listed the vegetables that were being served that day, which explanation didn’t clarify what bubble and squeak really means.  But the traveling four (whom we met on a second floor shopping centre of Naples), told us exactly what bubble and squeak is.  You have thanksgiving dinner.  The next day you take all of the left-overs, put them in a pan on the top of the stove.  Stir it until it bubbles and squeaks and then eat it.

                                             

... another lovely evening on the Mediterranean ...

Most of the other days, the menu specializes in some food that one might find on shore.  

The dining room is decorated with rich dark mahogany wood trimming the walls, a scarlet colour on the walls, sconces giving ambient lighting between the windows that stretch out with a sea view, and sometimes at supper the boat is leaving, so we watch the sail out as we order from the menu.  

 I am not going to forget this when I get home, for this part of the trip is still amazing to me – night after night, food that I haven’t had to buy, prepare, serve or clean-up after.   

Every evening seems like a miracle.

Arta