During that summer he ate for the first time a salad with a lemon and oil dressing and, at breakfast, yoghurt – a glamorous substance he knew only from a James Bond novel. His hard-pressed father’s cooking and the pie-and-chips regime of his student days could not have prepared him for the strange vegetables – the aubergines, green and red pepper, courgettes and mangetouts – that came regularly before him. He was surprised, even a little put out, on his first visit when Violet served as a first course a bowl of under-cooked peas. He had to overcome an aversion, not to the taste so much as to the reputation of garlic. Ruth giggled for minutes on end, until she had to leave the room, when he called a baguette a croissant.
Early on, he made an impression on the Pontings by claiming never to have been abroad, except to Scotland to climb the three Monroes on the Knoydart peninsula. He encountered for the first time in his life muesli, olives, fresh black pepper, bread without butter, anchovies, undercooked lamb, cheese that was not cheddar, ratatouille, saucisson, bouillabaisse, entire meals without potatoes, and, most challenging of all, a fishy pink paste, tarama salata. Many of these items tasted only faintly repellent, and similar to each other in some indefinable way, but he was determined not to appear unsophisticated. Sometimes, if he ate too fast, he came close to gagging.
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
