Tetherd Cow Ahead

And since we’re on the subject I feel obliged to bring this to the attention of Cow Readers.

Don’t go there if you’re squeamish. You have been warned.

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Thanks (if that’s the right word) boingboing!

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☆April 12, 1948: Maverick culinary scientist Leopold A. Moss finally perfects veal-style calamari.

It is a peculiarity of the modern age that chicken chips* taste nothing at all like chicken. Chicken chips really don’t have a taste like any other foodstuff, as far as my tastebuds can tell. In fact the flavour of chicken chips is best described as ‘chicken chip flavour’.

There are lots of artificial flavours like this – ‘banana’ is another one, as is ‘smoked ham’.

This got me to wondering – how do flavour chemists decide what something tastes like? I think the process goes something like this:

Flavour Chemist #1: Hey, Sam – what do you think this tastes like?

Flavour Chemist #2: Hmm. I dunno…

Flavour Chemist #1: Chicken? Ham? Banana?

Flavour Chemist #2: Maybe ham? No, hang on… chicken. Yeah, chicken.

Flavour Chemist #1: Should I write ‘chicken’ on the flask?

Flavour Chemist #2: Yeah. Write ‘chicken’. Maybe write ‘smoked chicken’. It’s got a kind of smoky flavour…

Flavour Chemist #1: Er. I think maybe that’s ’cause I dropped my cigarette in it…

It can’t be long before flavour chemists cotton on to the same trick that the people who make paint charts use; you know – colours are now not named by their actual colour, but by some kind of aspirational descriptor like ‘Topiary Tint’ or ‘Treasures’ or ‘Powdery Mist’†

So instead of supermarket shelves of faux raspberry, sour cream & chives and eggnog flavoured products we’d see – Moroccan Sunset flavoured chips, Velvet Cloud flavoured yoghurt and Monet flavoured soda.

See, ultimately this makes really good commercial sense. Our taste professors will no longer have to emulate, but are instead freed up to innovate. With no obligation to try and stick with analogies to existing foodstuffs, whole new avenues of possibility would be opened up.

The decision process might then go something like this:

Flavour Chemist #1: Hey, Sam – what do you think this tastes like?

Flavour Chemist #2: Hmm. I dunno… It’s sort of like a cheap toothpaste I once used on holidays in Greece…

Flavour Chemist #1: Excellent. I’ll label the flask ‘Grecian Morning’. Want to come for a spin in my new Porsche?

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*Or ‘crisps’ if that makes more sense in your part of the world…

†I kid you not. These are all real paint chart colours. I defy you to have any idea what colours they actually are.

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Here’s a little geeky web pastime. The object is to go to Google Image Search and find words that result in a full page of pleasing patterns of some kind. I found these for ‘colourwheel’…

…’lemon’…

…and ‘fern’.

Have fun! Report back with your best efforts!

I was reading recently some opinions voiced by a psychologist that young people today are in desperate need of proper role models to inspire them onwards into their adult lives. I can only concur with this assessment. Everywhere I look I see pint-sized emulations of trashy fashion celebrities, talentless entertainers and shady sports stars. We’re heading into a world where everyone will dress like hookers, sing like… er… hookers and cheat and lie to get ahead because they think that being on top is the only thing that counts.

Where are the true inspirational figureheads for the coming generation?,

For my own part, I attribute the achievement of my upstanding moral character and practical apprehension of the world to one guiding light in my teenage years. From matters of sexuality, through family relationships to issues of Law, this one man was my moral compass and my spiritual guide.

How could any teenage boy fail to be affected by his joi de vivre, his savoir faire, his generosity, his sartorial flair? He had everything any man could want: a good relationship with a beautiful wife, a happy home and family, money, and interesting hobbies. He was a man of the world, and a man who had travelled the world. He was a romantic in the proper sense, adept at fencing, yoga, dancing and knife-throwing and he could indulge in all these passions without dropping his cigar.

I am, of course, talking about this man.

So anyway, I’m at Sydney Airport at Gate 32 when the following is heard across the PA system:

This is a final boarding call for passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica* on flight number D567 to Melbourne. This flight has boarded and is waiting on you in order to depart. Passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica, please make your way to Gate 34, your aircraft is ready to depart.

This announcement is made at least a half dozen times over the course of twenty minutes or so, with the staff becoming more and more agitated, but still maintaining the proper good-mannered airport aplomb. There are, in fact, four ‘Final’ boarding calls.

“You know what?” I say to Violet Towne. “If this was Cow Air, by now I’d be broadcasting it like this”:

Passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica, will you please get your slack asses out of the bar and over to Gate 34 quick smart. There’s a plane full of really pissed-off people here who want to know why you’re making the hour-long flight to Melbourne take twice as long. You’d better have good excuses.

Other innovations I would introduce on Cow Air:

•Disposal of useless safety demonstration on plane, replacing it with one word: PANIC! Because I know that’s what everyone would do if the plane started crashing. Why not make it easy for passengers to comply with instructions?

•Compulsory confinement to seats, upon landing of the aircraft, until after the exit doors have actually been opened. Can someone explain to me why as soon as the seatbelt sign is switched off everyone seems to feel the need to leap from their seat, desperately hoik their luggage out of the overhead compartment and then queue sardine-like in the plane aisle for ten minutes? Listen up people – the doors ain’t opening any faster just because you’re on your feet. The airline wants you off the plane just as much as you want to be off. Everybody is working for the same result here. You may as well enjoy the wait sitting down.†

•Free alcohol. No-one should have to endure Economy Class air travel sober.

•Summary execution for seat-kickers. Especially children.

•Coffee that tastes like coffee instead of watery aviation fuel.

•Cowhide covered seats. Wouldn’t that look cool!?

•Flame-grilled ribs. C’mon – even you vegetarians have gotta admit that the smell of fine BBQ wafting down the aisle at meal times would be w-a-a-a-y better than the sick-making odour of re-heated fish in foil.‡

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*Not their real names.

†I dunno – maybe it’s so they can get off the plane a few seconds earlier and relish the extra time at the baggage carousel?

‡Yes, alright, I can hear the more astute among you protesting that you’d never be able to eat ribs with plastic knives and forks. On Cow Air we don’t hold with such namby-pamby business as kiddy cutlery. Not only would passengers be allowed nail scissors and hacksaw blades, each would be issued with a steak knife. We believe that the real reason behind terrorism is bad airline food.

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