Mezze

Gentle reader, on sight of the word ‘mezze’ do not grit your teeth and turn the page, your heart in the freeze-dried grip of reactive boredom. On the broad conceptual sweep we all seem to love the idea of mezze, but when addressing the subject in detail we yawn and say, ‘Oh please, give me a break,’ and close our ears and look for another story, a subject more likely to tease our culinary imagination and stimulate the palate.

The problem is that we have been sold the whole mezze thing so hard by writers like Claudia Roden who use words like ‘ecstasy’, ‘sensual’ and ‘mystical’ to describe the pleasures of savouring the mezze experience, making it sound like a cross between a seriously hedonistic drug and a religious trip. Mezze can be marvellous, but let’s not over-sell with unnecessary hyperbole. As the woman watching Meg Ryan simulate orgasm over her food in the famous deli scene from the movie When Harry Met Sally tells the waitress, ‘I’ll have what she’s having.’