Who can resist a title like this? I certainly could not.
What initially looked like moderately relaxing reading, suitable for a gentle evening in front of a fire and accompanied by a glass of wine, turned out to be somewhat more serious. Disturbing in some ways, and I suppose I should have anticipated it. I don’t remember who first said that no man is a hero to his valet and that may well be so, but as far as cooks are concerned the situation seems to be somewhat different. Some cooks actually like their dictator bosses.
Part history and part personal narrative by the chefs themselves, the book brings together a number of psychopathic murderers and the experiences of those who served them, cooked for them, observed their habits and described the interactions with their masters.
We learn about the dictators’ favourite dishes which, not surprisingly, mostly derived from their national or regional cuisines. Sadam Hussein’s favourite soup, for example, consisted of layers of oily fish coated in flour, fried onions, parsley, tomatoes, dried apricots and almonds stacked on top of each other and seasoned with turmeric (sounds more like a stew to me); Idi Amin liked goat pilaf; Pol Pot was partial to sour fish soup and dressed salads; Fidel Castro preferred the milk from one specific cow named Ubre Blanca and so on.
Since this is not a cookbook, recipes as such do not really feature much, but inevitably there are brief descriptions of some dishes here and there. Much of the text describes the relationships between the cooks and their masters, their opinions of them as rulers and, er, human beings.
It was interesting to note that three of the chefs still hold their erstwhile bosses in high regard. Erasmo and Flores, Fidel Castro’s chefs, still admire the dictator and would admit to only one fault: he always knew better than everyone about everything and anything and would pontificate about any subject to the point of excruciating boredom.
The feelings of Yong Moeun towards the mass murderer Pol Pot can only be described as reverential worship: “Pol Pot was not a murderer. Pol Pot was a man with a dream. He dreamed of a just world. A world where no one went hungry…
You ask if I loved him? After everything you’ve heard from me, you can give your own answer. How could anyone fail to love him?”
The irony that her hero, who wanted such a just world, was responsible for about two million deaths is entirely lost on her.
This book would be incomplete without descriptions of the chefs’ personal histories, how and why they became interested in food and cooking, how they were chosen to cook for these dictators, often having to sidestep arrest and/or execution and also how many of them actually got along well with the monsters they served.
With the exception of the three above-mentioned chefs, most were not overly pleased when asked to cook for their rulers, but they clearly knew better than to refuse.
Mr. K, Enver Hoxha’s chef, describes forced self-criticism sessions, being followed by two secret policemen when he visited family – and the hilarious situation when those policemen were themselves shadowed by two other members of the secret police.
There have been rumours that Idi Amin, like his fellow dictator Jean-Bédel Bokassa, practiced cannibalism. Given Amin’s character it may seem plausible, but his chef, Otende Odera, stated unequivocally that he never cooked human flesh or saw parts of human bodies in the refrigerators in his charge.
Odera, who was 80 at the time Szablowski interviewed him, is one of the most sympathetic and clear-eyed characters in the book. He very well knew what Amin was like and in that dangerous environment managed to survive a betrayal by his best friend.
I rather liked his remark: “The previous coup had taught me that generals are there for coups. But a cook is there to have clean hands and a clean apron. And to cook. Nothing excuses you from your work, because once they’ve carried out their putsch, they’ll arrive with empty bellies, and as long as you have something good for them to eat, there’s a chance they won’t kill you.”
Every good cook knows how to blend meats, vegetables and spices into a tasty meal. On a literary level Szablowski can do the same with a story.
READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE
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