Julius Caesar conquered much of Europe and Asia Minor, and brought Egypt into the sphere of Roman influence for the first time to boot. He invaded Britain and installed a puppet regime, but opted not to press ahead with his campaign because he disliked the weather. But there was one thing he couldn’t conquer: the Roman Senate, who murdered him rather than allow him to end the Republic and install himself as emperor.
This week, I experienced something similar. I conquered Caesar’s breakfast. I conquered his main course. I even conquered his dessert. But I couldn’t conquer his hors d’oeuvre.
For breakfast, I made a wheat pancake. Wheat pancakes are one of the innumerably grim ways that Europeans tried to get enough carbs in their diet before Marco Polo supposedly brought pasta back from China, and if you ever want to feel a surge of gratitude towards Polo, I recommend eating one. It’s easy enough to make: just remove almost everything that’s worthwhile from a pancake and substitute wheat and water. (The Romans managed to conquer the half of the world without potatoes in it, more’s the pity.)
Dinner was easier: roast boar with olives and dried fruit. Pudding was a doddle, too: the Romans made ice-cream by making their slaves collect vast quantities of ice and snow, storing them underground (the ice, not the slaves) and using these stores as walk-in freezers. I followed the more ethical course of buying an ice-cream maker and chucking the bowl in the freezer for a bit. I pair a simple vanilla ice-cream with a traditional Roman honey cake: eggs, honey and flour beaten together, slapped into a cake tin.
But what I couldn’t do was kick off my meals like Caesar: with a starter of edible dormouse. Not because they are endangered – actually, the humble Glis glis is considered a pest – but because no butcher would sell me one and I wasn’t sure I could buy one from a local pet store and kill it without ending up on the RSPCA watchlist.
Still, I think I’ve found a new world to conquer: the edible dormouse is well-placed to become next year’s hot food trend, and I’m sure there are plenty of local authorities or businesses who would pay you to dispose of theirs relatively humanely. A pop-up restaurant in which you are paid to source the meat: who needs an empire when you’ve got that?
