Henry I died an unusual death, he ate too many Lamprey eels. His death precipitated 'The Anarchy', the Civil War between Stephen and Mathilda. It caused so much destruction that the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle lamented that it was as if "Christ and his Saints slept". This Christian coma has had far deeper repercussions than a grubby chapter of British history; it created a monster. The parasitic lamprey (Henry liked his stewed in white wine) is translated into Italian as 'Lampreda'. This should have been a clue. Confucius's real golden rule states: do not masticate, digest, devour, feed or dine on anything named after a king-killing regicidal river monster.
In India, bovines are worshipped as a manifestation of the Hindu deities, in Japan, Wagyu cattle are massaged and bathed daily but in Tuscany, cows are consumed entirely and utterly. No one is sure what cows did to warrant such cruel treatment. Maybe Lorenzo the Magnificent stood in a cow pat? Maybe it's because only pig bladders can be inflated to make a Calcio ball? Regardless of the reason it has left Florence with spots as dark as the Black Death that blight the armpits of the city. They sit there innocently simmering away on the corner of almost every major piazza waiting to strike.The Lampredotto vans serve a 'local, traditional Florentine dish' - I think all Florentines are forced to a communal oath, an act of offal double-think denying all existence of Lampredotto or they are too busy eating fresh pasta to notice.
The cruelty, treachery and sheer heartlessness of the vendor that nonchalantly and with not a raised eyebrow in sight accepted my order will live with me forever. With a flourish of sadistic pride and like an Inquisitor revealing his instruments of torture, he opened his cauldron. Flabbiness is an underrated word. It has the faint onomatopoeia of a fat person farting as they attempt to stand up, it even looks glutinous with the rotund 'b' letters smugly in the centre, yet it doesn't have an associated smell. A good case could be made for the smell of sweat on public transport. However, the smell that wafts from the pot is at its warmest, wettest and most gloriously flabby.
Cows eat so much grass that they have to have four stomachs to digest the pulp. The fourth stomach, the bag of eels, is the Lampredotto. Presumably there's a Heston Blumenthal busily experimenting on revolutionary ways of serving the third stomach. It's boiled in a thin stock of vegetables and it's own vile juices. The mass of wetness is sliced and the toasted panini bread is submerged in the juices. An oily salsa verde thinly drips on the drowned monks habit of meat.
Dante's inferno never quite captures the terror of anticipation for the Condemned, if he had, it would describe the feeling as with trembling hands you survey satan's favourite sandwich. They say that as you drown you experience a moment of utter airless hedonistic bliss. The first mouthful feels like relief, the bread and sauce seem to cover the taste. Euphoria pours through you - I will survive you exclaim as you reach for your second bite...
Too late. It's over. The warm thickness collapses on the back of your tongue and a sense of primal self-loathing seeps into every fibre of your being. No amount of Chianti could prevent the inevitable. Sprinting to the nearest bin any hope of elegance is finished. Shame lingers just less than the residual aftertaste.
For just four euros you to can enjoy the worlds greatest gastronomical disaster.
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