06/09/03’s illustrious band:

All About

Brought to you by a little linguistic pet peeve of mine.

Today’s missive is all about -- OK, briefly about -- me griping about the phrase “all about.” I’m tired of hearing “It’s all about vision” or “It’s all about service” or “It’s all about the economy.” I’d much rather know what “it” actually is and what sort of action is taking place. It’s all about specifics, dude.

All right, enough word nerdism! Let’s talk about clotted cream instead. What the heck IS clotted cream, exactly? “Clotted” isn’t a word I usually associate with good things to eat. especially after a couple years working at a health magazine, where it’s all about blood and guts. But if you’re throwing a tea party, as one of my coworkers did this morning, you make the adjustment.

According to my mystical sources (the Internet), clotted cream is “A thick cream made primarily in England by heating milk until a layer of cream forms on its surface that is then cooled and skimmed off. Also called Devonshire cream.”

To me this sounds like a pale-faced butter wannabe, since I prefer my cream blended with generous amounts of sugar, chocolate and coldness. The clotted cream served at tea today looked sort of like milk gelatin. I think I’d apply the stuff to a food that was so piquant it needed its flavor dumbed down, like a jalapeno pepper or super-dense jam or something. I didn’t try the clot, though, so maybe I’m missing the culinary boat here.

I’ll tell you what is good, though: champagne garlic mustard. Talk about piquant! This is something I stumbled upon in the gourmet mustard section of my favorite grocery store. Since buying it less than 36 hours ago, I’ve already used it twice -- once for breakfast. Now I’ll have to buy better lunchmeat to live up to the mustard’s potential. We should all attempt to justify our condiments.

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