Poetics of enamelware

The Ivan Limbach Publishing House published the book “Kitchen: Lectures by Mr. Puf, Doctor of Encyclopedia and Other Sciences on the Art of the Kitchen”

Prince Vladimir Odoevsky in the 19th century was something like Lomonosov in the eighteenth. He literally permeates all the horizons of his contemporary culture: wherever you move, you come across his trace everywhere. If you unfold “Poor People” for whatever need, there is an epigraph from Odoevsky, from one of his fantastic stories, which he was a great hunter to write; If you start reading the report about the readings in memory of Glinka that recently took place at the St. Petersburg Conservatory (like I just did) - it will turn out that the prince presided over the Society for Visiting the Poor, cared for them with charity concerts, and even published notes. Etc. An encyclopedist, in a word. A prominent writer, a children's classic, and an adult writer - not of the first rank, of course, but popular. Editor. He himself spoke a lot in magazines. Philosopher. A professional musician, almost the first music critic in Russia. Teacher.

The range of his interests is truly Lomonosov: just as Mikhailo Vasilyevich comprehended existence in a complex way, from the laws of poetry to the laws of physics, so Odoevsky also added cooking to his countless activities. Having invented a certain comically smug, fat and charming Doctor Poof, on whose behalf he lectured in 1844-1845 in “Notes for the Hosts,” a supplement to the “Literary Newspaper.”

It’s not that, they say, a talented person is not a fool in everything, but an inquisitive mind cares about everything. Although this, of course. But you can study a thousand subjects at once introvertedly - simply out of interest (as Goethe, following the example of Faust, interspersed poems with mineralogy), or you can extrovertedly - then this is called enlightenment.

Odoevsky, like Lomonosov, like Peter the Great, saw before him a wild, inert, stupid and terribly inconvenient country. Everything needs to be explained to the natives for the first time. Not just the benefits of science and art, but the most basic things: for example, that teeth should be treated. And that glass is a good, even excellent thing. And even though it’s already the nineteenth century, all over Europe steam engines are knocking with all their might, and they, stupid people, have to go on and on: in copper utensils, poisonous vitriol is formed from acid, so it certainly needs to be tinned, but they tin it badly, half of it flakes off, people die from the poison , and all that is required is to switch to enameled cast iron. And so Odoevsky-Puf passionately proclaims: “Gracious sirs! I have the most humble request of you: do me a favor, go up to the roof and shout loudly: “The enamel kitchen utensils did not work because they prevented the canteens, butlers, cooks and cooks from stealing!” I assure you that this will be much more useful for public morality than many things that are included in it.”

Prince Vladimir Fedorovich prepared his lectures for a separate publication, but they have only now been brought to light by the Ivan Limbach Publishing House. The book “Kitchen: Lectures by Mr. Pouf, Doctor of Encyclopedia and Other Sciences on the Art of the Kitchen” contains a lot of actual recipes and all sorts of practical information, but they are partly outdated, and partly were not suitable before. The famous St. Petersburg chef and culinary writer Ilya Lazerson, who highly professionally and lively commented on the book, rightly drew attention to the over-complexity of technology, and, moreover, to sheer absurdities. For example, Poof orders the pies to be baked with one and a half pounds of sugar and 1 1/8 pounds of cayenne pepper, which makes them obviously inedible.

Errors - but above all time - stripped the lecture of its utilitarian value, turning it into a pure artifact. Odoevsky, like many other writers about food, was weaker in practice than in baking, so to speak, verbal pies. In addition, the language acquired an antique grace: “a sumptuous lunch for a young man who has suddenly become wealthy”, “game should always be fried raw”, “3 celeries and, if you have no prejudices, half a head of garlic”, “do not mix cucumbers with the salad, otherwise it will turn off” , “so that the air can decompose and become incapable of conducive to the fermentation of stored supplies,” “this cheese can be made not in St. Petersburg; but in our southern provinces they don’t know what to do with the violets”, “so you think you’re going to eat poison - and even the poison is tasteless; So I resorted to cunning”, “fat snipe... skinny snipe”...

These skinny snipes are packaged in a thick volume of excellent design (artist Nikolai Teplov), equipped, in addition to the aforementioned comments, with a sensible preface by the compiler - philologist Sergei Denisenko, who dug up this manuscript in the depths of the Pushkin House and seduced Limbach with it. With a keen ear, the text was brought to the norms of modern spelling, while preserving the aroma of violets of ancient spelling. On seven hundred-odd pages there are, perhaps, seven typos: in today’s times, that’s almost a feat. The discovery of an unknown work from the golden age of Russian literature is a real “poolard with truffles” for any lover of delicious writing.

Dmitry TSILIKIN, St. Petersburg