Classic Poem

ANOTHER METHOD

OF MAKING WALNUT CATSUP





And this is a very small cookbook for Trout Fishing in America

as if Trout Fishing in America were a rich gourmet and

Trout Fishing in America had Maria Callas for a girlfriend

and they ate together on a marble table with beautiful candles.



Compote of Apples



Take a dozen of golden pippins, pare them

nicely and take the core out with a small

penknife; put them into some water, and

let them be well scalded; then take a little

of the water with some sugar, and a few

apples which may be sliced into it, and

let the whole boil till it comes to a syrup;

then pour it over your pippins, and garnish

them with dried cherries and lemon-peel

cut fine. You must take care that your

pippins are not split.





And Maria Callas sang to Trout Fishing in America as

they ate their apples together.



A Standing Crust for Great Pies



Take a peck of flour and six pounds of butter

boiled in a gallon of water: skim it off into

the flour, and as little of the liquor as you

can. Work it up well into a paste, and then

pull it into pieces till it is cold. Then make

it up into what form you please.



And Trout Fishing in America smiled at Maria Callas as

they ate their pie crust together.



A Spoonful Pudding



Take a spoonful of flour, a spoonful of

cream or milk, an egg, a little nutmeg,

ginger, and salt. Mix all together, and

boil it in a little wooden dish half an hour.

If you think proper you may add a few

currants .



And Trout Fishing in America said, "The moon's coming

out." And Maria Callas said, "Yes, it is."





Another Method of Making Walnut Catsup



Take green walnuts before the shell is

formed, and grind them in a crab-mill,

or pound them in a marble mortar.

Squeeze out the juice through a coarse

cloth, and put to every gallon of juice

a pound of anchovies, and the same

quantity of bay-salt, four ounces of

Jamaica pepper, two of long and two of

black pepper; of mace, cloves, and

ginger, each an ounce, and a stick of

horseradish. Boil all together till

reduced to half the quantity, and then

put it into a pot. When it is cold, bottle

it close, and in three months it will be

fit for use.



And Trout Fishing in America and Maria Callas poured

walnut catsup on their hamburgers.





PROLOGUE TO GRIDER CREEK





Mooresville, Indiana, is the town that John Dillinger came

from, and the town has a John Dillinger Museum. You can

go in and look around.

Some towns are known as the peach capital of America or

the cherry capital or the oyster capital, and there's always

a festival and the photograph of a pretty girl in a bathing suit.

Mooresville, Indiana, is the John Dillinger capital of America.

Recently a man moved there with his wife, and he discovered

hundreds of rats in his basement. They were huge, slowmoving

child-eyed rats.

When his wife had to visit some of her relatives for a few

days, the man went out and bought a .38 revolver and a lot

of ammunition. Then he went down to the basement where

the rats were, and he started shooting them. It didn't bother

the rats at all. They acted as if it were a movie and started

eating their dead companions for popcorn.

The man walked over to a rat that was busy eating a friend

and placed the pistol against the rat's head. The rat did not

move and continued eating away. When the hammer clicked

back, the rat paused between bites and looked out of the corner

of its eye. First at the pistol and then at the man. It was a kind

of friendly look as if to say, "When my mother was young she

sang like Deanna Durbin. "

The man pulled the trigger.

He had no sense of humor.

There's always a single feature, a double feature and an

eternal feature playing at the Great Theater in Mooresville,

Indiana: the John Dillinger capital of America.