On a Sunday afternoon several weeks before Christmas Patrick and I heard the most inspiring piece of music we had yet to hear in our lifetime, The Boar's Head Carol. believe it or not it is a real christmas carol. Legand has it that a Student at Queen's college at Oxford over 500 years ago was attacked by a boar on Christmas. He choked the boar with a copy of Aristotle, cut of its head and wrote a song about his experience.
The culinary arts are something we take seriously in the Eror house. Every year at Christmas time we attempt new and glorious culinary feats. This year Catherine's white chocolate orange mousse in a cup layered with chocolate mousse was the winner. In years past we have had enjoyed dishes such as roast goose and seared foi gras. (Well most of us love foi gras... in my opinion it best left unseared and eaten strait out of a can!) We like to try the new and fabulous. (Some of us, think that the new stuff is scary and would rather watch from a reasonable distance.) And its ok that Catherine doesn't like seafood and Melissa doesn't like unusual textures and I hate all green salad. We all take part and make due and often we make marvelous discoveries. It was at meals like this that we developed a love of stinky cheeses and perrier. Well, the boars head carol gave us an idea. A real culinary shocker!
Imagine the families' suprise as mom stood and put a green felt hat on her head and with a strait face recited the story of the boars head carol along with a translation of the latin lines in the song. As she finished her lines Patrick and I jump out from the corner with a pigs head roasted and bedecked with bays and rosemary singing the boars head carol. We wore tights and tunics along with the beautiful hats that mom made.
The best part was that no one expected it. Carsen thought that it was awesome until Grandpa told him he had to try it... then he freaked out. This video is awesome. Watch for Carsen standing on his chair at the end of it! This is a video of Mike trying it. And ofcourse most of us took a bite or two... Why? because we are the Eror family... and when it comes to food we are a pretty adventurous group. However I think mom drew the line at narrator and didn't actually try any. Catherine did you try some? I can't remember.
If you don't have a weak stomach you can watch this weird video of mom and I trying to figure out how to open it's mouth for an apple. I don't know if it was rigor or what but we couldn't get it's mouth open. Patrick attempted prying it open with his bear hands... and keep in mind he had the flu at the time.
Here is the first verse of the song... Sorry about my bad latin spelling.
The boars head in hand bear I bedecked with bays and rosemary!
I pray you my maasters be merry
Qui estis in convivio!
Caput Apri Defero
Reddens Laudes Domino
I just want to make a special thank you to my team
to mom our translator, costume designer, and co conspiritor (have no idea how you kept a strait face!)
Patrick for the guts to go through with it
and the Barnes for driving to the middle of nowhere to find a slaughter house and then letting us store the head in your garage for a while. And you didn't even get to try it.
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