The Girl and the Fig...

I love figs. LOVE THEM. Next to the ovoid mango, it is my most favourite fruit in the whole entire world. It's almost obscene how much I love biting into a juicy, ripe, squishy black Mission fig, relishing every supple honeyed sweetness. Yes, I am drooling as I write this. One of my all time favourites is slicing up some of these soft delectables and adding them to a mescalun mix salad, add some creamy, crumbled blue cheese, and sprinkle it with an olive oil balsamic vinegar dressing. The mixture of textures and sweet, bitter, salty flavors sends my mouth swooning in the four directions of the wind. Pair that with a nice cool crisp fruity Sauvignon Blanc, and I am in heavenly bliss. Or sometimes I simply have these delicate fruits alone with a little bit of camembert, paired with a glass of Reisling. I'm set for the rest of the day. (I've been known to close my eyes in the midst of such ecstasy and breathlessly say "Please, leave us. I need a few moments, alone, with my fig".)

I once had a dish of roast quail with figs and herbs at Incanto, a few years ago during a short period in my life when food and sensuality were experimentally combined, often times with disastrous post-traumatic stress disorder inducing results. Those days are long gone and I have since learned not to participate in certain activities. I am still in therapy, and i'm feeling much better. But the seduction lasts to this day. My autumnal romance with quail continues, and my passionate love affair with the sack like fruit is on-going. I always thought figs look very much like the other kind of "sack". Maybe it's a Freudian thing. Or is a cigar just a cigar?

As an aside, on a similar vein, figs figure heavily in the bible... when Adam and Eve committed original sin and discovered their shame, they are often depicted wearing fig leaves as they flee from the Garden of Eden . Why is that, I wonder. Why fig leaves? Why not maple, or olive branches? Then there's the whole business of the fig tree as symbols of life, death, punishment (it's the tree Jesus curses), security, prosperity, a place to "rest and pray", the fruits bring images of sensuality and sex. Remember the INXS video "The One Thing"? That long table of food and orgy?. Ok, maybe not directly biblical... but you get what I mean.

I digress...

Mid- to late- summer is the season for figs. I encourage one and all to partake in one of mother nature's most delicious gifts. Go ahead, try it. Pick one up, part its soft flesh, look closely at the delicate pink to maroon hued meat, taste it. Feel its alluring texture in your mouth. Savor it's succulent sweetness. Brazenly pair it with other kinds of food and flavours. But be careful, you might just like it, a little too much.

More on the fig here. Warning... gastronomic pictures included.