MARGARET MEE'S AMAZON
Sue Loram Remembers ...Sue lived in Brasil for eighteen years from 1974 to 1992. She moved from Rio de Janeiro to Manaus a city in the heart of the Amazon forest in late 1979 where she lived with her boyfriend the ecologist Dr. John DuVall Hay. Very quickly she found herself working for an INPA* / WWF project. In 1982 she joined Margaret Mee on a journey to the igapós or flooded forest of the Rio Negro where they discovered some dying flowers of the Moonflower cactus. Sue moved back to Rio de Janeiro in late 1982 where she became one of Margaret's closest friends. Then in 1988 Sue was part of the team responsible for the success of Margaret Mee's final Amazon journey when she painted the opening of the Moonflower. Margaret died in an accident later in the same year and in 1989 Sue joined the same team to visit the cactus again and fix a memorial plaque to a tree. Sue who is now married, lives in Portugal with her long time friend and business partner David Butler-Cole This is one of a series of short, intimate reminiscences of her times with Margaret Mee
The last night on the Rio Negro 'It was Sally’s
last night on the Rio Negro. I decided to produce an amazing meal, a special
memory for her to take home.
I approached Margaret, who was busy sketching as usual, to
let her know that I’d be gone for a few hours or so in the canoe scavenging
in the “larder of life”. I asked her not to tell Sally, who was reading
inside, as I wanted the meal to be a surprise.
Margaret laughed when I told her I was going to try and catch a
fruit- eating fish, like the delicious ones Paulo and Maria had caught
for us. She said, “Remember the last time, Sue!” She was referring to my previous attempt, which
resulted in my hooking one minuscule piranha that I was far too scared
to bring onboard the canoe to clobber.
Piranha is actually a very tasty fish, but it takes a lot of experience
to remove them from the hook without their razor sharp teeth biting off
a finger or two. Unfortunately
I couldn’t ask Paulo and Maria to go fishing for us as they were far too
busy preparing Gilberto's ancient boat for the long journey down river
the next day….
So off I paddled with bait, line and hook towards a tree
inside the nearby flooded forest. I
had spotted it canoeing the previous day, off-loading its mature fruit
into the water. I quietly secured the canoe to the trunk.
At the first plop of fallen fruit, up came a good sized fish and
the fruit disappeared. I baited my hook with a piece of fruit and
threw the line overboard. The
fish weren’t stupid. Why risk snapping at a baited hook, with all that
gorgeous fruit going begging…with no strings attached?
I remembered Paulo imitating falling fruit to attract fish
by carefully making a plopping sound with a weight on the end of a line
and pole. Meanwhile, Maria would be ready with the gaponga to catch
any outwitted fish [it's a simple device to attract fish using a weight
that 'plops' into the water like falling fruit] . This method, of course,
needs two people and a steady canoe.
After what seemed like hours, I gave up the idea of catching
a fruit-eating fish and canoed to the nearby igarapé [a
channel] to try my luck there. Eventually, after nearly capsizing the canoe,
my endeavours were rewarded. Two fish of a totally unknown species (at
least to me) lay flapping in the bottom of the boat. I had the main course, now for the dessert. I plucked a fruit out
of the water, after a short tussle with a furious fruit-eating fish. I
wasn’t sure what it would taste like once peeled, so I paddled over to
a nearby fig tree. No, the fruit was too small and hard, and then I spotted
some palm fruits within reach of my machete.
These small fruits if boiled long enough in salty water can taste
quite good. Honest! Now to get back to prepare the feast!
Margaret and Sally were having a siesta, as I laid out my
spoils. I cautiously tasted the “fish” fruit. Mmm!
Definitely chewy, with traces of super-gloss that made my lips stick together.
So off I went again, this time
in search of my favourite fruit - Cupuaçu, it's a relative
of the cacao / cocoa and soft and semi-sweet inside. I
was pulling back the the undergrowth to see the ground because I
had heard a loud thump in the night, the tell-tale sign of a falling Cupuaçu.
It must be lurking somewhere.
It felt like hunting for treasure and sure enough there it
was, a large heavy brown fruit with a rock hard shell.
But I was equipped to deal with it. I had brought a hammer, chisel
and scissors with me, plus a bowl for the pulp (I didn’t want to wake
up Margaret and Sally). After four almighty blows around the centre of the
shell, I found I could prise it
apart with the chisel. Now I had
to cut the delicious fibrous pulp from the many large black seeds, which
were not so delicious. After a half hour’s toil,
I had separated a pile of glutinous fruit flesh which would, hopefully,
soon be transformed into a mouth-watering dessert.
Next job was to boil the palm fruit, clean the fish, and
get the lumps out of what remained of our farinha -[manioc flour].
The Amazon variety of farinha is coarse, bright yellow and
gritty (especially that which gets left at the bottom of the tin). It
is made from mandioca root and is eaten with every meal in the
Amazon as a source of fibre (you won’t get IBS if you eat this stuff every
day).
It occurs to me now, all these years later, what a challenge
it was to make a meal out of such ingredients and I wonder what a cook
on “Ready, Steady, Cook” would make when presented with a bag containing
: 2 unknown Amazonian fish, 1 rock hard cupuaçu, 2 handfuls of
hard palm fruits and 200 grams of coarse mandioca root.
No much, I suspect!!
Anyway I digress. It
was almost dusk and Sally and Margaret prepared the table for dinner near
the huge Buriti Palms, just as a large flock of parrots were heading in
our direction from across the Anavilhanas to roost in these very same
palms. The frogs and toads were just cranking up for their evensong. The parrots landed overhead and set about
their noisy business of roosting just as I brought the fish to the table. I divided it up the best I could and passed
around farinha, boiled
palm fruits and rice.
As we started to eat, there was a hush as finally the parrots
settled. The faces of my two friends were non-committal as they chewed. Then Sally started laughing, “Sue”, she said,
“for someone who runs a successful restaurant, this meal is truly awful”.
Margaret, who was somewhat more diplomatic, just said giggling
“No Sue it’s certainly not one of those recipes from your Aphrodisiac
food festival”.
They were right, of course. Yuck! it was truly awful! The
unknown fish was pronounced by Margaret to be a scavenger fish. It was
mostly bones and had certainly not been snacking on seeds or
fruit ! The farinha was still gritty, and the palm fruit
was a tasteless mushy mess. The rice was good though !
Margaret said hopefully, “I expect the dessert will be better,
you can’t go wrong with Cupuaçu”.
Can’t you? I had
tried very hard to break up all the fibres and whipped it for ages together
with our last tin of condensed milk. But when I was serving,
it stuck to the serving spoon like over-cooked porridge, and went
“blop” onto the dessert plate.
By this time all three of us were laughing hysterically and
woke up all the roosting parrots above us. They joined in the laughter,
as only parrots can, and it seemed the whole Amazon was mocking my disastrous
meal……..
After the meal, we had a competition describing the best
meals we’d ever eaten. (If it
were the worst meal it would surely have been the one we’d just had !).
Sally, being Sally, had the best stories to tell of banquets with
the Sultan of Brunei, dinners with her nephew (the richest man in England)
etc. etc. Margaret and I, of course, couldn’t even begin to compete, so
we just sat back while Sally entertained us with her incredible experiences
and descriptions of wonderful food. At
the end of it I said to Sally “After this I expect you won’t want to visit
our restaurant when you get back to Rio”.
She retorted “I wouldn’t miss it for the world, I’ve got to tell
your partner David all about the feast you’ve just prepared, especially
the glop”. For that’s what she’d
decided to call the dessert. A
combination of glutinous and slop. Great!
I knew I would never live this down………..
After we’d cleared away the bones of the meal Sally said
“Sue, I’ve got a huge favour to ask, there’s something I’ve been wanting
to do every since arriving here at the hut.” She looked longingly at the
dark water, then proceeded to explain what it was.
I replied “No way! That’s far too dangerous!”
She then said “If you do this for me, I promise I will never tell
anyone about that meal”. I laughed
and said “OK Sally, you win” and then proceeded to get ready for the daring
deed…..….
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