SEA COOKS

Greymouth Evening Star, 23 June 1928, Page 3

SEA COOKS

ANCIENT AND MODERN. ('uriously enough, jntii.ii ime historians have never shown much curiosity about Ihe sea cook. Who, for instance, was the first, person to engage in that honourable occupation;' AVTiat manlier of man was he ami where did hr; voyage I W'hat the range of his menu and what his emoluments and his pickings? Alas! We know not. lie came and went, this anonymous hero, leaving behind nothing but tlhe

memory of a. great experiment soon to he forgotten and the foundation of a, queer race of humble adventurers who followed his precarious calling. Yet in reality that first sea. cook must have

had some, of the qualities which help

to make men original investigators (writes “Mujik’’ in the “Sydney Morning Herald”) i That lie was yeally a, cook is, of course, incredible. Rather one must think of him as some restless, weatherbeaten boatman to whom lhad come as a great revelation the idea that if food could only be prepared at sea the time which he and his companions might spend alloat could be greatly extended. No need then, he reasoned, for those barbaric feasts in tidal backwaters and safe harbours in which the ancient seafarer indulged—to be followed by days of semi-starvation on beans and peas and chunks of smoked and putrid flesh. Ulysses had no cook, else would he have journeyed farllher. Indeed, it was not until the business of sea cooking had been mastered that the great geographers were able to separate fact from fiction. Without the- aid of the sea cook Gallileo might have been a. voice crying in the wilderness still and beyond, the setting sun would have been that precipice at the end of the world over \\,liich the rash voyager was bound Io fall. One knows the names of the greater early navigators, and holds them in just venerations. But who knows of the cooks?

1 The imagination may wander idly foi [a time on. -what might have been had custom and the needs of man been evolved- on different lines. One conjures then, a vision of exalted cooks, dispensing food to gallant sailors after the manner in which a judge disperses justice. But reality clamours, in the background, and the picture vanishes with recollection of a. gaunt, perspiring figure passing steaming tins of gi-easy food through the half-door of a galley. AVhat a strange agglomeration of men they would seem could they be paraded this morning—those sea cooks of the days of sail and salt! Among fihem one saw men of almost every race and colour —black and brown and yellow and white. Their accomplishments were as varied as their hue. Some could cook ; some could not. Perhaps it would be more correct to say some could succeed in making food palatable to hungry men, and that others could produce something which only the spur of hunger could make men swallow. Of course, their ambitions were severely restricted by the character and quantity of the provender placed at their disposal. But one singular fact seems-to be that in a “hungry ship” the cook was almost invariably a white man. A negro in the galley was usually an

indication of tolerable food Tie was a dirty brute often enough, but it is nevertheless true that to most seamen signing on for 'a. deep sea voyage a. black face amidships was a comforting apparition. lie was something of a gourmet in his simple, crude way the old-time sailorman, even though the great majority of seamen went through life not knowing what a. good meal really was. Tie was rationed down to the point of bare subsistence. He was always hungry. But he knew when tlhe best or the worst had been done with his pork or beef and potatoes. He knew whether the cook should be capable of greater initiative in making hash, and. whether the occasional duff was a work of art or a cannon ball. Differences of opinion on the subject were frequent. I knew a cook once who sailed from Liverpool to Melbourne, Iquique, and London, a nine months’ voyage. He was never seen out of the galley at sea during the Idhole run. Perhaps he considered himself lucky that he could crawl into his bunk through a hole in the starboard side of the galley. The duff he made was terrible. The first one nearly killed the bos’un, and the bos’iin'came from Peterhead, too. INDIVIDUAL TYPES.

Sailors, scullions, butchers, bakers, grooms, (handymen —all sorts gravitated to the galley of the lime] nicer. Yet, there were good, honest, genuine cooks, too, who did their job well and skilfully. One I knew well was a half-caste West Indian, who out of the poor-enough materials to his hand performed miracles of thrift and ingenuity —who on bad nights would turn out and from the wet wreckage of his equipment bring forth “something hot” long before it was due. .He must be dead long ago, but peace be to his ashes, for he was a kindly, faithful soul. lie sailed with, the same skipper fourteen consecutive voyages out of London—to Calcutta, Valparaiso, San Erancisco, Sydney—round and round Hie world year after year, and never put foot on shore away from. England. He never read anything, and never talked to anyone. But he knew all the chanties that were ever sung, and could play any hymn that was asked for on the concertina. A contrasting memory is of a gentleman we picked up at Port Louis to take the place of another who had got. foul of the law. lie filled the mains'! with talk, and I he little cabin aft; with fragrant, aromas, for he could cook like a wizard, and the skipper and mates were very happy. He had been ashore everywhere on earth, had this fellow, and had many strange adventures to recall strange even in the atmosphere of the foc’s'le, where life and language were strictly elemental. He had never sailed twice in the same ship, he used, to say, and was simply going as far as New Zealand in this one, Io get. another. Brit his greatest adventure had yet to come. The old man decided, to lay-1 oone morning near the Snares, misjudged his time, and we scooped one over green. Everybody saw it, coming hut one, and he was in the galley - and went over the side with it, and his pots and pans, ami gear ami boat, ami all the rest of it. The cleanest sweep 1 ever saw anyhow. As a rule the cook on the limejuieer was a remote, bad-tempered individual, perpetually living under censure, always on the defensive, 'the happier part, of the breed seemed Io drift, into the coasters I Im schooners, barqiientines, and brigantines, making relatively short runs. Perhaps limy were happier because I Im food was

better —perhaps it was because they were also sailors as well as cooks. Shortening sail meant that the cook had another job. Making sail he did bis bit too. He was really one of the crew keeping a twelve-hour watch, 'there was a, certain punctilio to be observed, by the way, in addressing the master of ceremonies in the galley. Ou the coaster “Cook” was good, enough On the deep-water ship it was always “Doctor.” 'Die aristocrats of the profession who have been called into being by the development of steam and cold storage belong to another clasX of men altogether. They are “chefs,’ cajiable of performing the rites appropriate to the jjreparation of ham and eggs and appetising entrees for firemen ami deckhands, and elongated menus for

the passengers. The old sea. cook would have been as much use in such undertakings as in making hay on a farm. But his wonderment at whether if was all worth while would perhaps be shared by the general run of men and women. One jjerson at any rate who has travelled occasionally on steamers bad often asked whether any really sane traveller wants a menu of bewildering variety placed in front of him at sea. Is nor this business of cooking at sea nowadays just as absurdly overdone, as it was monstrously neglected in days gone by? Is not the plain, simple food that a sensible man eats on shore enough for anyone on a, steamer It most certainly is. The cost of waste in this direction must be enormous, and a considerable factor in like high rates passengers have to pay for transport. After all, experience may yet show that there are far too many “chews,” that the profession is merely leading to boredom and indigestion, and that in the public interest plans for its elimination should be. earnestly considered by shipowners.