This is an article about biscuits.
You might be wondering why I chose to illustrate an article about biscuits with an eye-catching gif from the film '28 Days Later'. If you're unfamiliar, it's a horror film from 2002 which I am about to slightly spoil. If you haven't seen it at some point over the last 20 years and decide to read on, that's on you.
In the above scene, Jim Frenulum, played by Cillian Murphy, has been trying to survive in, what he thinks, is a world overrun by rage-zombies. But, after a particularly punishing series of events which caused, among other injuries, quite a nasty nosebleed, he collapses in the grass and stares skyward in despair. But there, between the branches of a tree, he sees the contrail of a high-altitude jet. It's at that moment that Jim realises that the world is fine. It's only the island of Great Britain that is affected. It's been quarantined.
Today I learned how the character of Jim Frenulum felt at that exact moment. I'm writing this on my birthday, and I received a number of wonderful presents today - this is relevant to the story, I'm not just bragging - from loved ones (again, not bragging). But in all the previous years leading up to my birthday, I had been living in a metaphorical world overrun by symbolic rage-zombies, like a simile. But enough preamble, we're here to talk about...
We all love a good biscuit, like the delightsome ginger cream, or the mighty garibaldi. Some of us even like a bad biscuit, like the unimaginative bourbon, or the drab custard cream. Given my preferred adjectives I'm sure you can work out which side of the fence I firmly sit. It's the side that has better biscuits.
You might think that the fancy side of the fence is the side with all of those 'Taste The Difference' deluxe styles of biscuit, or the bags of soggy cookies available in most supermarkets. If you did think that, shame on you, those are not biscuits, they are cake. A biscuit is rigidly defined, but also woolly enough for me to make these bold truth statements without argument. Just look at all the legal hoo-ha with Jaffa Cakes.
A biscuit is humble, but that doesn't mean a biscuit can't be great. If a biscuit is biscuit enough, it will never be barred from the category 'biscuit'. Neither is there a waiting period to establish greatness in the biscuit world. Just look at the meteoric rise of the HobNob as an exemplar. But I hold one biscuit above all others...
If you've been blessed with experiencing the delight of a Cafè Noir biscuit then you understand exactly where I'm coming from* and none of this is hyperbole. They truly are that good. Nectar in biscuit form. An ambrosia like no other. If, on the other hand, your life has been lacking, left wanting and bereft of the glorious experience of a Cafè Noir, then you, dearest reader, have my deepest sympathies.
[*It's out of the end of my winkie]
But then, some years ago, I began to notice something. Well, more to the point, I noticed that I had stopped noticing something. I'd occasionally peruse the biscuit aisle of supermarkets, my eyes eagerly scanning for that classy black packaging, but it seemed that fewer and fewer shops were stocking this incredible biscuit. Jammie Dodgers were virtually throwing themselves at me, I'd have been cock-a-hoop if I desired Party Rings, but my continued probing only ended with a disappointing Chocolate Finger. Eventually I realised that I couldn't find a packet of Cafè Noir anywhere.
There was only one explanation that I could land on. The product line had, for some unfathomable reason, been discontinued. How could the, objectively, best biscuit ever be stripped from the shelves as ignominiously as baby food full of broken glass? The invisible hand of the market has a lot to answer for, but this is a kind of cultural vandalism that simply cannot be forgiven.
So that was it. I was living in a world without Cafè Noir. A world overrun by biscuit-zombies, mindlessly nibbling and dunking their way through the blandest of twice-cooked pap and being satisfied with that. But beyond being disgusted with a society that would just sit back and take that kind of culinary abuse, what else could I do but wait for the slow and inexorable destruction of everything else I held dear, before my inevitable death? And so I waited. I waited years.
And it was whilst I was doing this waiting that I had my 'Jim Frenulum moment'. My birthday, another milestone of universal entropy, and I am handed a gift. Small, rectangular and impressively weighty. My slender fingers began to deftly strip back the gaily coloured wrapping, but as the first flap of paper tore away my fingers halted. My breath caught in my throat. I blinked, looked again, and the shiny black packaging, as classy as ever, hadn't changed. It was like seeing that contrail. What I thought was gone, lost forever, only a memory of past happiness in a sea of current misery, I was holding it in my hands. Cafè Noir!
Finding out you've been fed a lie in place of biscuits tasted like ashes in my mouth. Ashes mixed with shit. How, why and who turned off the Cafè Noir tap to this festering isle, I don't know. I'm not even going to bother to guess. What's the point? It won't change the fact that Europe scoffs, both by mocking and masticating, as I can only scrape and dab at the crumbs from their tables. Oh yes, continental Europe is knee-deep in Cafe Noir biscuits. It's only the isolated little island of Great Britain that has been cut out of the European biscuit economy.
I can't tell you how I got my hands on three full packets of Cafè Noir. My contacts demand anonymity. They* might be watching, reading, wanting to seal this gap in their biscuit-based Iron Curtain. Just know this. If you are in the UK, you are being deceived. Outside these dismal borders lies a world rich in those things you thought had been lost.
[*Big Biscuit]
In the film '28 Days Later' the character of Jim Frenulum uses his new-found knowledge as inspiration to enact a shockingly violent act of revenge.
We deserve better, surely? And maybe as time goes on more people will experience their own 'Jim Frenulum moment'. With each 'moment' another footsoldier joins our army. With enough of us, we can enact change. Yes...
- Vic Jameson