More evidence that Fran isn't the one doing the shopping

Further to this recent post about odd-coloured food I have more to report.

My husband brought THIS home.

Here is the conversation we had about it.

Me: What be this abomination, my master? Please remove it from my scullery or I will cave in your head with my chopping block.

Him: It be charcoal bread, my love.

Me: It can be charcoal, my master. Or it can be bread. It cannot be both of those things, or I am not a wench.

Him: Would your pretty mouth like a taste of it, my love? I will tear you off a piece and layer it with fresh butter from our dairy cow.

Me: I would like nothing less, master. In fact, I would rather eat my own ear wax than consider it.

Him: Then I will have to feast on it myself which I am pleased to do.

Me: From whence did you purchase it and how many pennies did it cost thee?

Him: It cost three hundred and fifty pennies, my dearest.

Me: THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY? Have you been eating of the mushrooms underneath the old elm, my master? Or quaffing from the secret hoard kept in the barrels in the barn?

Him: I have not, my love.

Me: Or perhaps, to have that much coin in thy belt, a-betting on the cockfights held by moonlight that you men think we wenches are ignorant of? Do we have coin left enough for meat? And for the baby to come that lays within my womb*, unaware that he or she will be born into a house of extravagance and to a father whose lust for strange and wonderful foodstuffs leads him into the devil's work?

Him: My love, I fear you protest too much. It is only a loaf of bread. Black as the night, I grant, but to me the taste is worth each penny.

Me: It has come between us, my master. The loaf has become a wedge between us, a barrier to our love, a boundary you have leapt across that hath spoiled our passion. I cannot live with a master who carries home such bread, touched by demons themselves until it is as black as sin. I think these are our last moments together. I will fold some clothing in a cloth bag and leave our cottage within the hour. I will set off across the lonely moors and -

Him: I also bought the strong cheese you love and feast on with joy. And warm buns with cinnamon and cloves and brown sugar. And clotted cream for the strawberries growing in the meadow.

(Pause.)

Me: - across the lonely moors and over the - over the - Lead me to the buns.  



* Don't panic, anyone. Just my imagination running away with itself.