Should you really pair Pimm’s with oysters?

Imagine a camel train, crossing the great desert. The remaining water is rancid; the beasts’ humps are shrunken. Death looms. Then suddenly, there is the sound of a fountain plashing and the scent of sherbet. Old Abdullah, who has done the journey often, as he has been reminding everyone for ten days and making his companions increasingly homicidal, is vindicated. The oasis is at hand.

Although Londoners, afflicted by heat, may feel affinity with those sons of the desert, our conditions are not so dire. For a start, there are many more oases, in the form of bars or clubs. That brings us to Pimm’s, that admirable method of rehydration.

According to the sources, Mr Pimm invented the drink to accompany oysters. Eh? I have never tried the combination, but on consulting my palate, am assured that it would not do. Moreover, Pimm’s comes into its own once there is no ‘r’ in the month; when oysters are milky and unsatisfactory.

Oysters and champagne can sort of work, for an unsophisticated event. But to give the bivalves a proper Walrus and the Carpenter send-off, there is nothing to beat Muscadet sur lie. Pimm’s? Nonsense.

Across the Atlantic, the descendants of the revolted colonists often have a sweet tooth. Although there is a drink called mint juleps, which is all right, Pimm’s is vastly superior. Moreover, there are normal summers in the UK – and will be again – when Pimm’s is the sole reminder of how summer ought to taste. Yet in parts of the States, the weather would encourage Pimm’s from February to November. But bottles are hard to find. Effective marketing is overdue.

Imagine the advert. Bertie Wooster is in a Henley blazer. Jeeves is pouring him a glass of Pimm’s. There is only one problem. The clouds are lowering.