What’s best for your liver?

British education has a lot to apologise for. Over the decades, our schools not only blocked their pupils’ access to literacy, numeracy and serious examinations. They perverted their taste in food. This was as true in the public schools as in the state system. Think of the liver we had to eat. Fried until it could have been used to sole a boot, but not enough to remove those evil-looking tubes. Where did that liver come from: mule, blaspheming Jew? By and large, the boys cleaned their plates; schoolboys will eat anything. But in those days girls were equally coarsely fed. Someone ought to write a PhD correlating the incidence of anorexia to the way that British girls’ schools served offal. I know females who still refuse to touch it, except in foie gras: stuff the geese.

Yet offal is delicious — and medicinal. Years ago, after a good dinner, I ran into Norman Stone. We repaired for some whisky, taking care of a couple of bottles. There was only one problem. About five hours later, I was due to give breakfast to Oliver Letwin at the Connaught. I succeeded in setting the alarm clock, but when it woke me, I was still drunk. I arrived at breakfast only a quarter of an hour late, to find that there had been no need to rush. No Oliver. The minutes passed — still no Oliver. He had recently married. For some time afterwards, I teased him about my folly in arranging to have breakfast with a recently married man. Finally, and although still unsure whether I felt like eating it, I ordered my own breakfast. Its centrepiece was a veal kidney, bespoken rare, arriving just so. As I slid my knife into its innards, the blood oozed out: an enticing sight. But as I tucked in, there were protests from my own innards, some of which seemed unhappy about blood from a Stone — or rather, so soon after drink with a Stone.