Hector’s

LORELAI: Anyhow, I looked through it and it just so happens that one of the best taco places on the East Coast is ten minutes from campus … [reads] “You haven’t had a taco until you’ve spent some time at Hector’s, crisp and meaty … not greasy”.

There isn’t a taco place called Hector’s in New Haven, but there’s a popular Mexican restaurant called El Carpintero run by a guy named Hector in Burbank, Los Angeles – across the street from Warners Bros and much frequented by people who work there. This seems so suspiciously similar that I think it must be the inspiration for the fictional Hector’s in New Haven.

Sand dabs

EMILY: Liliana will be right out with the sand dabs.

Sand dabs are a variety of flatfish native to the oceans around the Americas. The most common in the US is the Pacific sand dab, which is caught in California and the Pacific North West, and is a rather expensive delicacy of the San Francisco Bay area (it feels like this is the sand dab the writers of the show would be familiar with!).

Sand dabs can be grilled, pan-fried, or roasted. They are said to be an acquired taste, which might explain why Lorelai seems to have been less than impressed with her experience eating one.

“She didn’t have lunch”

RORY: She [Lorelai] didn’t have lunch.

There seems to be a bit of a pattern of Lorelai skipping lunch on Fridays, perhaps because she knows she’ll be getting a good dinner at her parents’ that evening. As a result, she turns up to dinner hungry and cranky, and ready for a dramatic fight every week! Of course, it’s possible Lorelai often skips lunch on weekdays, due to her busy schedule at the inn.

Salad After the Main Course

LORELAI: You know, Mom, in Europe, they eat the salad last and the main course first.

I’m not sure how many European countries this rule supposedly applies to, but in France and Italy at least, it is customary to eat the salad between the main course and the dessert, as a palate cleanser (it’s probably falling out of favour, like a lot of customs). Lorelai’s idea is actually pretty practical!

Dave and Mrs Kim

DAVE: You know, my parents would love these sandwiches. I wish I could bring them by but unfortunately they’re in private Bible study right now.

Dave shows Lane how interested he is in her, and how keen he is to impress her rather scary mother, by coming over to eat her fake egg sandwiches. Just in case you’ve forgotten, it is now past five in the morning! Who even wants sandwiches at this hour? Why is Mrs Kim still serving them? The filling would have gone off by now, and she freely admits herself the bread is stale.

He also pretends that he is a Christian, as a way to inveigle himself into Mrs Kim’s good books. He claims that his parents would be joining in the stale fake egg sandwich celebration, except that they are in a private Bible study session. At five in the morning??? It would be far more believable to say they were asleep!

Later he says his parents are at church (at five in the morning!), which means the fictional Bible study session wasn’t private at all. Dave’s story has more holes than Swiss cheese, but Mrs Kim, always shown to be pretty switched-on previously, is swallowing this farrago of lies like a gullible fool. She must be very, very tired. Or she really likes Dave.

Bobby Brady

RORY: The food is for the dancers.

SHANE: Who are you, Bobby Brady? Get a life.

Bobby Brady, portrayed by Mike Lookinland on the TV show, the youngest boy on The Brady Bunch, previously discussed.

Also, how ridiculous is it that the refreshments are only for the dance contestants, and not the spectators? They have to sit in the bleachers for sixteen hours or more with nothing to eat or drink? I’m with Shane – butt out, Rory!

Jess and Mrs Kim

MRS. KIM: Who are you?

JESS: Jess . . . ma’am.

Jess is the town bad boy with a smart mouth for everyone. Only Mrs Kim can bring him instantly into line and force him to speak respectfully, and she does it with three words and a stern look. You can’t help thinking that if Jess had had a grandmother or aunt like Mrs Kim, he would be a very different kid.

It seems as if the fake egg sandwiches are the only food provided at the 24 hour dance marathon, which is pretty terrible. And there’s no refrigeration, so this seems like another salmonella outbreak waiting to happen on the show.

Eggless Egg Salad

LANE: Eggless egg salad. Though this year my mom added food coloring to make the egg-like product look more eggy.

Vegan egg salad is made from mashed tofu, yeast, and vegan mayonnaise with mustard and turmeric for colouring. Black salt (actually pink in colour) provides the egg flavouring. It doesn’t need food colouring, but maybe knowledge of vegan foods has increased since 2002.

I don’t know who wants vegan egg salad at 6 am, but this is the refreshment that Mrs Kim and Lane are providing!

Coq au vin

SOOKIE: Last night, I made coq au vin for dinner, so of course the subject of children came up.

Coq au vin (“cock/rooster with wine”) is a French dish of chicken braised in wine with bacon/ham, mushrooms, herbs, onion, and garlic. The wine is usually a red Burgundy. The recipe was not documented until the 20^th century, but it is generally accepted that it was a rustic dish in existence long before that (according to legend as early as the days of the Roman Empire). The dish was popularised in the US in the early 1960s by Julia Child, and it was seen as one of her signature dishes.

Why serving coq au vin makes Sookie and Jackson discuss children is not as clear as Sookie seems to think. Something about cock and wine together, maybe?

“It makes me want to ration sugar”

SOOKIE: Wait ’til you see Jackson’s suit. It makes me want to ration sugar.

It seems to be a tradition, although not a rule, that contestants in the dance marathon dress in period costume from the 1930s and ’40s as part of the fun. Jackson is wearing a suit from the 1940s, which makes Sookie think of wartime sugar rationing. From 1942 to 1947, sugar was rationed in the US to half a pound (about 225 g) of sugar a week. This meant that Americans were allowed about 6 teaspoons of added sugar a day. Interestingly, this is about how much sugar nutritionists think we should be eating anyway!