Bombilla

PICTURED, powerful antioxidant: Maté, strong tea style beverage. I first encountered it in Argentina and felt mildly naughty drinking it owing to the drug-like paraphernalia...

Traditionally a hollowed Calabash Gourd (preferably mouldy) is filled with dried, diced Yerba leaves and hot - never boiling - water.

The soothing, caffeinated, somewhat cerebral concoction, taken through a perforated metal bombilla, yields bitter flavours of tobacco, green tea and straw.

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From slow sipping to fast food... What is one of the world's fastest? -Rare steak, the bluer, the brisker. Cooking steak for connoisseurs is a little like mixing Martinis. The duration meat sees heat might be compared to the exposure of the teardrop of Noilly P.

'Connoisseurs who like their martinis very dry suggest simply allowing a ray of sunlight to shine through a bottle of Noilly Prat before it hits the bottle of gin...'

[Luis Buñuel]