KITCHEN HEROES

Funny how the heroes change
My childhood knights, you'd find it strange
To occupy the daydreams I have now
Sure you ride a white horse, wave a sword,
And pledge your honour to some liege lord,
But when you've spilled your blood and made your vow...

Someone rubbed the horse down
And got the creature fed
Someone set the table
And someone made the bed, someone

Cleaned the boots and fixed the tack
Washed the clothes, and put it all back
With a flask of something good and strong
That was brewed and bottled when the nights were long

Mistress Quickly, hold my hand
When things get bad in this promised land
Till we learn to live within our means again
It's the stock and the cellar and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes then

So you can shoot a gun and wield a knife.
But there's more than that to the kind of life
That occupies the daydreams I have now
Do you know which tree's bark dulls the pain,
Whether heartsease lives up to its name,
And if you don't know yet, can you learn how?

To sterilise the bandages
And check the meat is sound
To tan the hide for a winter shoe
And store the roots below the ground

Set the bread to rise and the butter to come
And the cheese to set and the honey to run
Smoke the meat with skill and care
And keep us fed when the cupboard's bare

Elizabeth David, hold my hand
When things get bad in this promised land
Till we learn to live within our means again
It's the salt and the shovel and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes then

Sancho Panza, lead me through
I'm afraid we're all relying on you
And the windmill-building starts this afternoon
It's the soap and the seed and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes soon