Even vampires deserve treats. One of many many sacrifices that individuals make in alternate for everlasting life in vampire lore is taste. They will solely eat one factor for the remainder of their elongated lives, and it’s a metallic, salty, sinister factor. Everyone knows this. We settle for this. However vampires shouldn’t have to surrender texture, too. So, in 2013, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch was courageous sufficient to create a vampire with the imaginative and prescient to show that blood into one thing good to eat: Eve and her blood Popsicles in Solely Lovers Left Alive.
As a millennial lady, I’ve consumed greater than my justifiable share of vampire tales. I grew up entranced by Interview with the Vampire. Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight sequence of books and movies fell into my lap proper on the heels of one other fantasy sequence that, er, needn’t be named. Then there was True Blood, The Vampire Diaries, binge-watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer on the then-new app Hulu. However simply as soon as has consuming blood ever regarded appetizing to me. As soon as have I ever vanted to suck blood, and that’s due to Eve.
Jarmusch’s moody hangout comedy stars Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton as vampires named Adam and Eve (don’t fear about it) who’ve been on-again-off-again spouses for hundreds of years and reunite when Adam is in a selected state of ennui. He’s acquired a hookup at an area blood financial institution, so he doesn’t have to do any killing. However Eve will get experimental. In an effort to shock and cheer Adam up, she freezes some O unfavourable. Very refreshing, particularly whenever you’re in “a scorching spot,” she says. Now, Hiddleston having fun with “blood on a stick” is a finger-licking picture by itself, however this isn’t that type of thirst weblog. Hand to Lilith, that is the primary and solely time I’ve felt represented on display screen by a fictional vampire. That is precisely the kind of factor I might do if I have been undead. I like to eat Popsicles. I like to make Popsicles.
Have you ever ever been in a scenario the place you had restricted elements in your own home — due to cash, school, a thunderstorm, or a pandemic, for instance — and needed to get artistic with a purpose to keep away from consuming the identical factor on daily basis? Think about that plus immortality. Shouldn’t vampires be messing round within the kitchen in an try to boost their lives, like, on a regular basis? The titular cannibal on Hannibal loved sanguinaccio dolce, an Italian pudding, with human blood as a substitute of the normal pig’s blood. You may’t inform me Lestat wouldn’t be into that.
Vampires are creative, prolific even, in some ways. Throughout literature, movie, and tv, their preventing types fluctuate. They select to spend their daytime hours in numerous methods. You may all the time depend on a fictional vampire to experiment with vogue. However not meals. Whether or not the story is romantic or horrifying or a little bit of each, we normally see vampires feeding on contemporary human blood by sucking straight from their sufferer’s neck, wrist in the event that they’re well mannered, or femoral artery in the event that they’re nasty. It may be scary or erotic, however by no means precisely tasty. If a vampire doesn’t need to kill, and now we have loads of sullen and brooding faces in common tradition, they’ll discover extra palatable strategies. The immortal youngsters on The Vampire Diaries drink blood-filled IV luggage like Capri-Suns. Baz in Rainbow Rowell’s Carry On sequence, Interview with the Vampire’s Louis de Pointe du Lac, and the “vegetarian” Cullen household within the Twilight sequence hunt animals. Nonetheless, they’re consuming from the supply. There’s no sense of enjoyable. There’s no aptitude.
I can consider some notable exceptions. On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the vampire Spike alludes to enhancing his blood with burba weed for taste and crushed-up Weetabix for texture. At the very least as soon as in season 6 we see him doing it, so we all know it wasn’t a dry joke (laborious to inform with these Whedon sorts). What We Do within the Shadows has a bit enjoyable, too. The vampires can get excessive off the blood of people who find themselves on medication. They will combine blood with Bud Gentle and get drunk. Nonetheless, that’s not very elegant or creative. I anticipate extra from them.
Others simply advantage an honorable point out. The glamorous antagonist recognized solely because the Countess within the 1985 intercourse comedy As soon as Bitten drinks a glass of blood with a celery stalk. Sometimes you’ll see vampires drink their blood from a pink wine glass or a flask. Presentation is vital, so I recognize that. Amy Heckerling’s romantic comedy Vamps mixes it up by having Krysten Ritter stick a straw into the rat she’s draining. That’s (a) gross and (b) boring! And True Blood, in fact, is constructed round an artificial blood that vampires should purchase bottled and drink “out” in society. Nevertheless, most of the vampires on True Blood choose the actual factor and have a tendency to drink it within the common manner. Russell will stick his hand right into a human’s chest cavity and pull out their coronary heart, however he apparently can’t be bothered to organize his meals.
Come on! The place are the foodie vampires? I do know that Hollywood’s greatest and brightest can do higher. What about blood foam? Blood soup is already a dish in lots of cuisines. There are many meals cooked with blood, like black pudding or coq au vin. The place’s the whipping, frying, curdling, and coagulating? Present me a vampire beginning the day with a steaming cup of scorching blood. I don’t see why you couldn’t make freeze-dried astronaut blood for a day snack. If Popsicles are attainable, why not a bloody shaved ice, slushie, or sorbet?
I don’t even assume I’ve ever seen a vampire lick a uncommon steak. Let’s face it: Being a vampire seems to be enjoyable! Apart from consuming blood, in fact. That may change. If vampire fiction is right here to remain, we owe it to them to provide them one thing handsome to eat as a substitute of simply somebody handsome to eat.
