Listen to the music

and a recipe for Gildas, the quintessential Basque pintxo to kick off a summer evening dinner

Do you get the niggling feeling you’re forgetting something important?

Or maybe you simply forgot why you went to the basement - again. We can put it down to busy minds, multi-tasking, trying to juggle too many things all at once. But as we get older, there’s the real worry that forgetfulness may become persistent, a slow shift of our essential selves. And yet the how and why of understanding memory loss feels as ephemeral as sand in an hourglass.

The science of memory

With so many of us aging all at once, perhaps it’s no surprise there seems to be more and more time and research spent on the way our elusive mysterious memory works.

Take neuroscientist Dr. Richard Restak. He’s spent the last 20 years helping people with memory issues. In a recent article in the New York Times, Dr. Restak is described as thinking about how “memory is connected to creative thinking, technology’s impact on memory, how memory shapes identity.” The result of all that pondering is his latest book: The Complete Guide to Memory: The Science of Strengthening Your Mind.

It’s an excellent article and I’ve earmarked the book for a future read.

But as often happens when I read an article in the Times, I find the comments section to be even more illuminating and instructive. Readers, many of them in their 70s and beyond, shared their personal experiences, their tips and ultimately their rules for living. One of the key takeaways? The link between music and memory is a powerful one.

Connecting to joy

You may have heard of a documentary called Alive Inside.

It’s the story of a social worker who focuses on creating personalized playlists for patients suffering from dementia. In this powerful and moving clip, we see Henry, a patient who is near-comatose, come alive and regain himself through the power of the soundtrack of his life.

An article from the Harvard Medical School explains the phenomenon even further.

There is a growing body of evidence to explain why people…come back to life and begin to feel like their former selves when they listen to their playlists. Listening to and performing music reactivates areas of the brain associated with memory, reasoning, speech, emotion, and reward.

As I think about it, my very unscientific idea is that music connects us to deep-seated joy. It can instantly recall a moment in time, a feeling, a person, a place. And while there’s no question that songs can also conjure up feelings of sadness or loss - those hurtin’ love songs we all know so well - they are still tapping into our elemental selves, what makes us the sum total of who we are.

If music be the food of love, play on.

William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

That’s what happened this past Thursday evening. We hosted a dinner for seven in our secret garden, where good food, fantastic wine and great conversations overflowed. As the evening waned, the cigars came out and the candles inched slowly downwards, our guest Steven started playing the top Billboard hits from a particular year. Top 100 hits of 1967, 1961, 1971….we knew them all. It mattered not that we sang off key, missed words, bungled melodies. The music wove an even deeper web around a magical evening, filling us all to overflowing.

Ready for an evening of magic

I’ve already started building the soundtrack of my life on Spotify. At 18 hours-plus, it’s a melange of everything from Frank Sinatra and Elvis Costello, to Pasty Cline, Talking Heads and Bruno Mars The latest addition was Katy Perry’s Roar, added after we saw & Juliet, a musical that has everyone dancing in the aisles. If my memory begins to fade, you’ll find me singing at the top of my lungs, connecting to joy.

Gildas

allow two per person

If you’ve ever been to San Sebastián in Spain, you’ve likely wound your way down the narrow streets of the old town, stopping at one bar after another to have some pintxos, the Basque name for bite-sized tapas. The variety can be overwhelming, with dozens of bars outdoing each other to display the most tempting and high-quality creations.

Amidst the variety, there is one pintxo that is the queen. Created over 60 years ago, the Gilda is a taste explosion that combines anchovy, olives, guindillas (Spanish pickled green chiles), and tiny cornichons. Gildas are verde, salado y picante (green, salty and spicy) - a nod to the fiery Gilda that Rita Hayward played in the eponymous movie, and thus named after her.

If unexpected guests show up at your door, or even if you simply want a delicious bite to go alongside your Spanish vermouth aperitivo, the Gilda is ready in a matter of minutes. Be sure to always have the ingredients on hand for a virtual escape to Basque country.

Note: traditional Gildas are usually made with just four ingredients. Here I sub the pickle for cherry tomatoes and pop the Gilda on a square of toasted bread for a more substantial bite.

Ingredients

A pint of ripe cherry tomatoes

Several slices of sourdough bread

A jar of guindillas (Spanish pickled green chiles), or pickled pepperoncini

One tin high quality anchovies in oil

A jar of pimento-stuffed manzanilla olives

Long toothpicks

For a dozen Gildas:

1. Cut 6 cherry tomatoes in half. Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a small skillet and sauté the tomatoes over medium high heat, until they collapse. Set aside.

2. Toast the sourdough bread in a toaster or over a grill. Brush with olive oil, trim the crusts and cut into 12 bite-sized squares.

3. Cut the guindillas or pickled pepperoncini into 12 bite sized pieces, removing seeds.

4. Wrap an olive with an anchovy fillet and secure with a toothpick. Repeat to make 12 skewers.

5. To assemble the Gildas, place a tomato on a square of bread and top with a piece of pickled chili. Skewer the anchovy-wrapped olive through the tomato to secure it to the bread. Serve with Spanish vermouth on the rocks.