D is for Domino's
Nostalgia, homesickness, sentimentality.
To the untrained eye, there is probably not an obvious homogeneity between the title of this letter and these three words above but, for me, there is a very simple explanation for this juxtaposition and the story goes back about ten years.
I am not a food snob and despite my best efforts, I am not Italian and so to me, a Domino’s pizza is more of a work of art than an abomination. There is a skill in taking something so innocent and pillaging its purity to create a Frankenstein-esque “version” that so many would consider a cardinal sin. And yet…the taste is incomparable.
Between the ages of 13 and 18 I went to a boarding school in Rutland — the smallest county in the UK and until very recently, the only county without a McDonald’s. My school was the beating heart of the small market town that it was based in and named after. It wasn’t quite Harry Potter nor St Trinian’s, although occasionally not far off the latter — jolly hockey sticks and all, but for five years it was home away from home and I, for the most part, really loved it.
I lived in a house of sixty girls, twelve in my own year group, seven of whom are still my closest friends. I was never more than a flight of stairs away from my sister, this proximity I was very glad for. We had classes six days a week and sport for at least three afternoons, matches on a Saturday, followed by match teas (sandwiches, orange slices and yoghurts). Morning chapel every day except Tuesday and Saturday, even God needs a break, a competitive choral delivery to rouse the spirits.
We did not have a centralised dining system and so for each meal, we would return to our respective houses and fill our boots before getting back to the wonted scheduling.
Breakfast was compulsory for the first three years but it needn’t have been. Tuesday morning warranted a stampede from the younger years, as Tuesday meant muffins. Chocolate and blueberry mini muffins, almost certainly from a Brake’s catering ready-mix, but delicious nonetheless. Muffins were slyly slipped into dressing gown pockets to save for a morning break treat. A commercial conveyor toaster sat in the corner with a wooden spoon next to it for stuck-toast emergencies.
Mid-morning break was a mad rush. Twenty minutes to swap books, collect homework, and eat six slices of toast. Double-width Dualit toasters lined the counters in our kitchenettes and 24 girls would cram in to scran as many slices as possible. By 11h05, surfaces would be exfoliated with crumbs and pollocked with marmite and bovril. This AM tradition sparked the great Flora vs Butter Altercation of ‘11 (butter reigned of course.)
Lunch was the formal meal of the day in which our educators would come and grace us with their intellectual presence and we would entertain them with our tactless wit. The food at lunch would vary in quality most frequently but we would always have pudding. Chicken à la King was a regular but certainly not a favourite. Chocolate Crunch was a favourite but certainly not a regular.
Teatime started at 6pm and was a less rigid affair. You could come and go as you pleased and loosen your tie. Big Breakfast was winner, consisting of a full English breakfast at dinner time: baked beans, bacon, sausage, fried eggs, hash browns, cooked tomatoes, mushrooms. Remembering these meals and mealtimes is sending my sentimentality into overdrive but when I think more carefully about eating at school, I just remember being hungry all the time.
We were well-fed but we expended a vast amount of energy running between lessons, running to see friends, running away from teachers when we were caught smoking. So when evening rolled around, after we had finished homework, tummies were rumbling again. For our first few years, we weren’t allowed out in the evenings and so the only option for a supplementary meal was to order in.
The nearest Domino’s was a half an hour drive away and they were not actually allowed to deliver to the school, so in order to secure a pizza a Mission Impossible would commence. We would order with our deep voices to the house next door, wait patiently for it to arrive and then covertly run up the driveway and intercept the delivery driver en route. We didn’t do this often but the wrath that we’d face was truly worth it.
Tuesdays were the best day to order. After an afternoon of hockey in the rain, a Two for Tuesday special would beckon. Two pizzas for the price of one. Two large pizzas! With a child’s metabolism and the appetite of a wolf, I would easily eat two large Domino’s pizzas by myself. A feat which now seems impossible but at the time was a casual trial.
The salty satiation would often cause regret in the middle of the night when a colossal thirst would drag me out of my deep sleep and warrant sticking my head underneath the tap to rehydrate my entire body.
There is a very specific taste of a Domino’s pizza, it tastes like Italians rolling in their graves, and nonnas sighing clamorously. A Neapolitan marinara probably contains maximum six ingredients, whereas a Dominos is said to contain 56 - it truly is My Chemical Romance. The beauty of bastardisation is under-appreciated, some things can still taste pretty good outside of their purest / purist form. Wait for the letter O and we will be onto the next best thing — oven pizza.
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