“Fennel, which is the spice for Wednesdays, the day of averages, of middle-aged people. . . . Fennel . . . smelling of changes to come.”

“He leaned over and removed the lid, and some really wonderful smells steamed out. But I wasn’t going to get excited, not this time, because it was probably Bambi in shallots or Nemo with fennel or—”

“What are those bulb things you're slicing?""You've never seen fennel? It looks like celery and tastes like licorice.”

“Only an obstinate prejudice about this period (which I will presently try to account for) could blind us to a certain change which comes over the merely literary texts as we pass from the Middle Ages to the sixteenth century.”

“One might trouble one's dainty snout with a whiff of the taleggio displayed in an artisanal cheese shop, or take a saucer of jasmine tea and a knuckle of fennel-scented snuff at a counter of buffed Big Nothing granite. But there was a want in these ladies yet, and it was for the rude life of youth.”

“Julian presented the food. A fillet of sea bass with perfect griddle marks and a scattering of fennel picked from a nearby hedgerow. There were caramelized carrots, baby la ratte potatoes and a garnish of roasted tomatoes that had made a brief appearance in a painting that afternoon.”