It’s Sunday, so all the salami stores are shut. Tourists don’t stay here in December. We walk to a petrol station because I am hungry. From the freezer you select the least stale loaf, some sliced cheese, and plastic-parceled sausage that’s been shelved since 2002. We don’t even need oil, you say, it’s in the meat! Our rented flat has one skillet and two tiny gas burners. You ice-skate beef bits about the frying pan with a tin fork. I sit and hope to taste the lardy smell.

400 kilos of beef salami seized at the Batrovci border crossing after confirmed Slovenian BSE prompts Yugoslavian ban – officials gasolined the meat & watched it blaze — clouds of mad-cow for days.

The fat-blackened pan makes a warm plate for our sandwiches. When we finish, the ground outside is whiter. The medieval castle hangs over frozen water and I secretly want it to slide in, shattering all the glass, bloodying all the aprons. That prince’s palace has been rock solid and salt-cured in place for centuries. I am a greedy butcher. I want meat, but must settle for stealing the grease from your cheek.