Language Transfer 2. Word Building. Negative Prefixes

 

The words below with negative prefixes occur in Reading 1. Fill in the spaces with the appropriate word in the sentences suggested.

 

Misunderstanding, unfair, uncommitted, dissatisfied, unsatisfying, uncomfortable, inedible, unappetizing, unpleasant, ineffective, irrelevant, unserious, unusual

 

1. At times like these the legal system appears inhuman and _______. 2. What made this extraordinary story even more _______ is that Lee was a woman. 3. He liked women, and before his marriage had enjoyed a succession of casual, satisfactory and _______ affairs. 4. Musicians can be utterly _______ people right up to the moment they pick up the instrument and produce something absolutely heartfelt and true. 5. The treatment was expensive and _______, with a high recurrence rate. 6. But, as with such crimes in real life, such an answer is deeply _______. 7. Today’s technology has made geography almost _______. 8. The grey city took you in its mouth and spat you out as _______ and you felt you had survived something that would kill a normal person. 9. The man is not _______ but when he speaks, his words cut deep into her and she sees him as suddenly ugly. 10. Miller was obviously _______ with the questions and shifted in his chair. 11. And then they wonder why there are so many personal and world-wide _______s, war, misery, pain. 12. Handling complaints well can turn a _______ customer into a loyal one. 13. Love is the salt of life and without it, life would be tasteless and _______.

 

Fill in the gaps with the correct article where necessary.

Speculate on what cooking really is: an art, a passion, a necessity. Is there a kind of sorcery, magic or alchemy in cooking? Or is it more about skills and experience? Which words apply to cooking and which to fortune-telling? Is there anything in common between cooking chocolate and telling fortune?

 

to require skills to work domestic magic an endless fascination

(take) painstaking steps to look into hearts to see to the core of things wise fool’s gold to relish a layman’s magic a tiresome necessity

to enjoy an art to sell dreams and comforts to wield marvels

to be a knack loving preparation to make incense

sensual magic a lightness of touch to probe into lives

a professional secret a harmless temptation to see longings

This is (1) __ art I can enjoy. There is a kind of sorcery in all cooking: in (2) ___ choosing of ingredients, the process of mixing, grating, melting, infusing and flavouring, the recipes taken from ancient books, (3) ___ traditional utensils – (4) ___ pestle and mortar with which my mother made her incense turned to a more homely purpose, her spices and aromatics, giving up their subtleties to (5) ___ baser, more sensual magic. And it is partly (6) ___ transience of it that delights me; so much loving preparation, so much art and experience put into (7) ___ pleasure which can last only a moment, and which only a few will ever fully appreciate. My mother always viewed my interest with indulgent contempt. To her, food was no pleasure but (8) ___ tiresome necessity to be worried over, a tax on the price of our freedom. I stole (9) ___ menus from restaurants and looked longingly into patisserie windows. I must have been ten years old - maybe older - before I first tasted (10) ___ real chocolate. But still the fascination endured. I carried recipes in my head like maps. All kinds of recipes; torn from (11) ___ abandoned magazines in busy railway stations, wheedled from (12) ___ people on the road, strange marriages of my own confection. Mother with her her divinations directed our mad course across Europe. Cookery cards anchored us, placed landmarks on the bleak borders. Paris smells of (13) ___ baking bread and (14) ___croissants; Marseille of (15) ___ bouillabaisse and (16) ___ grilled garlic. Berlin was Eisbrei with Sauerkraut and Kartoffelsalat, Rome was (17) ___ ice-cream I ate without paying in a tiny restaurant beside the river.

Mother had taught me what she could. How to see to the core of things, of people, to see their thoughts, their longings. But some people are unreadable, unreachable. Making (18) ___ chocolate is a different matter. Oh, some skill is required. A certain lightness of touch, speed, (19) ___ a patience my mother would never have had. But (20) ___ formula remains the same every time. It is safe. Harmless. And I do not have to look into their hearts and take what I need; these are wishes which can be granted simply, for the asking.

Guy, my confectioner, has known me for a long time. We worked together after Anouk was born and he helped me to start my first business, (21) ___ tiny pattisserie-chocolaterie in the outskirts of Nice. Now he is based in Marseille, importing (22) ___ raw chocolate liquor direct from South America and converting it to chocolate of various grades in his factory.

I only use the best. (23) ___ blocks of couverture are slightly larger than house bricks, one box of each per delivery, and I use all three types: (24) ___ dark, (25) ___ milk and (26) ___ white. It has to be tempered to bring it to its crystalline state, ensuring (27) ___ hard, brittle surface and (28) ___ good shine. Some confectioners buy their supplies already tempered, but I like to do it myself. There is (29) ___ endless fascination in handling (30) ___ raw dullish blocks of couverture, in grating them by hand – I never use electrical mixers - into the large ceramic pans, then melting, stirring, testing each painstaking step with (31) ___ sugar thermometer until just the right amount of heat has been applied to make the change.

There is a kind of (32) ___ alchemy in the transformation of base chocolate into this wise fool's gold; (33) ___ layman's magic which even my mother might have relished. As I work I clear my mind, breathing deeply. The windows are open, and (34) ___ through draught would be cold if it were not for (35) ___ heat of the stoves, (36) ___ copper pans, (37) ___ rising vapour from the melting couverture. The mingled scents of (38) ___ chocolate, (39) ___ vanilla, (40) ___ heated copper and (41) ___ cinnamon are intoxicating, powerfully suggestive; (42) ___ raw and earthy tang of (43) ___ Americas, (44) ___ hot and resinous perfume of the rainforest. This is how I travel now, as the Aztecs did in their sacred rituals. (45) ___ food of the gods, bubbling and frothing in ceremonial goblets. The bitter elixir of life.

***

I know all their favourites. It's (1) ___ knack, a professional secret like (2) ___ fortune-teller reading palms: My mother would have laughed at this waste of my skills, but I have no desire to probe further into their lives than this. I do not want their secrets or their innermost thoughts. Nor do I want their fears or (3) ___ gratitude. (4) ___ tame alchemist, she would have called me with (5) ___ kindly contempt, working domestic magic when I could have wielded marvels. But I like these people. I like their small and introverted concerns. I can read their eyes, their mouths, so easily: this one with its hint of (6) ___ bitterness will relish my zesty orange twists; this sweet-smiling one the soft-centred apricot hearts. For Guillaume, (7) ___ florentines, eaten neatly over a saucer in his tidy bachelor's house. Narcisse's appetite for (8) ___ double-chocolate truffles reveals (9) ___ gentle heart beneath (10) ___ gruff exterior. Caroline Clairmont will dream of (11) ___ cinder toffee tonight and wake hungry and irritable. And the children… (12) ___ Chocolate curls, (13) ___ white buttons with (14) ___coloured vermicelli, (15) ___ marzipan fruits in their nests of ruffled paper, (16) ___ peanut brittle, cracknels, assorted misshapes in half-kilo boxes… I sell (17) ___ dreams, (18) ___ small comforts, (19) ___ sweet harmless temptations to bring down a multitude of saints crash-crash-crashing amongst (20) ___ hazels and nougatines.