Sweet Revenge: 200 Delicious Ways to Get Your Own Back

star David Tomlinson, was a prisoner of war in Stalag 3, the Royal Air Force Officers' POW camp, for four years. It was practice for prisoners to pool their Red Cross parcels and for an unfortunate volunteer to do the most creative cooking and preparation that was possible in the circumstances. Standard additional rations were a few potatoes, some bread and half a horse to make into a soup. One particular volunteer only took on the job with great reluctance and on the strict condition that no one was ever to complain or he would give up. He was hoist by his own petard when everyone made a supreme effort not to complain and he found himself still doing the cooking three months later.
    He decided to get his own back and invite criticism: when he was collecting the rations from the horse-drawn cart he picked up some balls of horse manure as well. He rolled the balls in bread crumbs, fried them and served them up to the unsuspecting prisoners. One of them took a mouthful and exclaimed: 'Oh my God, horse shit!' Realising that this might lose them their cook he quickly added: '... but bloody well cooked!'
     

     
    Col Peter Rogers of The Blues and Royals is the Lieutenant Colonel Commanding Household Cavalry and 'Silver Stick in Waiting'. He is very good looking and charming and, back in his day, was one of London's more popular Debs' Delights. In the early Seventies he was stationed at Knightsbridge with the Household Cavalry Mounted Regiment and was asked to make up a party of people going to one of the most popular shows in the West End at the time. However, he admits

    he was a little naughty - at the last moment he had a hot date and he stood his friends up. They were not best pleased.
    A few months later Rogers received a very smart invitation from Lady Paget for her daughter: At Home, Quaglinos, Dinner and Dancing; Dress: White Tie. Rogers thought this a little odd as he didn't know a Lady Paget so he looked through the books and found a Lady Paget in Somerset. He telephoned her, to ask whether she was giving a party for her daughter. 'Not as far as I know,' she replied tartly. He also thought white tie (i.e. full evening dress) was improbable. His concern was slightly eased by the fact that Lady Paget's invitation was appearing on brother officers' mantelpieces - Richard Wilkinson, John Greenaway (now Sir John) and Dick Morrisey-Paine were also going and there was a certain safety in numbers. He was still mystified even while changing for the party on the evening and, to reassure himself, he went along to Charles Horsfall's room, but he had already left for the party. 'No problem,' he thought as he set off in a taxi to Quaglinos and was met in the foyer by a waiter who inquired: 'Lady Paget's party? Please follow me.' Rogers peered through the door and saw the band in full swing. As he pitched in and found himself by the dance floor, he realised that everyone else was in black tie (far less formal). By then he was on the stage in full view of the assembled company. The band instantly struck up and everyone who wasn't laughing too much sang along: 'I'm putting on my top hat, doing up my white tie ...' It was all taken in good grace and the boys offered to buy him dinner. Rogers chose all the most expensive things on the menu.
     

     
    'In 1953, while doing my National Service as a Second Lieutenant in the 10th Royal Hussars, I was on a "Survival Course" in Germany with my troop of three Centurion tanks. Survival in this case meant living off the land for two weeks without rations or cash.
    'We camped in a forest which turned out to belong to a most gentle and generous German aristocrat. I knew this to be so because one evening he invited me to dine with him in his castle. In order to treat the occasion with proper respect I donned my officer's uniform and arrived at the castle gates at 7 p.m. Imagine my surprise when I found that a Signal Corps Brigadier had also been invited for the same reason. He had bivouacked a whole brigade within the generous confines of the estate.
    The three of us sat down to a gargantuan feast in an enormous dining hall. Course after course was washed down with continuous libations. The Brigadier was quite unable to cope with this generosity and soon began to insult both our host and me. He made a number of insulting toasts to the Germans in general and our host in particular, but soon, concentrating on the one least able to defend himself, he turned his attention to me. He patently