Mustrum Ridcully, Archchancellor of Unseen University, was a shameless autocondimentor. He had his own special cruet put in front of him at every meal. It consisted of salt, three types of pepper, four types of mustard, four types of vinegar, fifteen different kinds of chutney and his special favorite: Wow-Wow sauce, a mixture of mature scumble, pickled cucumbers, capers, mustard, mangoes, figs, grated wahooni, anchovy essence, asafetida and, significantly, sulphur and saltpetre for added potency. Ridcully inherited the formula from his uncle who, after half a pint of sauce on a big meal one evening, had a charcoal biscuit to settle his stomach, lit his pipe and
disappeared in mysterious circumstances, although his shoes were found on the roof the following summer.
There was cold mutton for lunch. Mutton went well with Wow-Wow sauce; on the night of Ridcully senior's death, for example, it had gone at least three miles.
.../.../...
The entire cruet floated up in the air and started to spin slowly. Then it exploded.
The wizards, dripping vinegar and expensive spices, watched it owlishly.
"It was probably the sauce," the Dean ventured. "It was definitely going a bit critical last night."