Splendid Tableau

Lynn Rosetto Kasper talks food she cooks well (this post’s title is borrowed from her show). In Portland, Ore., where I used to live (pre-NYC), the restaurant ethos was so inspired from moments like her. I think I owe it to Ms. Kasper, as well as Ms. Gray, mentioned earlier in the blog, and if I haven’t already, here’s an homage too to Nigela Lawson and of course the sweet Rachel Khoo, all my goddesses of the home kitchen, and I want to thank them for why I cook the way I do— and write the way they cook. Living on Maui now is a splendid privilege because, to my mind, there’s something “living in its geographic poetry” that is beyond the tropical paradise rep it has. The French Laundry is a “living” restaurant, according to its famous American Chef. Maui is a living proof of a pristine island biosphere within a humanism ecology protecting the land as it has always been. The freshwater langoustines are caught by hand at daybreak in the river refuge, in the clearest water. The coconut pulps in local ice creams are a reminder of the tableau scenery of their tress all around the land. The surfing waves are constantly carved by hand and ancient turtles. The everlasting plumerias and chicken flocks with no natural predators— this island has no venom; and the constant breeze is blowing, here and there, the soul of the sacred mountains. The goddesses have possessed my cooking and my nourishment is spiritual in flavor and the designer of my plate is the fruit and flowers themselves. Poetry can’t always be written, when nature can suffice. “The grass flowers come up in the ravines a little of the day leans toward with no boredom in life no trace of absence,” (Jean Follain, translated from French).