La salade niçoise aioli would be the perfect white dip for this cold cuts platter par excellence— and imagine the addition of hard-cooked eggs dusted with dried marjoram and paprika sofrito coming on the plate, and sticks of wild fennel fronds from the Salento region of Italy, if you could find them. This is the dawning of the "Age of Aquarius” summer, and these indigenous foods (of the tuber and gourd genus) bloomed on my table like the moon and stars. So peace be with you, and toast! (raising a sweet wine grappa shot or a strong port, the best drinks to cheers)... Maui’s great pacific sunset was lighting a color evoked in a professional studio. It was a photograph to remember: this beautiful dining night… The orchid caught in Haiku will be called The Bird... A highland tribe in North Luzon celebrates rice harvest by chanting an epic poem about the legends of their people. Red tea plants mark the boundaries of the rice terraces submerged in mountain water— this floating garden stairway to the sky. In the legend the chiefs of the village shape-shift and turn their tribal wars by cockfighting; they strike with talons at the head by confusing its opponent with fiery plumage. (My hanging orchid is this bird in disguise inside my room.) By this tribe, heirloom rice is turned into wine, a miraculous mellifluous scent of cognac, after fermentation in a weaved basket lined with banana leaves. The aboriginals were guided by the biodiversity of the forest and therefore taro was cultivated. Liana vines adopted by primary trees, like filigree bijou on their arm, guided the sweet growing of chayotes, mimicking ornaments like bees and dragonflies over cascade meadows... Ms. Gray is writing this blog, again, so I could live like her thirty years ago in the Salento wilderness, and to boot, compose recipes from a “life source” quantum, drawing a classical epicurean thought, before they become a splendor on the table... I broiled the purplish taros seasoned in lemon juice, olive oil, rock salt and pepper, and a priori hand-mixed them with a sprig of cut rosemary. I had young dandelion leaves for this chunky salad. And more of the chayote squash was a medley into a tomato consommé soup, spliced with broccoli broth. Eating, it dawned on me where this food all began.
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