The Jay-Blog

Chez Panisse

Chris von Koschembahr emailed me a couple of days back, saying he was coming to Berkeley Wednesday night for a conference on campus the following day. Where was it again I lived?

My house is a little over a mile from the Berkeley campus. I discovered Chris is a foodie. I called Chez Panisse, which is usually booked a month in advance. A party had just cancelled. Last night Chris and I ate dinner at the second seating at Alice Waters' temple devoted to top-quality, fresh ingredients.

While I'm something of a foodie, too, this was actually my first time downstairs at Alice's Restaurant. You see, my wife is vegetarian, and a picky eater to boot. At Chez P, you eat what they give you. They value freshness over variety. As a result, we'd never experienced this cultural icon in our quarter century living in Berkeley.

La Carte

La Cuisine

At the conclusion of the meal, we split the bill 50-50. We'd downed a few glasses of wines matched to each course and a liter of sparkling water. So, you ask, was this worth $110 apiece? Mais out. Of course. Would I make a habit of this? Maybe if I struck oil.

The food was delectable, fun to roll around in the mouth, savoring the flavors. The experience of doing Chez Penis (as some locals call it) was a delight I'll enjoy in reflection for years. The atmosphere was refined and soothing. The conversation was great. I enjoyed myself. I'll definitely be back in the next quarter century.

Chris von K departing.

Truffles

When returning from Nice last year, I wanted to bring home some small but interesting gifts, so I ended up in a French supermarket with lots of exotic salt, a collection of specialty mustards, a jug of anchoiade, and a single black truffle. In case you haven't seen a truffle before, here's what it looks like:

That's about the size of a healthy cherry tomato.

I sliced the truffe into thin pieces, some of which I buried between similarly thin slices of parmesan cheese, placed on the mini-toasts and zapped in the microwave for 20 seconds. We nibbled the remaining slides raw just to savor the flavor.

Did I say flavor? There wasn't much. The box they came in warns, "A consommer de preference avant voir date sure le couvercle," and I couldn't find a date on the couvercle or anywhere else, so this could be a truffle from the last century for all I know.

Putting the to the ultimate aroma test, Smokey devoured his but Latte played with his slice, chewed it a bit, and left it on the sofa. I think Smokey finally got it. Smokey likes to eat flies, too, when he can catch them.