To receive from someone happiness—is it not to choose the sauce in which we want to be served up?
—Colette, The Pure and the Impure
My first professional menu writing had been a daily-changing task for each lunch and dinner. Foie gras and “turtle fat” in 1973 couldn’t feature on those $6.50 per person menus, but I still needed to let out the Cecil Beaton in me, so I loved cooking outside the restaurant. I could splurge at home or at friends’ houses. Sometimes the menu was over-the-top (even if the food was simply prepared), and sometimes the wine.
One dinner was both.
An Alice B. Toklas Dinner at Fern Canyon for Von Thurn und Taxis
May 29, 1974
Ten people, ten bottles.
I cooked this menu for some friends at their palatial Mill Valley, California, house, on top of Mount Tamalpais. The menu was written mostly in French, because in 1974 that was the language of Chez Panisse, and the friends wanted a Panisse, Alice (B. Toklas) inspired, menu. The dinner was a big success despite the guest of honor, the Prince von Thurn und Taxis, declaring as he looked at the first course, “All you need in life is birth control pills and hundred-year-old cognac.” I agreed about the cognac.
The prince turned out to be a fake, but no one and nothing else was.
Pâté de Foie de Volailles
Lillet
Quenelles de Saumon, Sauce Nantua
Champagne René Lalou 1966
Pigeoneaux Rôtis
Richebourg, DRC, 1959
Glace d’Asperges
Gigot de la Clinique
Purée de Topinambours
Château Montrose 1932
Brie de Meaux
A Tender Tart
Château Suduiraut 1955
Château Suduiraut 1928
Nitrous Oxide
Cocaine
Champagne Roederer Cristal 1966
The cumulus-cloud-light salmon quenelles with a cream crayfish sauce were followed by plain roasted pigeons stuffed with herbs because, after the quenelles, I wanted something not too rich but substantial enough for the great big rich Burgundy. I don’t like a sweet fruit sorbet intermezzo between courses (the sugar spoils the palate for anything else), but a nonsweet sorbet of asparagus was the perfect precursor to the very rich lamb, which had been injected every day over a week with a mandarin-orange-and-spices concoction and cooked for seven hours. A wonderful Brie finished off the rest of the red wine, even if my choice would have been for a big white. Finally the rich but not too sweet “Tender Tart” from Toklas’s cookbook was accompanied by two aging Sauternes. Nitrous oxide sent all to their “postprandial pleasures” on a high and me back (now uncaring) to my little one-room apartment in Berkeley.
A DELTA DINNER
Another dinner for eight people was for Ron Batori, the dean of the California Culinary Academy, who had invited first Ken Hom and then me to teach there. He invited Ken and me to cook at his large old farm mansion along the Sacramento River Delta. The wines were brought by Darrell Corti from Corti Brothers’ wine and food emporium in Sacramento. My notes say that the wines showed Darrell’s wonderful madness and deep knowledge of great wines as well as his willingness to share it by the shovelful.
Darrell Corti, Ron Batori, Ken Hom, Gregg Lowery et al.
February 15, 1980
Champagne Jeanmaire Brut en magnum
Smithfield Ham
Champagne Pol Roger en magnum, 1973
Tokaji Furmint 1975
Tokaji Szamorodni 1973
Tokaji Aszú 3 puttanos 1973
Tokaji Aszú 4 puttanos 1973
Grilled Delta Sturgeon
Joseph Phelps Chardonnay, en magnum, 1977
Duck Breasts and Legs with Kumquats
Chateau Margaux, en magnum, 1960
Chateau L’Evangile 1971
Cheeses
Chateau de Pommard 1972
Reserve de Chèvre Noir 1934
Pear Tarte Tatin
Tokaji Aszú 5 puttanos 1973
Tokaji Eszencia 1969
Ken and I decided it was important to keep the menu as clean as possible across from the almost (but not quite) overwhelming lineup of wines. Particularly the progression of the very heady and rich Hungarian Tokaji, going from the driest to the beginning-to-be-sweet (three puttanos) to the sweetest at five puttanos and then the Eszencia itself. I love old Malmsey Madeira, or semisweet sherries with ham, so to taste the progression of dry to sweet Tokaji with the Smithfield ham (soaked, poached, cooled, very thinly sliced) was an education in the level of sweetness that was perfect with salty, rich ham.
Ken cooked the duck Peking-style for the breasts with seeded kumquats stewed briefly in duck stock and red wine, and we poached the legs in duck fat to make confit before grilling them to be served with endive salad.
A NAPA WINERY DINNER
For a dinner at Joseph Phelps Vineyards to celebrate Joe having amassed a huge cellar of wines from auctions in London and the arrival of a lot of new fresh products onto the California marketplace, I wrote and cooked this menu for Joe, his then manager, Bruce Neyers, and a bunch of visiting chefs, like the great Frank Stitt from Highlands Bar & Grill in Birmingham, Alabama.
Dinner at Joseph Phelps Vineyards
Friday, October 10, 1980
Beluga Caviar
Champagne Billecart-Salmon, en magnum, 1975
Great Lakes Whitefish Gold Caviar
Chicken Breasts with Fresh Oregon Morels
Château Gruaud-Larose 1962, 1937, 1934
Rack of Lamb Grilled over Vine Cuttings
Château Gruaud-Larose 1945, 1929, 1926, 1918
Autumn Vegetable Stew
Basket of California Goat Cheeses on a Bed of Vine Leaves
Coulommiers
Salad of Warm Fruits, Guatemalan Cream
Steinberger Riesling, TBA 1959
Roasted Italian Chestnuts
Cockburn Port, vintage 1950
Unknown Port, perhaps Warre, vintage 1920
I don’t remember what the Guatemalan cream was, but at that time I was very excited about the newly arrived fresh tropical fruits. I think the cream was all about fresh guavas.
I was stunned to be able to taste a sequence of one of my favorite red wines, Château Gruaud-Larose, over a forty-four-year period, let alone to taste one harvested at the end of the First World War. But my excitement was to convince everyone to serve a white wine with the cheese, a crusade that to this day has been only partially successful but that I still fervently believe in as a better pairing than cheese with red wine. With white wine one can taste to their fullest both cheese and wine; with red, the flavors of both cheese and wine are dulled. Better rich cheeses with a high-alcohol, high-extract California chardonnay served after the red wines.
A DINNER FOR CHEZ PANISSE FRIENDS
May 19, 1981
The superb Martine Saunier, of Martine’s Wines, in the Bay Area, shared a passion with me for the wines of Burgundy’s Fixin, as well as for the wines of Leroy and the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, which she represented in California. So when I wanted to cook a dinner at my house for Alice and some of the staff from Chez Panisse (including Pat Curtan, who later did all the drawings for the Chez Panisse cookbooks) a couple of years after I left the restaurant, Martine supplied the wines. So much for the so-called Alice-Jeremiah feud.
Salad of California Smoked Sturgeon
Bourgogne Blanc, Rene Manuel 1978
Chassagne-Montrachet, Chateau de Maltroye 1967
Spaghetti with Sun-Dried Tomatoes
Hermitage Rouge 1976
Sadie Kendall Goat Cheeses
Fixin, Clos La Perrière 1964
Platter of Indian Mangoes and Strawberries
Chateau Doisy-Védrines 1964
THE SOUTH OF FRANCE
In 1975 Richard Olney wanted to introduce me to the Bandol wines of Domaine Tempier, owned by his friends Lucien and Lulu Peyraud. He knew I would be bowled over by the kind of hospitality that the Peyrauds offered, and would want to introduce their wines to California. When I returned I did through George Linton of Connoisseur Wine Imports.
Lunch at the Peyraud Family Table
Rosé 1964
Fresh Striped Bass with Fennel Grilled over Vine Cuttings and Sauce of Its Roe and Liver
Rouge 1973, 1972, 1970, 1960
Tomates Provençales
Lamb’s Lettuce with Garlic Oil
Fromages de Chèvre
Rouge 1961, 1968, 1964
Fruits
Coffee
Marc de Tèmpier 1961
I didn’t need notes about the food because I knew it would be forever etched in my memory. The wines, though, were a challenge since Richard, Lucien, and I had tasted twelve or so from the casks before lunch.
While sipping the rosé before lunch I saw Lulu stocking up a fire of vine cuttings and dried wild fennel branches outside the back door of the kitchen for cooking the bass. I had not seen her making the off-white sauce that appeared on the table in an off-white sauceboat. But when tasted it was one of those few life moments. She had ground up the liver and roe of the bass with a mild, fruity extra-virgin olive oil and lemon juice, a bit of fish bone stock, and lots of freshly ground white pepper. It did not look like much, but spooned over the moist, white, flaking flesh of the perfectly fresh and perfectly grilled fish, flavored by fennel and the lemon-like acid of the smoke from the vine cuttings, it was heaven on earth.
BREAD AND WATER WITH RICHARD OLNEY, 1975
After all that wine, the coup de grâce of the marc (think French grappa), and a two-hour drive over the mountains back to Richard’s hillside house, I was more dead than alive but, oddly enough, a few hours later a bit peckish, as one can be after a long day of food and wine. Casually and with sleight of hand, Richard produced a dish that, for the second time that day, created a memory that is perhaps even stronger now than the moment, perfect for its time, when I ate it. We went out into the garden in the fading light of the evening and picked potatoes, onions, and thyme.
Soup of Water, Potatoes, Onions
Puligny-Montrachet 1971
We added chunks of stale bread and French butter to the soup, salt, and ground pepper. A lifesaver!
COOKING FOR JAMES BEARD
The guests were Cathy Simon, Michael Palmer, my Special Forces or “Green Beret” brother, Gregg Lowery, and James Beard. His command had been to keep it simple, but that he felt like some great French wines (he had heard I had a decent cellar). Also that he was pining for the fresh and chemically untreated bay scallops I had been bragging about as now available in San Francisco.
I knew he would love the caviar and would understand my serving the pressed, or payusnaya, apart from the fact it was all I could afford. And beef was always safe when served with Lafite.
Dinner for James Beard, My House, San Francisco
October 19, 1979
Caviar Paiusnaya and Toast
Champagne Jeanmaire, Blanc de Blancs
Tagliarini with Bay Scallops
Córton-Charlemagne, Louis Latour, 1970
Roast Beef, Jerusalem Artichoke Puree
Château Lafite 1955
Cheeses
La Tâche, Domaine de la Romanée-Conti 1953
Fruit Compote
Wehlener Sonnenuhr Auslese, J. J. Prüm 1950
Cockburn 1950
Jim wouldn’t hear of putting a white wine with the cheeses. After a precautionary tasting of the old Prüm, the comments were “faded from opening, should have been aperitif, overpowered, badly placed,” so we put it with the compote and drank the La Tâche, which turned out to be truly a great one, with the cheeses.
Two months later I cooked another dinner for him at my house, a menu to revive tired palates after a season of feasting.
POST-CHRISTMAS BEARD DINNER, FOR TIRED APPETITES
December 27, 1979
The guests were Cecilia Chiang (of the great Mandarin restaurant in San Francisco); Marion Cunningham (Beard’s San Francisco factotum and minder in those days); Robert Finigan (restaurant critic and wine writer, now speaking to me after the lamb incident at Chez Panisse several years before); Alice Waters; my great love, companion, and rose grower Gregg Lowery; and Ken Duprey, my host in Nantucket. I must have found some money from somewhere to pay for the Sevruga.
Champagne Pol Roger, Cuvée de Blancs de Chardonnay 1971
Caviar Sevruga Blini
Pol Roger, or Aquavit Frozen
Smithfield Ham in Old 1950 Madeira
Pol Roger, or Malmsey 1920
Salad “Alice,” Chinoise
Compote of Tropical Fruits
Pol Roger, or Rieussec 1975
The salad was adapted from Escoffier’s Ma Cuisine (curly endive, lemon juice, walnut oil, olive oil), which I made “Chinoise” for Cecilia by using fresh water chestnuts. The fruit for the compote was mangoes, papaya, and stewed quinces, flavored with an essence of roses from Gregg’s garden.
COOKING FOR LOVERS
There is nothing like past and present relationship tensions and appreciations to spice a meal with friends. Alice Waters cooked this dinner at her house in Berkeley for two pairings: hers with Robert Finigan, and mine with Gregg Lowery.
I brought the wines from my cellar. The wine everyone was poised to taste was the sweet white wine made by Beaulieu Vineyard from botrytis grapes in the thirties. It was the gold color of a middle-aged Chateau d’Yquem, stunningly good, but turned out not to be sweet. It was more like a Chateau Grillet, or a vin de paille, a bit oxidized, but beautifully, if you have that English taste. My notes say it “would have been perfect early in the meal—with fish. Memorable, haunting wine.”
As was the evening. Mine with memories of Alice with me in the moonlight at the Gritti in Venice, of her coping with Gregg’s existence, and of several stories Bob related about Alice visiting three boyfriends in one night, funny only by the time we got to the Mount Veeder.
Dinner with Alice and Boyfriends
May 26, 1980
Baby Lettuces
Meursault Genevrières 1970
Grilled Lamb Chops
Beaulieu, Georges Latour Private Reserve Cabernet
Sauvignon 1974
Mayacamas, Cabernet Sauvignon 1969
Mount Veeder, Cabernet Sauvignon 1973
Asparagus
Coulis of Strawberries
Beaulieu, “Chateau Beaulieu” 1930s
DINNER WITH ALICE AND NEW BOYFRIEND
October 27, 1980
This was a meal I cooked for Alice Waters and her new boyfriend to celebrate their being together. He was a wonderful guy, very good-looking, not yet twenty-one, and very complicated. They both were very nervous about the occasion, so I invited old friends in common with Alice, Cathy Simon and Michael Palmer, as well as Gregg Lowery, to show that we were not against the new one just because our common good friend Bob Finigan had been at the altar before him.
Vouvray Mousseux, Brut 1970
Veuve-Clicquot, Brut NV
Fettuccine with the First Fresh White Truffles
Chateau de la Maltroye 1967
Mixed Green Salad
Sonoma Goat Cheeses
Les Forts-de-Latour, en magnum, 1970
Dried Fruits and Nuts
Gonzalez & Byass 1970
Abundant white truffles have a way of conveying that all is right with the world.
Balance may be everything.