THE CHEZ PANISSE MENU COOKBOOK

When I was asked to write my first cookbook (a very unexpected surprise!) after all of the writing and recipe testing it came time to do what is almost always part of writing one and that is the ‘Acknowledgments and Dedication’ pages. The dedication went to my wife, Janet and our son, Justin. The first ‘national names’ in my acknowledgments went to Alice Waters and James Beard, two profoundly American food champions!

I got my first copy of this book in 1982 when it recently was published by Random House. It was a gift from a man who changed the path of my professional career, Gordon Sinclair. He’d been out to California to scope out what was going on in American restaurants just prior to opening a new one in Illinois named, appropriately, “Sinclair’s”. Almost magically he returned with a copy which absolutely magically was given to me a short time later. Maybe because after lending it to me he realized how taken I was with the entirety of what Alice had created in Berkeley, the location of Chez Panisse. Gordon was an excellent judge of human nature.  I was the Chef of his restaurant. I wish I could go back in time and see that kitchen and who I worked with back then because it was like a light switch of extraordinary magnitude was lit!  More than the recipes in her book I was even more gobsmacked by the thematic menus she and Jeremiah Tower created. That was the abracadabra part I wanted to turn my life in cuisine towards. And so I moved forth to do that. I made some of the best friendships of my life during this time. Charlie Trotter and Carrie Nahabedian to name two.

A few years later Janet, Justin and I had moved back to Key West. Seismic changes were afoot. I became Chef of ‘Louie’s Backyard’. The operating partner of the restaurant also became a dear friend. His name is Proal Perry. Proal really understood what was happening in American cuisine and he was tuned in like I was to the totality of it. We got invited to go out to San Francisco by Bruce and Barbara Neyers for an annual party they had at their home nestled in the Napa Valley. Before party day Proal and I spent 3 or 4 days going to all of the famed restaurants in SF we had been hearing about. It was 1987. We went to Joyce Goldstein’s ‘Square One’, ‘Masa’s’, Cindy Pawlcyn’s ‘Fog City Diner’ and the white hot ‘Stars’ by ‘Chez Panisse’ alum Jeremiah Tower.

Then the day of the party came and it was surreal. I had secreted away my copy of the C.P. cookbook if by some chance … These folks lived a life dedicated to food and wine on a whole new level. Bruce was the main guy for ‘Joseph Phelps Winery’ and Barbara was co-managing ‘Chez Panisse’! The people at the party were what you might imagine. And the food and wine set up was off the charts. But what I will never forget as long as I’m breathing was the moment I looked through their kitchen screen door and saw Alice Waters in a chic head scarf and matching summer dress sitting on a lawn chair. Some of the next time period was a blur. I don’t often get ‘star struck’ … but after having been so rocked by her book and all that her restaurant embodied I surely was. But I gathered up my composure and I found the words to walk over to her and say, “Would you autograph my copy of your book Alice?” She looked at me with a smile starting to cross her face, and took it with her delicate hands from me gently. The book was swollen, stained and bruised. After what seemed an hour of silence she turned to her husband and said, “From now on I only want to sign copies of my book that have been so loved“. And that is the God’s honest way it went down in Napa Valley on a day I’ll never forget. And I certainly won’t forget that a few hours later she and I were dancing to some music coming either from the stereo or from the sky above.