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What would be your last meal on earth? What would be
the setting? What would you drink? Would there be music? Who would be your
dining companions? Who would prepare it? Melanie Dunea posed these questions to 50 renowned
chefs from around the world. Their answers are the subject of her 2007 book
My Last Supper.
Each chef contributed a recipe, but My Last
Supper is more coffee-table book than
cookbook. Their answers range from the exotic to comfort classics.
Full-page photos of each chef, part of what makes the book fun, range from
aesthetically beautiful (iconic chef Jacques Pepin amid a food still life)
to whimsical (Lidia Bastianich, chef/owner of restaurants in New York City
and Kansas City and star of a PBS cooking series, wearing an Easter bonnet
of pasta and clamshells) to risqué. Not surprisingly, the
risqué photo’s subject is Anthony Bourdain (author and host of
the Travel Channel’s No Reservations). Bourdain, who wrote the book’s introduction,
stands naked in front of a brick wall, cigarette in one hand, holding an
immense raw beef bone between his legs with the other. He comments,
“It’s probably not wise to make career decisions after four
shots of tequila.”
“Chefs have been playing the ‘My Last
Supper’ game in one form or another since humans first gathered round
the flames to cook,” he says. “Someone always piped up:
‘If you were to die tomorrow, what single dish, what one mouthful of
food from anywhere in the world or anytime in your life, would you choose
to be your last?’ ”
For four of Springfield’s most distinguished
chefs, the food itself is important, but equally so are the people with
whom they’d share it. David Radwine, general manager of the Sangamo Club,
would like to revisit his roots in Taylorville:
“My guests would include family, past and
present, and several very close friends,” he says. “We’d
start with my mother’s chopped liver and rye bread, smoked oysters,
all washed down with V8, served in the living room at my childhood home in
Taylorville.
“Then we’d have dinner at the now defunct
One Mile Inn, starting with Angelina Doleman’s iceberg-lettuce salad
with slivers of raw onion, dressed with oil and vinegar. There’d be
platters of fried chicken, homemade ravioli, and spaghetti. Kay Young would
provide a platter of thickly sliced prime ribs of beef. Beer on tap would
be served in frozen frosty heavy glass steins.
“Then it’d be on to Manner’s Park
for an after-dinner outdoor concert of the Taylorville muni band, under the direction of Ron
Lindvahl. Dessert
would be ice-cream cones enjoyed in our lawn chairs under the
stars.”
Michael Higgins, chef/owner of Maldaner’s, is
originally from northern California and would return there for his final
meal. Friends, family, and “12 of my disciples,” he jokes,
“would gather around a long table with a view of the Russian River
where it flows into the Pacific. “We’d catch a few waves
first,” says the former surfer, “and then start the meal with
oysters. Next we’d have bouillabaisse made by my father. It’s
what I always had for my birthday when I was growing up.”
Bouillabaisse is a classic Provençal saffron-flavored
fish-and-shellfish stew.
Music? “Anything, really, as long it’s
not classical,” Higgins says. “Classical music is bad for
digestion.” He’d like lots of wine, including some bottles of
first-growth Bordeaux “even though it wouldn’t really go with
the bouillabaisse.”
Higgins is most passionate about his final dessert:
It has to be pie. “I really love pie,” he says, “For my
last meal I want pie made by whoever can make the best homemade pie. I
don’t care what the filling is, but the crust can’t be made
with Crisco. It has to be made with butter and lard. If it’s not a
great pie, it won’t be my last meal.”
Patrick Groth, master baker, chef, and owner of
Incredibly Delicious, says it’s challenging to come up with answers
about his last meal “because I have so many people I love to share
life with. Over the past several years we’ve hosted dinner here
almost every Saturday night with a group of friends. They have a very big
place in my heart. Our friends bring their kids, and the kids help finish
the dinner — we have a good time.”
Groth wants his last meal to be highlights from
those warm and wonderful Saturday-night suppers that he, wife Bitsy, and
their three children have shared with their friends: “My meal would
consist of braised [beef] short ribs by Mary Cay McCabe; mashed potatoes by
Michael Higgins; braised carrots with walnuts and thyme by Nancy Fuchs; haricots verts, baby green
beans, grown by JoAnn’e Glatfelter; country French bread by me;
seasonal tomato and mixed-green salad by my sons, Samuel, 7, and Isaac, 4;
and cherry pie by Della Fuchs. The food would be good; however, it would be
better because it was made by people who love me. That’s what really
separates good food from a great dining experience — if you’re
loved by who’s making your food.”
“We’d dine here in the salon, the large
room in the southeast corner [Incredibly Delicious is located in the
incredibly beautiful, historic Weber Mansion] and drink lots of
fresh-squeezed lemonade and iced tea, and Jane Hartman would play the
piano.”
Stephane Perrin is Springfield’s very own
French chef. He’s worked in several local restaurants and is
currently the chef de cuisine at Sebastian’s. Perrin is a native of
Normandy, a region on France’s western coast whose culinary
specialties include seafood, apples, crème fraîche, and
Calvados, an apple brandy. (Any dish described as à la normande is made
with apples, cream, and Calvados.) For Perrin, like the other Springfield chefs, the
food is inextricably intertwined with the folks who would make and partake
of it: “The people I’d be dining with are actually more
important than the meal itself and would determine what the meal would be.
“I’d have dinner with my wife, my
brother, my sister, my best friend, and their families. Can’t forget
Mom. The place would be at my best friend’s house in Normandy, and
we’d all participate in the preparation. Drinks would start with
Ricard [an anise-flavored aperitif from southern France] and end with
Calvados and coffee. “The music would be the song
‘Jean-Louis’ by Yves Jamait. The refrain goes something like
this: ‘We talk, we talk, but it’s getting late. The end of the
world is near, and we have nothing to drink.’
“The meal would consist of goodies from home: tripes à la mode de Caen [the most renowned dish of Caen, one of the largest cities in
Normandy]; some fresh fish from the Channel with crème
fraîche, potatoes, and fresh baguettes to soak up the sauce; cheeses
from home — Livarot, Camembert au lait
cru, and Pont l’Eveque.
“That’s it. The food is simple, but the
people and place do it for me. Most of the meals I remember have a why or a
who attached to them, not a menu.”
Contact Julianne Glatz at realcuisine@insightbb.com.
This article appears in Feb 21-27, 2008.
