GRILLING RIBS

"Dining is and always was a great artistic opportunity."
- Frank Lloyd Wright

My friend, Richard the Sage, has invited us over to dinner at his place. He’ll be grilling his famous ribs. Well, not his ribs. I imagine he’ll be keeping those. But he does have a way with ribs on the grill. I can attest to this personally as last summer Lucy and I had an opportunity to spend an evening at his dinner table feasting on ribs and some tasty but unnecessary side dishes (I say unnecessary because, once you have tasted Richard’s ribs, there is little reason to turn your taste buds to anything else on the table – except for, perhaps, the wine).

My mother is here visiting and so the Sage was kind enough to include her in the invitation. I have bragged to her about his ribs, explaining that she has a true gastronomic festival to look forward to, particularly since she is something of a gastronome herself. I had an email from Richard this afternoon asking me whether my mother has any particular food aversions he should be aware of. (My wife tells me that it is proper to ask such a question anytime you invite someone to dinner as food allergies are all too common these days.) I assured him that she, like everyone in my family, will eat most anything. We Behans are all enthusiastic eaters. We eat freely and we eat often. So far as I can remember, in my entire lifetime I cannot recall anyone in the family ever taking a bite of something, grabbing their throat and keeling over onto the floor.

I even eat sushi. I realize for some people the thought of raw fish is disgusting but I have always contended that most of the revulsion surrounding certain exotic foods is purely psychological and that most anyone could overcome the mental block with the help of a dollop or two of wasabi and a couple dozen hours on the couch of a good therapist. A glass of good sake can also be helpful (presuming there is such a thing as good sake). Perhaps the only food difficult for me to enjoy is the stuff they had the nerve to serve up in some of the London pubs we visited. I had so looked forward to experiencing pub food in England, but after three days of it we’d had enough. This is a nation that serves baked beans with scrambled eggs.

Food is an important part of a balanced diet.
- Fran Lebowitz

A few years ago a chef friend of mine prepared a fantastic multi-course meal for Lucy’s birthday. I had surprised her by inviting four or five couples over and having chef Walt show up with enough ingredients to satisfy a small city. During the salad course, Walt brought in plates of greens arranged around a certain fish. He wouldn’t tell us what it was until we had all tried it and expressed agreement that it was delicious. Then he went around the table asking everyone to guess what sort of fish we were eating. The fifth or sixth guess nailed it: eel. Smoked eel, actually. At that point a couple of our friends put down their forks and refused to take another bite. They loved it until they found out what it was.

Schizophrenia beats dining alone.
- Oscar Levant