Menu Lyracism

Brandade puffs with piperade and nicoise olives

Smoked salmon with korozott on rye

Vichyssoise with fois gras, lardons and white truffle

Tai snapper with romanesco puree, bagna cauda, puntarella and tapenade

Rabbit paprikas with savoy cabbage dumplings, spaetle and winter vegetables

Lamb chops with marcona almond romesco, papas bravas and long cooked romanos

Toasted almond panna cotta with saba and adriatic figs

Tarte au chocolate with bosc pear and poire williams caramel

These are some of the menu items I present to clients. They are the items that warrant the most questions, due to the abundance of foreign words and obscure produce varietals in their titles. Spell check doesn't like 20 of the words. Despite the fact that none of my customers-- most of whom are savvy diners-- have known what korozott or bagna cauda are, I still refuse to translate them within the context of my menu. A "Hungarian dip of chevre, farmer's cheese, cream cheese, paprika, caraway and shallot" it too long to write out, but korozott is what it is because of all these things together. I will not write cheese-paprika dip, because even my mind wanders off into plebeian locales with that one (made with velveeta... served on wonderbread... I just don't know...) In fact, it takes everything in me to not write that it is served on not just any rye bread, but on Anna's Daughter's Rye Bread. 

And bagna cauda, an Italian dipping sauce, is made of anchovies and garlic slow-cooked in extra virgin olive oil. If I wrote "anchovy-garlic sauce," I don't think most of my clients would even bring it up, due to the fact that most people in the U.S. need to be coddled and convinced into eating the little fish. But the name bagna cauda has promise, perhaps because it originates from the boot's revered gastronomy or because the translation means "hot bath" (for crudite) or because when they ask me, I get to insert my disclaimer, "But really, the anchovy is very subtle, lending just a savory quality... In truth, I don't love the taste of anchovy myself.

Part of the reason I write my menus the way I do is to show that I am knowledgeable. My clients are enlisting "an expert". The languages I employ convey my culinary palette and palate, and the fact that I use heirloom vegetable names or include the names of farmers conveys how important the quality and ethics of my ingredients are to me. Finally, I love the conversations that these menus initiate. I get so excited talking about food and sharing a little bit of what I do and love. And I love making other people more knowledgeable about what they're eating through what they initially read. I put as much time into the linguistics structure of a menu item as I do into the structure of a line of poetry.