There is another thread in this forum about filet mignon.
I made the following post in that thread:
My post was #52.
What is the best meal you have ever had?
Where did you have it and was it cooked by a professional chef or by a spouse or someone else?
All the best meals I’ve ever had were cooked by a professional chef or a spouse (unfortunately, never my spouse).
Damn! I sure do wish I had learned how to cook. I’m so sad when I order an expensive steak and find that I don’t like the way it was prepared. But what can I do when that happens? It must mean that some professional chefs are not nearly as good as other professional chefs. I don’t think that is any reason for me to send it back. What would I say? “You hired a bum chef”? IMHO, that is just not appropriate and would likely not fly.
I hadn’t eaten all day and I was a giant ball of anxiety from work. Went to a bar with a friend, ordered a cheddar jalapeno burger with fries and a gigantic Smithwick’s. My mood delta from that one meal was epic. I’ll never forget it.
I once had a twelve course meal at a Moroccan restaurant. We sat on cushions on the floor and ate with our hands. It was delicious and one of the more memorable dinners of my life.
I have heard of such things before and always wanted to try it. But I’ve never known a lady who was willing to do this with me.
I just can’t imagine trying such a thing alone. It seems very clear to me this kind of experience must be shared with someone I felt strongly about and it just wouldn’t make sense to me to do this by myself. I’m certain that I would just feel extremely “strange” if I did this alone. I know this doesn’t sound right. But I don’t know how to explain it.
Can anyone explain how I could do this solo and not feel like everyone in the room would think I’ve been stood up?
I don’t know if it was the best but it’s stuck with me the longest. I just can’t find anything close in the states. When I was stationed in Germany I discovered how much I loved Jaeger Schnitzel. I had the opportunity to go back for training about 15 years ago. A bunch of us went to this tourist trappy German restaurant in Rudesheim. Amazing Jaeger Schnitzel. I really hope I can find something as good here.
It was probably a meal we had at the Inn Little Washington, it’s been years, and I don’t remember the menu (we have it saved somewhere), but the service was amazing and I remember kind of floating home after it.
At the restaurant I went to, the twelve course meal required a group of a minimum size, I thing there were six or eight of us. The food was served family style in large serving dishes, and every body helped them selves. I remember a large meat pie, and I asked the waiter how to eat it without utensils. He took my hand with a smile, and jammed it right into the pastry. Everything was like that, very enjoyable.
The meunier amandine at Irene’s in New Orleans. The fish that day was puppydrum, which has a lemony flavor that elevated an already stunning dish. I literally hadn’t known food could taste so good.
I was later gratified to find out that Julia Child had the same experience with the same dish (though at a different restaurant).
What kayaker said. There are a lot that stand out, though. Like the meal at one of Todd English’s restaurants that featured wild boar and ended with a flight of cognacs that are way out of my price range. Or the time we had dinner with Steve Wynn at Sinatra. Or the time we had ceviche with Qadgop and wife. Or the last time we were at Delmonico and I had a halibut steak that was damn near transcendent. Or…you get the drift. The only common denominator was that they were with my wife, which makes any meal special. Particularly if she cooked it.
Shortly after I was married, the decision was made by my grandmother and her surviving siblings and in-laws to sell the family farm. We had one last family gathering at the old farm house. The older ladies cooked all day, making fabulous, complicated, food with on-site fresh ingredients. We had chicken and dumplings, fresh green beans, scratch-made yeast rolls, and rhubarb pie. And all of this was prepared on an old wood-fired stove.
My new husband’s comment “Wow, I didn’t know food could be this good.” That was pretty much the consensus around the table. Those 80-year old ladies who had cooked since childhood were wizards in the kitchen.
Multiple meals at a little beachside shack on Tybee Island. At the time, I lived on the island, worked weird hours, and enjoyed going barefoot everywhere. (My regular eateries let me keep some flip flops behind the bar, so I could comply with the shoes and shirts rules. I usually didn’t have to borrow a shirt…:D) At any rate, I’d get off work by 10 or 11 am, go home to change clothes and kick off my shoes, and go wandering. Many afternoons, I’d finally meander over to that little shack, and ask the chef/owner to surprise me. Those meals were astonishing. The freshest seafood, with a cold beer and some Caribbean soul, and usually some interesting company for additional seasoning. And I’d put my shoes back in their cubby on the way out, and get a big bear hug from the owner, and go walkabout until the next time.
