Nouvelle

[The most expensive meal of my life happened last night. As a consequence of his last job, John had acquired a substantial gift certificate to the French Laundry. We had planned to go on our four-year anniversary in April, but Violet called me up last weekend to say she had a 9:15 PM reservation for 4 on Monday, and would we like to join her and her companion? Well, since we knew we weren't assured of a reservation even if we did call the requisite two months ahead, we thought we'd better grab it. Besides, an evening out with Violet is always jolly and a little surreal.]

[We zoomed off in her deceptive yuppiemobile (though she lives in affluent Marin County, dresses like a Republican lawyer, and drives a German automobile, Violet is actually a socialist-feminist radical who attends the hippie-remnant New College law school.), singing along to the Go-Go's and Alison Moyet. We arrived early in chilly and gentrified Yountville, and were greeted with glasses of champagne and immediate seats. We were presented with an amazing menu of stupefyingly expensive prix fixe choices, and the food just started coming.]

[Besides the five tiny but exquisite courses we ordered, the kitchen kept sending out little amuses bouches like a savory cone filled with pureed salmon and creme fraiche, or a small, salty rectangle of sardine on a diminutive puddle of some sweet sauce. I'm going to try to chronicle what I had, just for my own rapidly receding memory:]

[Course 1: A "salad" of minuscule, diced potato, warm braised leeks, and some vinegary dressing. It came on the plate formed into a sort of cake, but I broke it apart with my fork, it formed a flavorful pile of yum that I guess could be called a salad.]

[Course 2: A bit of buttery white fish, with crispy edges, served on a couli of artichoke and, I think, shallot, and another lovely sauce.]

[Course 3: Violet and I shared a small saddle of lamb, very rare, over a dense, herbed sauce. There were quite a few slices, actually, but without anything else on the plate but little piles of six exotic SALTS (!), it still didn't look like a full meal.]

[Course four: A small (have I got the idea across that each of these courses were TINY?) smudge of Spanish cheese with a little crouton, and couli of red pepper.]

[Course five: Dessert, whimsically called "coffee and doughnuts." A cinnamon-sugar donut, with the donut hole placed on top like a stopper, next to a mug full of rich cappuccino ice cream topped with foam from an actual cappuccino.]

[We had free little "extras," breads and cookies and chocolates placed on the table, and about ten servers to handle the different courses, and Violet flirted shamelessly with the sommelier, and we drank too much expensive wine, and talked and ate and laughed for hours. I drove us home, bopping to the 80's CD John made for last month's holiday party, and stumbled into bed at 1:30.]

[Last Friday, John and I took Grandma to a much less expensive dinner in Sonoma, and she grimaced when she heard we were going to the French Laundry. "They don't serve a real meal there," she opined, digging into her meat-starch-veg. "You never get enough to feel satisfied." While I've enjoyed the art associated with preparing and eating, say, sushi, I can't really say I've ever had the full nouvelle experience before last night. Now I get it. Grandma's wrong. I'm still a Double-Double kid at heart, and I never would do it without outside funding of some sort, but...wow, it was good.

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