Go Ask Alice...

I didn’t hear about Alice Waters until after I got to San Francisco. It was a little embarrassing at the time, but in retrospect, it seems appropriate. I wasn’t supposed to be dating, but anyway, there I was, talking with a girl I’d met...well...in a bar, and telling her about my crazy decision to move out to San Francisco (on a bus, with just a rucksack) to become a chef. She seemed impressed, and then said in that knowing mix of world weariness and mild condescension which is unique to big city folk, ‘Oh, you must have moved out here because of Alice.’ I didn’t know it yet, but she was right. My urge was to say ‘Of course’ for fear that a mere legal aide might realize she knew more about this mysterious and apparently important figure than an actual (if a bit naïve) aspiring chef, but (thank goodness) I was honest, and as a result she ended up loaning me a copy of the Chez Panisse Café cookbook.



By the time I actually met Alice Waters, briefly, a few years later, I was finally and well aware of her influence and symbolic sainthood as the de facto founder of ‘California Cuisine.’ I had also thought long and hard about what I would say when I finally met her. My opportunity came after having the honour of serving her a ‘Farmer’s Market’ dinner (five courses, each centered on the product of a single farm) with Eric and the rest of the Millennium crew. She and Cecelia Chiang (whom Alice has described as ‘the Julia Child of Chinese cuisine’) had attended the event as the guest of Millennium’s apparently well connected and always lovable owners (in addition to being the best possible advertising for the vegan diet), Anne and Larry Wheat. After the meal, Eric and I were ushered out to hold court at the table, but before I had a chance to dazzle her with my charm (or pester her with my shameless hero worship, whichever you prefer), she leaned in close with a conspiratorial smile and said ‘Slow Food. It started in Italy, we’re bringing it to California, look it up, read about it.’ I had finally met the inspirational queen of West Coast Cuisine, and she had high jacked my chance to praise her with a teaching moment.



To read about Alice Waters is probably not unlike reading about a Joan of Arc or a Mother Theresa. Her ability to stay ‘On Message’ in the numerous articles and books written by and about her is impressive. From the reader’s perspective, she seems to live the life of a food puritan, always knowing the provenance of every pear, the story of every stonefruit, the very chicken which begat the egg. She sets an example in her every action, or so it would seem. I am fascinated by the disconnect I seem to feel when examining such people; it’s almost as if it would be sacrilege to report on a shortcoming, because they are so important symbolically to the communities for whom they speak.



My first ambition was to be a preacher. I was raised in the Baptist church and I had an excellent pastor, Dr. Dick Maples: a wonderful teacher, a genuinely nice man and a good shepherd. The good Doctor’s charisma was buttressed by his knowledge and wit; some of the best comedy timing I’ve ever learned was in the Sunday morning sermons he delivered. Dr. Maples was also the man I went to in my teen years when I realized I was losing my faith. He was patient and did not judge me. He answered the questions with the best of his theology, pointing out the most positive parts of his faith, and often even changed the subject to the politics of the day, about which we were both pleased to discover that we shared many views. He didn’t push me or browbeat me; he just focused on the positive and tried to be a good example.



Chez Panisse was founded on the principle, inspired by a trip which Waters had taken in France, of serving only fresh, seasonal, local food, and nothing else. The menu was a fixed price, the staff was well paid, the space was crafted by artisans, and the food was prepared by hand. These days, we’ve all heard of such restaurants, or restaurants that have aspired to such goals, but at the time, it was a revolution. The once humble converted home in Berkeley still serves its fixed price dinner nightly in the downstairs dining room with its open kitchen and has even expanded to include an upstairs Café with a more diverse menu, and another stand up Cafe (Café Fanny) a few blocks away; all of which have stayed true to a vision of local, seasonal and organic foods.



But Alice’s Restaurant started as an idea not just to reinvent the restaurant industry (which it has), but to change the way people think about food, or about their relationship with food, with each other, and in actuality, with the planet itself. In fact, it is safe to say that if you have heard of organic food, Chez Panisse is a likely reason. It was not ground zero (but it was close) for the organic movement, environmentalism, or the fair trade movement or even for the sense of community awareness that typified the West Coast youth politics of the heady decade from which it sprang. But it was an institution that brought those philosophies together under one roof with an ambition rarely seen outside of a church, a nonprofit group, or a political party. As such, it did become ground zero for a retooling of the industry for which I have felt my calling: the art and lore of breaking bread, of life through food, of giving and sharing at the hearth and at the table.



Alice Waters is rarely described as a great businesswoman (it took seven years for the little idea to turn a profit, and even then it was under someone else’s hand) or even as a great chef, a title she herself has eschewed. In fact, she was once famously criticized by a prominent French chef who said, ‘That’s not cooking, it’s shopping,’ a quote I have heard her repeat as high praise. Even the night I met her, she was late for the dinner and even answered her cell phone during the meal, an irony not lost on us as Chez Panisse was also famous for being one of the first restaurants to require diners to turn off their cell phones. She is not a saint, as she has often been described, but a human, with all of the flaws which that condition entails. But in the same way Dr. Maples deftly steered the subject away from the Spanish Inquisition or the fate of Ghandi’s soul in our discussions, I rarely dwell on Alice’s shortcomings when I think about her importance as a symbol.



By living her principles and pursuing her dreams to the best of her ability, Alice has helped to create a movement that has gone from California Dreaming to the fastest growing sector of the food industry in North America, and is quietly but assuredly changing the world in the process. But even in recent interviews she has not once rested on her laurels. Her new projects include a foundation, a prison garden program and an idea inspired by driving by a public elementary school in her neighborhood called the Edible Schoolyard Project, which seeks to share her principles with a whole new generation of eaters through hands on involvement in the production of their own school lunches. If that won’t change the world as we know it, then I don’t know what will. Alice is not a perfect person, but she is a perfect inspiration.



Slow Food, a movement started in Italy in 1986 to protest the building of a McDonald’s at the base of the Spanish Steps in Rome, has grown to become an international advocate for traditional foodways and recipes, biodiversity through heirloom seeds and livestock varieties, organic and small production agriculture, even wine and cheese-making; or, in more general terms, an advocate for the preservation of the pleasure of taking our time and appreciating life, food, and the act of sharing. Instead of dividing its membership into producers and consumers, it uses the terms producers and co-producers, thus implicating all of us in the process of change. As she predicted when I met her, Alice Waters did bring Slow Food to the US; in fact, just this year she helped to coordinate the largest celebration of American food in history; her ‘Slow Food Nation’ event boasted an attendance of 50,000 people in downtown San Francisco around a victory garden in the Civic Center Plaza.



I had a chance to dine at the Café during my San Francisco years. It was a treat, so simple that at first glance it seemed almost unimportant; but under scrutiny revealed many truths: care, attention to detail, sincerity, honesty, belief in the product and its importance. A chicken dinner became a little prayer on a plate. Ultimately, I did not become a preacher, but I did follow my heart. I did listen to that still and quiet voice inside me that said, ‘go forth and do good works.’ I often ponder the nature of what it means to be good. I think, in my heart, it is to think in terms of the community over one’s self. It is to do what is best before what is easy. I never did become a preacher, just as most boys never become astronauts or firemen, but I did find my faith, and through the organic movement and our restaurant, my voice. As for Alice Waters, I mentioned that I had thought long and hard about what I would say when I finally met her. I would have said thank you.



On the inside flap of the Chez Panisse Café cookbook, Alice is quoted as saying: ‘[We had] an ideal: to create a community of friends, lovers, and relatives that spans generations and is in tune with the seasons, the land, and human appetites.’ That ‘delicious revolution’ sounds pretty good to me.