Restaurant le bijou pretentieux. Menu prix fixe. Tuesday,
September 5, 1995.
*** Appetizer ***
Salade de saison. Zen Arroyo Farm fiddlehead fern curls, dandelion greens,
four leaf clover, amanita mushrooms, and endive sprinked with rose petals
and nasturtiums, tossed with a summer
savory-tarragon-chervil-dill-rosemary-marjoram-cilantro-borage
raspberry-horseradish vinaigrette.
-or-
Turf and surf. A bed of warm Dar es Salaam queen-and-worker termite
thoraxes in a chocolate-habanero mole sauce, topped with a handful of
still-wriggling minnows freshly netted from our duck-pond out back.
-or-
Rouge et jaune, bleu et vert. A platter of Lake Ponchartrain crawfish and
smoked Santa Clara County banana slugs arranged en espadrille, with
blue-corn tortillas and a tub of drawn butter laced with wasabi.
-or-
Crispy whole Humboldt County spotted owl, skewered on Indonesian hardwood
spears, and grilled on a mesquite and thousand-year-old Humboldt redwood
fire, then stuffed with sauteed Tennessee River snail darter and served
with a small puddle of cocaine beurre-blanc on a faux-tigerskin platter,
finished with a light sprinkling of rhino horn and hot pepper spray.
*** Main Course ***
Road kill cassoulet. White beans stewed in Jack Daniels with chunks of
Ozark mountain possum lightly crushed by a 1977 red GMC pick-up truck
mingled with raccoon pureed by a 1985 Winnebago along Highway One south of
Pescadero, served with just a touch of andouille, and a duck confit made
with our very own mallards from the duck-pond out back.
-or-
*heartstopper special*
Noodles Cage. Three soba noodles swimming in a bowl of hand-churned barely
melted butter (from Maisie, our Sonoma County Fair blue ribbon Guernsey
cow--fed exclusively on a diet of organic oatmeal, lemongrass hay, and
sun-dried papaya), covered with a thin transparent "lens" (lentille du sel)
of recrystallized Great Salt Lake salt, with a single grilled shitake
mushroom, nicoise olive, and two flakes of grated daikon on top. The
waiter will gently tap the salt lens until it breaks (recording the sound
with a microphone hidden in the base of your table's candlestick holders),
allowing the olive, shitake and daikon to bathe briefly in the butter.
The recorded sound will be played back at extremely high volume at random
intervals during the meal (headphones provided by Le Stereo Shop, our tiny
audiophile emporium). Note: this dish will only be served to diners who
sit facing east.
-or-
Sole toxique. Fresh bay sole from our Chevron-by-the-bay fish farm in
lovely Richmond California with selenium cadmium beurre noire, dressed with
with capers and paper-thin ribbons of Burmese pastrami, and served on a bed
of Russian kale from the Chernobyl Cooperative, Ukraine.
-or-
Filet Mignon. Maisie stopped giving milk. Our chef suggests this dish be
cooked very rare.
*** Dessert ***
Blackberries zodiac. Fresh, dew-laden Mendocino blackberries, plucked by
14-year-old blonde California Unitarian virgins, arranged on the platter to
mirror the constellations of the zodiac as visible from Willits California
at 9:07 PM, April 21, 1961 (birthplace and time of your waiter, Sam, whose
home address and phone number is written on a note on Zig-Zag paper stuck
under the platter), and covered in Lhasa-yak cream lightly dusted with
nutmeg.
-or-
Martyred pears. Two crimson pears, lightly flayed, poached in calvados,
shot with seven bitter chocolate arrows, and served en flambee on a
cruciform platter.
-or-
Assorted cheeses, kumquat, loquat, star fruit, cherimoya, granny smith apples.
----
Muslin-filtered kona coffee hand-picked by second generation Honshu-dialect
speaking Japanese-Americans and dried on tatami mats, with just a hint of
cardamon, galangal, and benzedrine.
----
107 year-old Inverness gorse-flower brandy served in a Czechoslovakian
crystal snifter, gently heated with billows of warm air fanned from our
grill by palm-frond bearing sous-chefs.
*************
Recycled water, smuggled out of Biosphere II, served upon request.
Bread provided by Raisin' Hell, our own petite bakery, which uses only
natural and organic ingredients whenever possible. Stop by sometime for a
fresh loaf of wood-fire baked bread; our famous organic oatmeal, lemongrass
and sun-dried papaya granola; brioche, scones, muffins, and shortbread.
Tableware from Plate Tectonics.
Palm-fronds courtesy of Raffia 'n' Things, our own little import house.
And don't forget to visit the Zen Arroyo Farm Unitarian life-enhancement
retreat.
Note: Our kitchen is supervised by a monitor from the ASPCA. No animals
were harmed during the preparation of these dishes.
[by Jonathan Cohen]
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