Chapter Twenty: The Perfect Meal

1. PLANNING THE MENU

A neighboring cherry tree:
the source of Pollan's dessert.

"Perfect?! A dangerous boast, you must be thinking. And, in truth, there was much about my personally hunted, gathered, and grown meal that tended more toward the ridiculous than the sublime." From grit to over-cooked food, and toxic salt, Pollans guests didn't boast that this meal from nature was at all perfect. The Wild Californian pig was the main course. Pollan set himself six guidelines for the meal that went along the lines of he must hunt, gather, grow and cook everything by himself. Each edible kingdom must be represented. No money should be spent (items in the pantry could be used); all food items should be fresh and in season. Pollan had troubles with both the mineral, salt, part, and the seasonality rule. His experience hunting sea-dwelling abalone was also a failure. His meal also included some pasta and pate by Angelo, as well as a braised pork leg and brined loin. An egg fettuccine, wild east bay yeast levanin, garden salad, cherry galette, chamomile tea and some of Angelo's wine topped off his meal. "Reversing the historical trajectory of human eating, for this meal the forest would be feeding us again."
2. IN THE KITCHEN
Pollan continued to catch yeast (a rather interesting process that involved leaving out a tray of water and flour and waiting for bubbles and a beer-like smell) and making broth for the meal. At Angelo's, he had his first taste of the pig, something he was actually able to eat, and he liked it. Pollan's saturday night was quite packed with things to cook for his dinner at seven. His day seemed to go by less than perfect, and he often found himself questioning his idea to make this extremely ambitious meal all by himself. But her realized he needed to fulfill this; to show off, to honor his guests and over everything, ". . .to honor the things we're eating, the animals and plants and fungi that have been sacrificed to gratify our needs and desires, as well as the places and the people that produced them." Suddenly, Pollan felt alot more satisfied.
3. AT THE TABLE
As Pollan (with Angelo's help) finished his meal, his guests, most of them strangers, were getting along quite well. A simple toast started the dinner, and Pollan thanked everyone for his or her contribution. His gratitude towards the foods was not voiced, for fear that it would come off too corny and ruin the meal. But much of the dinner conversation was about food: from specific plants, to animal species and even places to find fungi. "It occured to me that the making of this meal, by acquainting me with these particular people, landscapes, and species, had succeeded in attaching me to Northern California, its nature and its culture both, as nothing I'd done before or since. Eating's not a bad way to get to know a place." Welcome to the neighborhood!
Pollan ends his book by reflecting upon the two ends of the omnivore's spectrum: the fast food, and the ritual meal he just ate. "Let us stipulate that both of these meals are equally unreal and equally unsustainable." We must find a balance, somewhere in the local farm and organic way of life. Pollan wants us to learn what we are eating, and go beyond. "What it is we're eating. Where it came from. How it found its way to our table. And what, in a true accounting, it really cost."
And so it is, the omnivore's dilemma!