A Modest Meal

It is said that Scientology was started after a wager made by Isaac Asimov to L. Ron Hubbard that the latter could not start a religion. It is said that a similar wager led to the creation of the restaurant I ate at tonight. It is uncertain whether it was Musk and Batali or Zuckerberg and Marco Pierre White, and one could never tell, for the kitchen was most certainly closed to prying eyes, but it was the same sort of combination of derring-do and disregard that led to the existence of Swift’s.

It was a modest proposal, you see, to serve the unthinkable at this thought experiment come to life, but there I sat just hours ago. Tim Curry never knew such anticipation. It’s said that the chef’s tasting menu at Swift’s was the last thing Tony Bourdain ate before he hanged himself.

Swift’s is on a boat, adrift in international waters. It flies no flag. It is likely armed. Guests are flown in on helicopters. The trip took two hours from Cape Town for me. Devices are politely confiscated before one departs. Two hours is a long time to anticipate, as you watch the sun go down on the endless ocean.

People talked on the ride, of course, the twelve of us seated among the rich mahogany and supple leather interior that lets you know you’re in for a real treat. No one was wearing a tuxedo, but it wouldn’t have been out of place. A lot of them drank. Some of them drank a lot. They talked about everything but the food.

It’s hard to say what the boat looks like, but it’s got a helipad and the dining room could comfortably seat at least two dozen. Plus the kitchen. It’s not small. It is exceedingly well appointed. The maitre’d is out of central casting, beyond knowledgeable about everyone’s preferences. Even me, who had done nothing more than accept an invitation from a man who had read a review I’d written. He thought I was the kind of guy who’d appreciate it. Was he right? Who knows? He wasn’t even coming. He just wanted to hear my take, voyeuristic fuck.

I visited the head immediately. It was larger than would be expected. The sink was a trough, a little incongruous, and there were two attendants. It all made sense. We’d all heard the rumors of tears and refusals and people getting sick. We heard they were escorted off to another part of the ship for vegetarian sushi. I guess a lot of the freakouts happened in here. The attendants looked like former Spetznaz.

The table settings clearly cost as much as a decent BMW. The napkins had the date on them. You were encouraged to take them home. The table is, of course, round and the art on the walls is beyond impressive. Vermeer was conspicuously absent, and I thought it was evidence that some things are beyond reach no matter how much money you had. An ill-timed joke to that effect assured me that the Vermeer had merely been rotated out as the art on the walls was in a constant state of flux. Silly me.

The headwaiter was perfect. Some sort of French purebred designed to do nothing but fawn intelligently about every detail, somehow obsequious and condescending at once. It was quite a performance. He explained that the first course would be ceviche. We were all served at once.

You know going into it, obviously. You do your research. You know ahead of time that babies taste like fish, but I promise you that you will be wholly unprepared for the actual experience of eating one. He said they were bathed in limes from Madagascar, I think. Sea salt from some ancient Sicilian bay. There was cilantro on top. I can’t describe it, really. It truly is one of those things you have to do for yourself. It changes you, staring at the eclipse like that.

It was twelve courses. Starting with the little ones and getting progressively older. As they grow they get less tender, cooking methods need to be slower and wetter. Sous vide featured heavily at the end. They don’t tell you much about the meat. I’m not sure it matters. The real emphasis is on the other ingredients, as if the saffron picked by monkeys is the real exotica.

There was wine for every course. I don’t drink but I tasted each glass with a bite. It worked. The Sommelier made the headwaiter look like a simpleton. If you particularly liked a certain vintage he could show you on google maps which hillside it had grown on, how the wind from the sea to the west crested just so over the hills and brought forth those flavors in the grapes. It could almost make you forget. You weren’t encouraged to drink all twelve glasses of wine, but many did. It could almost make you forget.

It was sublime, all of it. The rib roast and the tender cuts and the stringy bits in the stew that showed up somewhere down the line. Every dish a miniature symphony of dedication to the craft. People didn’t talk much after the first course arrived, and they arrived quickly after that. It seemed that the staff didn’t want us spending too much time between courses thinking about things. We all made it through. Wasn’t that the challenge, though, after paying this much?

No dessert. How could there be? Maybe it would be funny to serve Neapolitan ice cream. Maybe it would be obscene. It was a joke, right? Swift’s modest proposal? He didn’t mean that? How did we get here? We were encouraged to enjoy cigars and brandy but by the end of the meal the mood had changed. A short discussion and we were able to get them to agree to take us back 20 minutes early. Two hours of silent flight followed.

I’m not going to write to the guy who paid for my meal. I won’t grant him the pornography he wants. I couldn’t anyway. I’m guessing you can’t really explain what a murder is like either. Maybe you can, I’m not that good a writer. I’m sending this to you, to you alone. Do with it what you will. I won’t be around to explain. My bedsheets are not nearly the threadcount of the napkins at Swift’s but they’ll do.