Reflections of February 2007

Arriving at Cafe Drake on gossamer wings, Inspiration hails from many different locales, certainly not limited to the world of food and drink but often finding reinterpretation therein. To summarize less floridly, kitchen fires are frequently ignited here by outside sources: a painting, a late-night film on Turner Classic Movies, a song or a book. Lately our bedside companion The Unexpurgated Diaries of Cecil Beaton, 1970-1980 has fueled many a thought for entertaining, culled from Beaton's descriptions of meals with both high royalty and bottoming-out rock stars. Far juicier than the previous volume of 1960s entries, the last in the series, ending two days prior to Beaton's death, pays special attention to the good food and bad manners of many a dinner party and invigorates with its bitchiness, rarefied tastes and surprising naive enthusiasms. Samples of genius include a jotted remark on unwanted houseguests ("People take up space in houses disproportionate to their actual size"), retorts to well-meaning acquaintances suggesting the 70-year old bon vivant give up smoking for health reasons ("Really, causing ill health? You must be a dear and send me literature on the subject. I'd be interested to see that the research reveals.") and a barb from a petty former friend ("Cecil never arrived at a party without making you feel he'd just left one far better"). Or most poignantly, "...we are always appreciating things too late, belatedly seizing the quality of an experience or a person, as though they had to grow in us with the years before any fruit of meaning could appear."


A common contemporary disorder we've followed for sometime can be described in one hyphenated phrase: over-subscribed. No we're not referring to triple-booked Saturdays or days too rife with plans to fit into your Moleskin planner, but instead, a magazine emergency. Periodicals Addiction is right up there on the List of Dysfunctions at Cafe Drake with Bloody Marys before Breakfast, and though it's gonna hurt, take some tough love from us and cut your subscription list in half if you hope to ever do anything besides turn glossy pages. The good news is re: this site's concerns, you can cancel Gourmet and Bon Apetite and Everyday Food and Everyday with Rachel Ray etc in favor of two gustatory monthlies only: Wine Spectator and Food & Wine. The first is invaluable if you de-cork even once a week, the latter has become a sort of guidepost for all lesser copycat publications. Just as it's always exhilarating to see a horse emerge from the crowd and run on its thoroughbred legs, Food & Wine has managed to transform itself into a Bible of food, drink and entertaining that leaves the pack in dust. Mouth-watering recipes, features on emerging and celebrated chefs and creative photography make this essential reading.