Category Archives: BITS AND PIECES

Legacy: Alti Gusti, Petaling Jaya

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d’Alti Gusti

They say you never forget your first time. Having done very little research, I remember not being completely prepared for the formality of the private dinner at d’Alti Gusti (“AG”). I was dressed in a nondescript long-sleeved black sheath and nude pumps, wanting to remain invisible and unnoticed. We were a table of six, and it was the week of my birthday in 2022. I was the last to arrive, and I scampered to the seat at the farthest end of the table, my back to the kitchen. My napkin was quickly placed on my lap. Everything moved like clockwork. The chef and owner, Simon Phillips, quietly positioned himself at the head of the table, and silence fell as everyone looked towards him.

“Welcome to AG,” he smiled, a twinkle in his eye.

What followed was a hypnotic narration by Simon of parts of Virgil’s epic poem, the Aeneid, followed by the presentation of visually stunning dishes representing those verses. I was left breathless, in part by the captivating storytelling, and in part by the exquisite dishes that were created to match the beautiful, poignant, triumphant verses of the Aeneid. We need to acknowledge the beauty of language, art and literature and its impact on humanity; of how our bodies literally ache to see, hear, feel these things, more so in this world of temporary and instantaneous gratification, shrouded in materialism and superficiality. This was one of the greatest masterpieces of Latin literature, written more than 2000 years ago, and AG found a way of respectfully incorporating it into an uncommon but deserving medium, ie. food. I left that evening, belly full, my soul enriched.

AG is a private dining space offering more than just fine Italian cuisine. For the guest, it is a holistic experience; from the moment you enter, you immediately feel the warmth of service, heavenly aromas wafting from the open kitchen while the chefs quietly but purposefully move around the stations. I’ve always said this, and I’ll stand by this – AG feels like home.

What sets AG apart from many restaurants is originality – recipes are created from scratch, guided by the fundamentals. The process requires a sound knowledge of ingredients, techniques and flavours, and experience to know how much to use and when to stop. Restraint.

In recent months, I have had the privilege of watching Simon and his team of chefs, Jonathan and Alvord, conceptualise menus and create dishes. I sit at the side with a cup of coffee and absorb the lessons he imparts, his face stern, as he challenges his boys to attain the high bar set for them. There is an urgency in his voice, at times frustration, and I think I understand why. This has been Simon’s personal endeavour, and one which he has been completely immersed in for the last four years, heart and soul. “What is it that I have built here? What would happen when I am no longer here?” Aside from the huge responsibility of ensuring the continuity of AG for his team, there are also those questions that keep many of us up at night.

What will I leave behind? And will it matter?

How will I be remembered?

How soon will I be forgotten?

AG is Simon’s legacy.

More I would, but Death invades me, Death is now a welcome guest. When I am laid in earth, may my wrongs create no trouble in thy breast. Remember me! but ah! forget my fate. – Dido and Aeneas/Purcell from Aeneid/Virgil

A couple of years on from my first dinner at AG, we discussed this verse over many, many glasses of whisky, in the dead of the night, oblivious of time, our conversations a desperate attempt to establish our significance as microcosms in this universe. Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas’s haunting melody played in the background. And we pondered on the words and the depth of emotion in that plea. Remember me.

It was impossible not to weep.

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It has been more than 10 years since my last post, and I often ask myself why I bother to keep this website alive. Websites cost money. I look at it, a shell of its former glory devoid of former widgets and links; what remains is only the prose. My life story for 7 years, covered in cobwebs.

And of course I know the reason why I haven’t given up on A Whiff of Lemongrass. I’ve always struggled to express myself fully in person. The words are always in my head, but there is an internal turmoil. What if the intended recipient isn’t receptive to what I have to say? What if I say too much and bore them? What if? What if? What if?

So I write. It becomes an expulsion of raw unfiltered emotions. AWOL is my living legacy. Most of the restaurants listed here have ceased to exist, but the words, the stories, the joy and tears, significant and trivial, they remain.

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Alti Gusti,
8, Jalan 21/7,
Sea Park,
46300 Petaling Jaya

altigusti.com

Meeting Elena Arzak

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The photographs from 2009 lacked the withered, yellowed appearance that one would expect of old photos.  There was no mold, no dust, no opportunity to romanticize the experience of flicking through the pictures and feeling the  brittle plastic sheet from the photo album rustle beneath my fingers.  In this decade, photographs are merely a collection of millions of pixels without the benefit of exposure to light or dust.  There is no burning of pictures to exorcise memories; you merely hit the delete button and everything is gone.

I pressed the right arrow key over and over and over again, each tap of the key hitting a different nerve within my body, an ache despite the lack of physical contact other than my index finger tap tap tapping on the arrow key as picture after picture from another time appear on my 15-inch monitor.

There are no pictures of our meal at Arzak in 2009.

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We were staying at a B&B in San Sebastián which we eventually discovered was owned by a rather reputable restaurateur in the town.  We didn’t know any Spanish, and he and his employees knew little English, but like love and music, the love of food formed that shaky bridge of understanding.

Arzak was fully booked, but the B&B owner managed to get us a table one sunny afternoon. Elena Arzak personally greeted us and led us to our table beside the kitchen.  After spending some time getting to know us, she disappeared into the kitchen.  What eventually came out was food that was visually magnificent with unexpected flavours and surprising textures.  I don’t have the autographed menu with me anymore, nor do I have any pictures thanks to a strict ruling at the restaurant with respect to the photographing of food, but how can I forget the fresh, juicy mussels with rice vinegar, or the mushroom popcorn, or the lotus root with a mousse made of fish, or the figs, jam-like in texture with caramelised bits and foie gras that melts in the mouth, or the lobster served with crispy potato with an unusual texture, or the poached egg with sesame and seaweed, or the monkfish with olive oil in spherical shapes that had the appearance of bronze metallic paint, or onions cooked and flattened to resemble paper which was then painted on, or pigeon with silver, blue potato juice in blue globes, or strawberry soup and orange with red wine and sesame sugar.  The images and flavours are etched in my memory.  “Why are you smiling?” he asks.  “Because I’m happy,” I reply.

If there is one meal in my life that I never want to forget, this is it.

As we prepared to leave the restaurant, Elena Arzak presented me with an autographed copy of her book.  “You may not understand the language,” she smiled, “but it is a small gift to you so that you remember your time at Arzak.”  I wondered why she would give me a gift  as precious as this.

Her one message to me which I remember to this day is this: “There are people who save up a whole year to be able to dine at our restaurant, and there are people who can afford to dine daily here.  We recognise that, and we treat everyone equally.”

******

We walked along the sandy beach of San Sebastian, the breeze gently lifting the frills of my blouse.  I watched the children build sandcastles and laughed at the faith of fools and a misplaced sense of confidence in an eternity that is so easily washed away with  the rising tides.

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A picture of Elena’s father, Juan Mari Arzak, and Elena’s autograph.

 Note: In 2012, Elena Arzak was voted The Veuve Clicquot World Best Female Chef.  The restaurant is currently ranked 8th in the world on the San Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.

Arzak
Av del Alcalde José Elosegi, 273, 20015 Donostia-San Sebastián,
Spain.
Website

The birthday cake that could

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I am an accountant, and to a certain extent, I fit the stereotype associated with accountants.  I am an introvert and I am risk-averse.  Change is something that I view as an absolute last resort.  At this point, my friend, Fatboybakes, will probably sputter out an incoherent string of words that will probably include “guffaw”, “roll eyes” and “delusional”.  Public events scare me.  If you don’t want someone to be your friend on Facebook, tell them you’re an accountant.  *crickets*  Oh look, there’s Jules…I haven’t seen him in awhile…ta!  It’s worse if you’re an auditor.  You may as well whip out your mobile phone and exclaim, “Oh dear, my boss is trying to reach me!”, then seek out the darkest corner and play Candy Crush alone for the rest of the evening.

When you’re forced into a situation of change, you have no choice but to swim.  What used to scare you at night now scares you even when your eyes are wide open.  Everything becomes amplified. and soon you become your worst nightmare and you begin to do things that are destructive because you think that when you’re hurting, the whole world will hurt with you.

The fact is, and this is clearly evident in the current times, people have short term memories and what may be sensational this hour will be old news in the next.  We live in a disposable world.  People, objects, memories…they’re all replaceable.

The remedy?  Embrace the change, acknowledge the cause and problem, and fill that void.

To put things simply, I cooked.  I cooked ferociously, day and night, and even when there was no one to eat the food, I’d still cook.

When Bongo Lee told me that she was throwing a birthday party for her brother, I offered to bake the birthday cake.  But here’s the thing – my track record, as far as baking is concerned, is pitiful.  If you have been a reader of this blog since its inception, you may have laughed at some of my struggles (links HERE and HERE).  The oven has always been my enemy.  Nevertheless, I wanted to do this.  There was no back-up plan.

I’d been meaning to try the butter cake recipe from WendyinKK’s blog, named after her friend, Mrs Ng SK, who gave her the recipe, so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for me to try it.  It was past midnight when I took out my pans, feeling somewhat intoxicated from the drinks and hokkien mee that I had consumed earlier at The Moon Bar, and I became Nigella, boobs and all.  Adamant that this would not be a repeat performance of my 2008 baking disasters, I followed the recipe to a T.  A couple of hours later, I was staring at my masterpiece.  It was a work of art.

The next morning, I had bigger ambitions for the cake.  I had this sudden brilliant idea that I would sandwich the cake with lemon curd, then coat it completely with lemon butter cream.  My only problem was that the existing cake was too low to be sliced horizontally into two.  Solution?  Bake another cake for the top half.  So with barely a couple of hours to go before my lunch appointment with my parents, I set out to bake the second cake.  This time, Nigella did not materialise.  I was Usain Bolt as I moved at lightning speed.  In a little over an hour, my cake was done.  It was another masterpiece.  I set out to my parents’ place, pleased as Punch.

When I got home after lunch, I decided to slowly work on the construction of the square cake.  After whipping the lemon butter cream and preparing the lemon curd, I assembled the cake.  It looked somewhat lopsided, but I figured that the butter cream frosting would take care of that.  So I painstakingly coated it, layer after layer, with the frosting.  I was meticulous, adding a millimetre here and a millimetre there, but after the umpteeth time of frosting, chucking it in the fridge, then frosting it again, I realised that the cake was destined to look like an amateurish effort at best.

I looked at it sadly and made the executive decision not to serve it at the birthday party.

I am an accountant, and I have this idea of perfection, the devil being in the details and all, and I thought it an abomination to serve something so imperfect to people I barely knew.  I wanted to disappear into a corner and play Candy Crush.

It wasn’t just a cake to me.  It was a projection of the unspoken insecurities and a desire for affirmation.

A couple of days later, I served it to some friends.  They tried it and said that it was good.  I got the affirmation I wanted, but I realised that I was doing it the wrong way.

I am studying the book of Jeremiah now and the following verses in Jeremiah 29 have been seared into my heart –

11 “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.  12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.  13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Maybe there is hope for me yet.

Recipe HERE.

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