The food & art of an artichoke

I love being a food essayist, and especially like it when I’m asked to read my essays aloud.

This happened recently when WAMC, Northeast Public Radio, invited me to be part of a series of broadcasts entitled Mixed Ingredients, which was made possible through the support of the New York Council for the Humanities.

Below is the essay I offered. If you prefer, you can hear it for yourself and listen to the other contributors’ works too. I begin by saying:

Art and design sell everything we touch.

We are delighted by the curve of a wine glass and the innovative artistry of a wine label.

Lavish sums are spent not only on what food goes on a restaurant plate, but on the plate itself, perhaps a lovely cobalt blue glass plate on which to serve the rosy pink smoked salmon, or the rustic pottery casserole for the beef stew, the perfect lavender-colored plate on which to display the chocolate cake or the pristine white porcelain pot for the mint tea.

Even the display and presentation of the food itself can be considered visual art.

Daring chefs are presenting their food on twigs and wires and other wildly creative forms. Working with sculptors and jewelers, they are inventing new artistic ways to serve — and even eat — their food.

Anyone who has attended a banquet or sailed on an ocean liner will gasp at the creativity of food and ice carvings. And visitors to the TV Food Network are astonished to see the breathtaking constructions of cake designers and chocolatiers.

It was The Four Seasons restaurant in New York that permanently changed the way we now view fine dining restaurants.

When it opened in 1959, the Four Seasons became the inspiration for the modern American restaurant. It was one of the purest examples of an idea transformed into vibrant reality.

The planning for the restaurant consumed two and a half years, and cost four and a half million dollars — a mighty heap of money in the 1950s. At that time the average price of a car was $2,200 dollars. Gasoline was 30¢ a gallon, and the average annual income was considerably less than $6,000.

This was the first restaurant to employ famous architects and graphic designers. Philip Johnson, the architect for New York’s famous Seagram Building, designed the space and graphic designers of the stature of Mies van der Rohe and Eero Saarinen were invited to join the planning team. Their work has endured and can still be admired today.

The Four Seasons was a pioneer in many ways: it was the first restaurant to purchase fine art to grace the space. Dubious New Yorkers scoffed at the idea of hanging Picasso, Miro and Chagall paintings on the walls of a mere restaurant.

Now art and design are essential elements that contribute to the success of grand restaurants, bustling bistros and even comfortable cafés like Panera.

Under the steady rain of goods and services we know as the consumer culture, the graphic designer is the invisible force in nearly every transaction between producer and purchaser. His is the persuasive hand responsible for the design that says to the buyer: “Look at me, remember me, trust me, want me, and buy me — NOW!”

We spend more in a well-designed supermarket, and often choose our food on the basis of the attractiveness of its packaging.

Brilliant design even plays a persuasive role in packaging for fast food restaurants, soda cans, bottled water, many specialty foods and even dog and cat food.

The art director is a trained specialist in color, texture, form and function, who creates the look and feel of magazines, newspapers, cookbooks and menus.

You need only to step into a gallery, craft shop or museum to discover that artists have been working for centuries to turn food into art in the form of decorative Faberge eggs, and distinctive serving dishes.

Jewelers, potters, glass blowers and craftspeople use every media from clay to precious metals and gemstones to render food into images to admire and to use.

Food is art for everything from shopping bags to Christmas tree ornaments and greetings cards. Commercial designers and manufacturers produce a dazzling array of kitchen equipment and elegant, useful tools for cooks.

Still life paintings depict the last supper, a recent hunting expedition, a silver bowl of ripe fruit, a table laden with a simple loaf of crusty bread, cheese and a goblet of wine, or an entire meal consisting of ham, pheasant, figs, cheese and cherries.

Here are feasts to last for gastronomic eternity in the form of fine and everlasting art.

Every few weeks I’m invited to speak to the newly arriving students at culinary school. I tell them I teach a class on love affairs.

I am the matchmaker.

I want to know what each student loves (not what he or she likes) to do.

With a little bit of luck, I can suggest ways in which they can marry their hobby or unique skills with their culinary knowledge as they seek a long and fruitful career.

I’m astonished to discover how many budding chefs yearn to own a truck. A truck that serves every kind of food from cupcakes and rice pudding to Korean barbecue.

Today I talked about the calendar. The US Tennis Open is coming up. So is the World Series. A sports fan may want to cook at the private dining room of a sports franchise or become a private chef for an athlete.

Dancing with the Stars employs a personal chef for each competition. Personal chef jobs are on the rise. It is one of the best jobs for an entrepreneur who can start a business without requiring a capital investment.

I spoke about jobs in art and design; photographer, food stylist, kitchen designer, and special event cake designer. Create a wedding cake in oil and acrylic paint to frame and preserve for ever and ever (or as long as the marriage lasts.) become a chef in a museum, create a food exhibit, become a lecturer on the topic of food in fine art? Become a recipe developer for Panera or Starbucks (or Dunkin D’s.)

Tasting is a good and well paying job. Taste ice cream, coffee, tea, olive oil. Chew gum. No kidding. Nestle is one of the companies that employs chewing gum tasters. There are real jobs that require super taster to… well…taste…all day. .

How about becoming an ethicist, a futurist or a trend tracker?

Or work on Wall Street analyzing food companies?

Or work for a food foundation or as a humanitarian or lobbyist or inspector to trace the source of contaminated food.

Here are just a few ideas for working in the food media: investigative journalist, vegetarian columnist, historian, folklorist (why do so many Jews go out for Chinese dinner on Sundays?)  The late Professor Alan Dundes examined this question with his students who also study the allure of violent sports, holiday traditions and even the mystique of the vampire.

Said Dundes: “As a psychoanalytic folklorist, my professional goals are to make sense of nonsense, find a rationale for the irrational and seek to make the unconscious conscious.”

How about taking up a career as a food memoir writer, biographer, commentator, geographer (do you know what a food geographer does?) trade magazine reporter, supermarket observer, radio host, (I’d like this job myself,) essayist, restaurant reviewer, food book reviewer (not only cookbooks but also food books dealing with politics, profiles of food companies etc.), catalog writer, TV star, ingredient shopper for TV star, TV producer, obituary writer for former food celebrities. Preparer of last meals in the federal penitentiary leading to a possible book contract for Meals to Die For.

I had only three minutes to describe my food jobs class so I didn’t have time to even mention careers in education, farming, science and technology or rare, unusual and extraordinary culinary careers so instead, I’ll get around to them in this blog. Please come back soon.

And.

Have a nice day (as they say at the bank!)

Michael Batterberry, co-founder FOOD ARTS magazine

I was standing next to Michael Batterberry in the crowded Rainbow Room. We were listening to Reese Schonfeld as he revealed his plans for the launch of the TV Food Network.

It was 1993 and I’d guess just about everyone in the room was secretly hoping we’d be discovered, and he’d invite us, (beg us), to sign a contract for our future appearances on his network.

The more he said, the more our hopes were dashed.

After a few minutes, Michael turned to me and said, “Let’s go and have a glass of champagne in the bar, there isn’t a place for us here.”

From the outset it was clear there would be no room for anyone of Michael’s depth and breadth of interests. Michael and his wife, Ariane had the intellectual heft and undaunted persistence to raise the money for the publication of Food & Wine magazine.

Later, a bitter dispute with their partners resulted in the Batterberry’s ouster from this magazine. The tragedy eventually led to their next venture: FOOD ARTS Magazine.

Food & Wine lives on with a current circulation approaching a million subscribers.

FOOD ARTS also lives on as the most influential magazine for top flight restaurants.

Ariane lives on as publisher of FOOD ARTS.

Michael was managing editor. He too will live on as the generous visionary who encouraged the flow of ideas into the magazine. (He even allowed me space to discuss issues related to biotechnology.)

Michael earned the respect of legions of food professionals who admired him as a historian, as a great writer, a wonderfully witty speaker, an insightful forecaster of food trends and a mentor for innumerable chefs and other food folk.

We were so fortunate to have known and admired him.