"Meals Worth the Price of a Plane Ticket" by R. W. Apple

[Joe H]

http://travel2.nytimes.com/2006/10/22/travel/22apple.html is the last essay that "Johnny" Apple wrote before his death. For myself he was my favorite writer of all. Expressive, passionate and larger than life he lived his life for a meal, for an experience, for a taste and a texture, for an adventure. And he wrote about it. Really well. I believed in him. In fact there were too many places that he visited that I spent far too much time (especially on a detour from a business trip) and too much money to explore. Rarely was I disappointed.

This is one of his most interesting pieces of all.

I am wondering, now six years later, has anyone been to any of these? And your thoughts?

[seanvtaylor]

I remember breezing through this article some years ago, and to my surprise discovered that I've now been to two of these restaurants in the last years.

Comme Chez Soi in Brussels is the restaurant that gets so much notice, but few of my Brussels friends had actually eaten there. It was very expensive, and very good, but I don't remember too many details of my meal there other than it occurring on a very cold night with snow/freezing rain, and the restaurant feeling like the coziest place in the world to be. That's got to mean something--dining at that level is often quite stiff, and this seemed relaxed and congenial, by Belgian standards, while serving beautiful food.

Don Alfonso 1890. This meal I remember, quite well. We were staying in Sorrento and ventured up the mountain to Sant Agata. Our dinner started around 8:30, I believe, and ended somewhere south of midnight, after what must have been 8-10 bountiful portions. It was too long ago to remember many course details--there was a squash blossom soup, I think, that was quite memorable, and a very nice fish course. But I remember our excitement as several of the courses were served--they were interesting, immediately enticing and aromatic, and we couldn't wait to taste them even as we began to reach our limits. As the evening wore on, and the wine flowed, our dining party became more like a true party, and the owners of the restaurant were exceedingly hospitable. At the end of the night we walked down into their wine cellar--a tunnel, perhaps, that would have gone all the way down to Sorrento back in ancient days, and we marveled at the drama and history of it.