Simran Sethi - Bread, Wine, Chocolate

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Love After Love from The Poetry of Derek Walcott by Derek Walcott, selected by Glyn Maxwell. Copyright 2014 by Derek Walcott. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC.

BREAD, WINE, CHOCOLATE. Copyright 2015 by Preeti S. Sethi. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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FIRST EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 9780061581076

EPub Edition October 2015 ISBN 9780062221544

15 16 17 18 19 RRD(H) 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For every person listed in the acknowledgments,

especially Nani and Masi, Lale and Sedat, Mom and Dad,

Tim and G, and Luigi and Kim.

Thank you for feeding and nourishing me.

This is because of you.

And for my nephews, Dev and Avi.

May you inherit a delicious and resilient world

where all have a seat at the table.

LOVE AFTER LOVE

The time will come

when, with elation,

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror,

and each will smile at the others welcome,

and say sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self,

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love-letters from the bookshelf

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

DEREK WALCOTT

I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake... a shudder ran through my whole body, and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place.

MARCEL PROUST, SWANNS WAY

This is a book about food, but its really a book about love. Its about that moment when you find yourself savoring something so wholly and intently you never want to let it go. I thought this love, at least in the culinary sense, could only be found in superlative places: a secret supper club in London, a hidden bistro in Paris or a roadside dhaba in Mumbai. But I know now the greatest love is found in humble places: in my morning coffee, in a morsel of bread or in a bite of chocolate. And that to pay closer attention to these ordinary pleasures isnt just to see them anew but to experience them in a whole new way.

I had forgotten how to do this. I had forgotten how to be present to what was right in front of me, knowing only how to love what shouted for my attention. Until I realized I could lose them.

I spent the spring of 2012 researching this book in Rome, Italy, where the saying When in Rome took on a life of its own. When in Rome, start the day with un caff e una sigaretta! When in Rome, mangia un gelato every afternoon! When in Rome, start drinking at five: In bocca al lupo!

Four months later, I returned to the United States chubby and tired, primed for a cleanse. And primed I was as I walked through San Franciscos Embarcadero to the headquarters of chocolate maker TCHO (pronounced cho), basking in the virtuous glow of the no-sugar-no-dairy-no-gluten-no-alcohol-or-cigarettes-or-anything-that-could-be-construed-as-sinful cleanse I had started days before I was to interview the companys head chocolate maker, Brad Kintzer.

I stepped into the chocoholics lair and asked for Brad. (If you ever eat a TCHO chocolate bar, youll find a photo of him smiling beatifically on the wrappers inner fold.) About five minutes later, he walked out, apologized for running late and requested another 15 minutes to finish his work. He invited me to order a cup of hot chocolate from the caf to pass the time and sweeten the delay: Order whatever you want. I thanked him, waited until he left and ordered a cup of water. I was cleansingand virtuous. So virtuous.

To be inside the original TCHO space (they have since moved) was akin to placing myself inside a Willy Wonka dream: Simi and the Chocolate Factory. Brad brought me into the conference room and explained they were putting the finishing touches on a new hazelnut bar. The room was heady with the aromas of nuts and chocolate; broken samples were scattered all over the conference table. Help yourself, he said. I smiled, beatifically. Im okay. Thanks.

The 20-minute interview stretched to almost two hours. I was captivated by Brads story, his journey from a man who had started off studying the biology of sugar maples to now making award-winning chocolate. At one point, he described the moment he shared some of that chocolate with the farmers whod grown the cacaomen who had never before tasted a finished chocolate baras one of the most sacred moments in all my life.

I was starting to regret my cleanse.

As we wrapped up the interview, Brad asked if I wanted to tour the factory. Of course. Willy Wonka was giving me a tour of his chocolate factory. Brad and I slipped on mesh hairnets, smooshed in orange earplugs and walked into the outer perimeter of the factory where bars are molded and hand wrapped. It was chilly; the area is kept below 66 degrees Fahrenheit to maintain the consistency of the chocolate. And it was loud; Brad shouted over slappers that hit chocolate bars out of their molds, plus cooling and packing machines that churned out roughly 5,000 TCHO bars per hour.

He then pushed through a thick plastic curtain and led me into the inner sanctum, a cozier 80 degrees Fahrenheit. The aroma of chocolate grew stronger as we approached the refiner, a machine that grinds and melts solid cakes of cocoa into a warm, gooey mass.

Thats where I nearly buckled.

As Brad explained the transformation of solid into liquid, I closed my eyes. The scent of chocolate was so overwhelming, my mouth started to water. The fat in chocolate is solid at room temperature, he said. I swallowed; I could taste the chocolate without tasting it. Chocolate melts just below the temperature of our mouths.