There’s this scene in Ratatouille that I think about often.
It’s when Anton Ego, the infamous food critic residing in Paris, visits his least favorite restaurant—Gusteau’s. In favor of giving Gusteau’s new head chef, Alfredo Linguini, a shot at winning his important criticism, he sits at a table alone. After endless waiting, he receives his main dish: ratatouille, which, in French culture, is widely known as a peasant dish.
Regardless, Ego takes a bite and is suddenly transported back to the days of his gilded youth, to a time when his mother made him ratatouille after he crashed his bike and scraped his knee. With the first mouthful, the delicate petals of eggplant, tomato, and zucchini are instantly interspersed with the love from his mother, evoking a sense of comfort.
Now, in the present, Ego is stunned. It’s evident that he hasn’t savored the nostalgic flavor in so long, with the shocked look on his face and the negative criticism that he tends to give to restaurant owners.
He forgot the meaning of good food: comfort.
Food is part of what keeps humans alive by nature, but it mentally nurtures us as well. When savoring the last sip of masala chai or letting a delightful snow cone melt on your tongue, you are bound to remember the feeling of tasting good food and/or drink, especially if it’s associated with a person.
Last summer, I made a lemon meringue pie on my own for the first time. It turned out perfectly. The meringue was fluffy and lightly browned from the oven, the crust was crisp on my tongue, and the lemon curd was an exquisite combination of sweetness and tartness. When my dad tasted it, he said it reminded him of my grandma’s lemon meringue pie that she used to make for him and his brothers when he was a little boy.
Similarly, sometimes I’ve caught myself saying that a certain taste reminds me of a dish I had long ago. Just yesterday, I tasted an Indian butter chicken dish that elicited a memory from when I visited Edinburgh four months ago. There, I had the best meal of my life, a savory, flavorful dish of butter chicken and a chocolate chai latte from a restaurant called Dishoom. At that moment in Edinburgh, the dish created a sense of nostalgia and nourished the mind and soul. It was a meal I won’t soon forget.
Famed chef Roland Henin once told his trainee—and now internationally renowned chef—Thomas Keller that chefs cook to nurture people. And that’s it. The truth of restaurants and every meal you’ve ever eaten is that food is to nourish and nurture. It’s an art like any other, one that strives to create connections while sustaining the nature of the soul.
Each time I eat a simple, delicious grilled cheese sandwich or an elaborate, cultural dish from a restaurant, I’m reminded of every meal I’ve had before that gave me a sense of stability and comfort in the effervescent realms of worldly cuisine.
