A Man of Taste

May 5, 2008 9:58 AM

Grant Achatz, chef and owner of Chicago's finest restaurant, Alinea, was diagnosed with tongue cancer last year. After aggressive chemo and radiation, his cancer is in full remission, and he is slowly regaining his palate.
posted by AceRock (17 comments total)

the last link is very moving. I had heard he had tongue cancer, but then that he had beaten it and that his taste was returning -- knowing the details, and the 3 year survival rate, makes it all the more haunting, sad, and so brutally ironic.
posted by felix at 10:00 AM on May 5, 2008

“Flavor is memory.”

Great post, thanks. I wish him the best.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 10:14 AM on May 5, 2008

I wish I could afford to eat at his place. I'm not entirely sure I understand what he does, but I can appreciate it the same way I can look at a painting and figure I'm not entirely getting that either. I know he is an artist, and I wish him the best. Chicago pride and all.
posted by timsteil at 10:34 AM on May 5, 2008

and a bean dish that came on a tray with a pillow full of nutmeg-scented air. The plate of beans was placed atop the pillow, forcing the aroma out.

See? Sometimes overthinking a plate of beans is a good thing.

Kidding aside, I'm glad that he's on the mend. I doubt I'll ever have the funds to eat at Alinea, but I think it's very important that people are thinking about food in new and different ways.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 10:41 AM on May 5, 2008 [2 favorites]

I've been, and I found the whole thing challenging (in a good way).

It's not the "hey, let's go out and have a fantastic meal!" type of restaurant -- it's more "hey, let's go out and spend several hours contemplating the nature of food and the enjoyment of flavor as compared to the enjoyment of texture."

For example, they did a nifty job on the wine pairings but there were a couple in there that I swear they meant as a slap in the face to make sure you weren't taking things for granted & to keep you on your toes.

(also, I really liked the entryway)
posted by aramaic at 10:49 AM on May 5, 2008

Good for him.

Abe Frohman called and made a reservation as soon as he heard the good news.
posted by chillmost at 10:56 AM on May 5, 2008

What an incredibly dramatic and frightening turn. I'm not to the he-gets-better part of the article yet, I got hung up on "the cloacal undertone of ripe banana."
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 11:09 AM on May 5, 2008

A few years back my wife and I stayed at a tiny waterfront place in Bocas del Toro, Panama. The owner, an Iranian ex-pat named Bernard Bahary, was a fantastic chef who had lost half his tongue to cancer. Our meal was fantastic, but I was left thinking that it's a pretty cruel world when someone who lives to cook can be left unable to taste.
posted by JaredSeth at 11:25 AM on May 5, 2008

My maternal grandmother passed away of stomache cancer - she couldn't eat anything during the last months of her life. For a Cantonese person, this is an awful awful way to go.

Glad this chef-dude is regaining his palete.
posted by porpoise at 11:57 AM on May 5, 2008

Interesting story. I had trouble getting beyond this, though:

In a third image, a sphere had been divided into three concentric layers: a core of strawberry, a middle of Niçoise olives, and a crust of white chocolate flavored with violet.

Fuck me, that sounds revolting. White chocolate is shit by itself, but crusting olives? I'd say he's regaining his palate very slowly.
posted by basicchannel at 12:12 PM on May 5, 2008

White chocolate is shit by itself, but crusting olives?

Actually, the white "chocolate" + olive combination has been done plenty of times before. Vosges, for example, makes one.

Some folks clearly like 'em. Not my thing, but he's not exactly treading new ground with that particular flavor combo.
posted by aramaic at 1:19 PM on May 5, 2008

Hell of glad he seems to be doing well. He's one of the handful of chefs I really admire, and would really, really like to sample his food. Nice to see him being able to continue to do what he loves as well. Fingers crossed for him.
posted by opsin at 2:20 PM on May 5, 2008

It's not Alinea's food, it's Moto's, but I really liked this post, which I think goes a long way to explaining why olives + white chocolate is not a bad idea. Scroll down to where the pictures start.


The waitress described this course as “Chef Cantu’s interpretation of Texas barbecue.” Chef Cantu, if you ever happen to read this, I’m going to paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen: I live in Texas; I know Texas barbecue; Texas barbecue is a friend of mine; Chef, confit of capon leg wrapped in a wafer-thin slice of sous vide breast, topped with a scoop of fried chicken ice cream and plated with a beet and walnut puree, sunflower seeds, and trumpet royal mushrooms is not Texas barbecue.
posted by felix at 3:14 PM on May 5, 2008

Oh, and Chef A has a cookbook out -- which in this case also comes with a free insane multimedia web experience.
posted by felix at 3:18 PM on May 5, 2008

I've been as well. Easily the best meal I've ever had. Bit of a write-up of each course here, and photos here. Interesting pairings, facinating food, and, this was the clincher for me, it was all really fun. Not pretentious, we weren't getting talked down to (both of us in our early 20s, couldn't really afford the meal but went for it anyway). It was a great evening.

I wish for Grant's quick recovery.
posted by craven_morhead at 3:51 PM on May 5, 2008

A chapter in Peter Sagal's The Book of Vice deals with a dinner at Alinea:

Waiters carefully place in front of us: a square of Lucite, four inches by four inches by half an inch, standing on edge. On top of the square: a sliver of metal, holding what looks like a single yellow die on which the spots were applied by a blind person with a tiny brush. This is, according to the menu: 'Corn, with coconut, cayenne, and lime.' It looks no more like Corn (or coconut, cayenne, or lime) than a Whopper looks like the Queen of Romania.

I'm glad that Achatz is better. I had no idea he was ill.
posted by lukemeister at 7:52 PM on May 5, 2008

This may not be pointed out, but I've noticed that a lot of chefs have gotten either tongue or throat cancer. There has to be a connection in all the foods they sample.
posted by doctorschlock at 9:10 AM on May 6, 2008