MeinBuddha

I do recall a Chinese wedding meal that I had once in Yunnan and in New Jersey. The first half of the wedding happened in Edison and the second half in LiJiang, which is on the Tibetan border where the Western Himalayan begin and also just North of the Great Rain forests of forbidden Burma. It is truly one of the most exquisite and remote areas on earth, populated largely by pristine and uncorrupted minorities tribes who hunt the large populations of white Snow Leapords and Cesuo Dabian, which they use for fur and food. The wedding took place over the course of 24 hours with the Space Shuttle serving as the means of transport between Edison and Lijiang. When one has connections and a cornucopia of money earned by doing all the proprietary bond and currency trading for the Trilateral Commission, the world is truly one’s fawning and flapping oyster—even the greatest public resources of the formidable US government and NASA are available for one’s private, whims, including of course, spontaneous meals. To be connected, rich, well bred and the CFO of the Trilateral Commission. Yes, indeed, all is possible. The wedding was a dual ceremony with the Pope performing the first of the ceremony, having been flown in secretly on the bride’s private jet from Rome along with some Umbrian white truffles still encased in their native soil and some caged Cinghale from Tuscany, which had been bathed in holy water spontaneously by the Pope. The Dalai Lama, having gotten secret permission from the Chinese government, because of the groom’s great connections to the Trilateral Commission, performed the Chinese portion of the ceremony, though his Holiness was kind enough to speak in Tibetan and English. The Pope could not make the Chinese ceremony, unfortunately. The ceremony began a bit off with the groom needing to short 400,000,000 US10 Year bond futures on a whim. Of course, his genius was proved almost instantaneously when US bonds promptly tanked ten points on strong employment news, and he covered for a profit of several billion dollars. Such genius, the groom was now able to find the entire wedding through one brilliant trade. And he always bet right. The meal in New Jersey began at 2:00 in the afternoon with crabs flown in from Maryland and Lobster flown in from Maine prepared by Guy Martin, who had accompanied the Pope on the flight from Europe, and thankfully had the day off. This was followed by the legendary and rarely seen Burmese dish of monkey virgin. The live monkey virgins were deflowered painlessly in front of the guests and the blood was mixed with lavender and chrysanthemum water by Iron Chef Morimoto who was up in Edison from Philly for the day. This blood flower admixture was then drunk by everyone as part of toast of generosity, and to signal that indeed all present were special and part of the most special and most perfect group of people on earth. Indeed the bride and groom’s genes would be the source of future perfectly genetically engineered generations, all at the wedding knew. Such was their perfection. The third course was served in outer space. Dry-aged kobe beef that had been reared listening to an auditory diet of ½ Coltraine and ½ Bach was cooked lightly in UV light for the duration of the trip, and then lightly seared on reentry under the direction of Alain Ducasse, who decided that cooking in space required the reverse treatment of beef required on earth. This dish worked brilliantly as we enjoyed the dual toast of the Emperor of Japan and the Queen of England, the former having provided Otokayama Mottomo Junmai Bakka Iro sake from the 17th century secret casks of the imperial castle and the latter having forced the Wedgwood factories of her homeland to work 24 hours a day for weeks to fashion platinum and diamond vessels suitable just for this drink. What an exquisite toast the two monarchs gave too. Upon re-entry we enjoyed 100 year old Springbank provided by the Queen, and those of us that felt so inclined were permitted a light puff of anise flavored opium, which had been picked at the perfect hour at dawn in the DiuLouMou section of the Golden Triangle. This was particularly special because the opium so obtained at this one hour on this one day of the year is renown for its flavor but non addictive dream like qualities. It was the perfect spiritual aperitif for the mildly scary reentry to the earth’s atmosphere. Oh, the view was fabulous from outer space. We arrived in perfect time in LiJiang where we were taken half way up the snowy mountains (the half way point having a deep significance in ancient Tibetan Buddhist scriptures regarding tantric metaphors for space and time joining) by the local and brave starving peasants, who gallantly carried us up the mountains having been served a menu of goat rice generously provided by our groom via a famous Jamaican Creole cook who made these sorts of meals that the lower classes might enjoy. Such was the couple’s magnanimity and spontaneous generosity that he also guaranteed all the local peasants American citizenship and free and easy entry into Harvard. Our first dish in the Himalayas was the last endangered Panda Bear available in this province skewered slowly for 6 weeks over an open JiangNan Mu smoke pit by the ablest banquet cook in Beijing, famed for the inventive dishes he had served Chairman Zhou Enlai as his private chef (everyone “in the know” is aware that Zhou Enlai’s chef was superior to Mao Zedong’s, since the latter was prone to excessive use of sugar and cabbage). These were followed, as is the custom among perfect people, with a palette cleanser of potato knishes made by the bride’s Uncle Moish. White lotus bulb based wine served as the drink of choice as the next portion of the entertainment of castrati eunuchs trained during the late Qing performed the last Shanghainese opera in Cantonese heard by the Last Emperor, Pu Yi. The last savory dish was Tibetan snow ice cured groin of Smiley Lapdog served in a sweet sauce of half Hunan quail blood and half Xihu carp blood with chilis. Everything was perfectly balanced in the most beautiful place on earth. I have never had so exquisite a meal. But it was not completely over. The desserts were parachuted in by the 15th Battalion of the US Army, bringing us a pear tart prepared by Claudio Fleming (before she left GT) and a half bottle of 1974 D’Yquem for each guest to enjoy on the privately F14 jet ride each person was to enjoy back to Hawaii where the Concorde awaited them. Certainly the best meal of my life.

I am new to this board, but Suvir your story sounds like you are full of $^&t. My favorite piece was about the helicopter flying out for fresh food. How many helicopters can fly 1000 miles from the Himalayas to Bombay and return with fresh seafood within the course of a few hours? Or perhaps it was a fighter jet on loan from the Russian commisar who was also staying in the Himalayas as a guest.