Believers and practitioners

The cliché is so overused that it can no longer be used without blushing. Temple of fine dining, sanctuary of gluttony, pilgrimage site for food lovers… Religious similes are a constant refrain in culinary literature. I suppose it's because the vast majority are recited like a hymn of praise that only finds its equal in sacred scripture.

There's not so much hymn-waving when you head down to the bar for a round of beers with your buddies or grab a bite of the set menu near the office. Those eulogies are reserved for heavenly tables and come with rituals that allow you to savor the delicacies in advance, in a kind of Eucharistic mystery played out on the altar of social media. This pilgrimage that food writers, and we repeat, mea culpa, repeat is often literal. How often, to enjoy the manna, is it necessary to travel a long way? We travel backroads to a remote village to visit a reclusive chef in an unknown monastery. And there are those who sail the seas to distant lands, following the trail of shooting stars. The promised land isn't always as we were told, it must be said, but that's another story.

The fact is that those tables marked as destinations by the latest bible might better withstand the rigors of daily life when lean times arrive. While in the Babylons of Airbnb and vulture funds, the lower clergy of restaurateurs are beginning to protest, they're struggling to get their customers to open their wallets as often as before, the monasteries of fine dining continue to receive pilgrims. And from farther and farther away every day.

Why is that? The reasons are varied, and my homily is getting longer. The fact is, the daily mass-goers who used to fill the collection plate at the neighborhood church are dwindling. But for the occasional pilgrimage, there's always a bit of money left in the purse. In the end, the sentimentalists were right, and in the world of gastronomy, it's a bit like religion: believers abound, but practicing ones are scarce.