Theresa Whitehill, her husband, Paulo Ferreira, and I came to Stags’ Leap in July with the
intention of extrapolating the sensory memory of this place into spoken word and cuisine.
We came to create a visceral interpretation of a place that evokes Saudades.
I arrived at the estate, after a three hour drive from my home on the Mendocino coast.
The heat of Napa Valley quickly penetrated my skin and I welcomed the warmth and dry
crackled air. We walked together all over the property, through the winemaker’s apothecary
garden, up along the slopes of the palisades, into the wine caves, and I began taking a
mental inventory of the wealth of herbs, flowers, and food plants. I settled myself into
Canary cottage and watched Theresa write, as she began her process of articulating all the
images and sensations she was experiencing around her.
How does one translate earth and rock and water and vineyard into poetic form, into
flavor and texture and nourishment? For me it began within a landscape that is ancient
and fertile and sacred. This landscape is where the muse resides.
What Theresa expressed in word and verbal form, I translated into culinary and sensory
form. We collaborated on the concept and structure of images, flavors, sensibility, and
sensuality. Inspired by Robert’s gorgeous winemaking, we connected this landscape to
language, language to food, food to wine.
On the shelf of the cottage I found a curious book, Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs.
Having an interest in herbal medicine for many years, I was instantly intrigued, and quickly
found a shady lounge chair and immersed myself in the fascinating world of myth and lore
and magic and medicine.
There were so many wonderful and amusing concoctions and potions and many of them
included ingredients I wanted to focus on and use in my menu—plants and herbs that were
growing on the estate, fruits and flowers that conjured Saudades for me. I lay on the lounge and
read these anecdotes out loud to Theresa as she mused and made notations, throwing to her
bouquets of scent and flavors, mythological remedies for lovesickness, or homesickness, the
place of Saudades, potions to fall in love by, or to free zombies from the half dead...(that recipe
entails eating pistachio nuts, from the shell, preferably the red ones).
We were entranced and transported by all this incredible information. My favorite being a
recipe for Invisibility... Soak poppy seeds in wine for fifteen days; then drink the infused wine
for five days while fasting... This will enable one to become invisible at will. Hence the Emulsion
of Poppy Seeds and Champagne, Cooling the Braised Endives and Leeks, which we served as the salad course
of our event…
Our presentation of Saudades at Stags’ Leap, on the manor house porch at twilight, was a
weaving together of the poetry and the food, with each poem followed by the course specifically
designed for that poem. Theresa’s performance was in the true poetic spoken word vernacular;
my expression accompanied her words with flavors, texture, a connection to her language, and
the wine.
My menu was inspired by many different things... recipes based upon ancient remedies,
potions to conjure love and protection, abundance and creative fullness… all the things we
want all beings to have. I imagined simple combinations to nourish the already rich and fertile
spark of care, conviviality, and friendship.
We will not talk of the long post lunch naps, Viognier-induced, nor the hike through
rattlesnake territory above the vineyard, nor the valley at sunset, the twilight sky, the color of
which I have only seen in Montpelier. We will not talk of the haunted croquet court or the
moon garden resplendent in jasmine, phlox, and gardenia.
I used many foods growing on the estate: eggplant, ollalieberry, cactus pear, rose geranium, all
the culinary herbs... Sitting on the manor house porch, watching the rabbits running through
the vineyard inspired the rabbit loins wrapped in pastry. I could smell the pungent herbs of
rosemary, lavender, and thyme emanating off their backs as they ran wildly past, the heat of
the sun charging the olfactory hit.
All these elements were thrown into the pot of inspiration, fusing each sensation into the
light above the promontory at dawn, the glint of water shimmering on vine leaves, the chirp
of cicada at dusk, the musty smell of old stone steps, a pulled cork, a fragrant nose of Petite
Syrah. Saudades... fate, longing, memory.
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