Cannabis Cuisine. Andrea Drummer

       Introduction

      Every chef gets the question at least once…a month: What’s your favorite dish to cook?

      To this day, I’m at a loss for words. I rally my most diplomatic face and launch into a pseudo – intellectual rant about not being pigeonholed, the value of exploration, and blah, blah, blah, but in fact, I feel like indignantly asking a few questions in return: Would you ask a painter which painting he likes most to paint? Or an architect which building he most likes to design? You see, while the technique is generally applicable, the art and joy is in rediscovering; it’s in challenging one’s ability to the beyond. The true answer to the ubiquitous question is my favorite thing to cook is food.

      The seeds of becoming a chef were sown long before I could understand what was happening. They were planted at my inception and cultivated through family and life experiences. Sometimes just a small thing can enter your life and change you profoundly and forever: a great bottle of wine, a child, an idea—for me, it was the moment that I realized the endless possibilities of food and its preparation. I am not speaking only of the skilled choreography that it takes to bring a culinary idea to life, or the intricate melding of spices, products, and protein. I’m speaking also of the universal role that food has in bringing people together to love, share ideas, laugh and…well, just be. To prepare food is to introduce an idea—it is the taste of sun in a peach or the saline flavor of an oyster that dances on the back of your palette. The possibilities of food forced my hand in every regard and shaped a career that was predestined.

      I remember the day I discovered a tomato for the first time. It wasn’t the first time I had eaten a tomato, but this time I discovered it; it was unveiled to me in all of its authenticity. My cousin and I (at six and seven years old) snuck into our grandmother’s garden and pillaged a few vine-ripened tomatoes. We scurried into the bathroom having quickly swiped the saltshaker. There, for the first time I came to understand the nuances of a tomato. I inwardly marveled at the texture of the flesh as it differed from the skin. I lapped up the seeds and pulp, feeling the texture and bite with my teeth. I noticed the taste changed depending on how much salt I used.

      These overt and subtle differences in flavor and texture piqued my interest. I was learning not only to explore food but also to dissect it. I was learning the difference between simply eating a carrot and unearthing the change in flavor between the core and root of the vegetable. I studied the taste, texture, and density of peanuts, almonds, or pecans, as I ate them one by one, in four to six bites per single nut.

      This concept alone led me through masses of people on a Sunday afternoon, in search of the best sea bass or scallops or salmon or duck in Philadelphia’s 9th Street Italian Market. Years later, it engrossed me in the food markets of New York’s Chinatown– fish flying in midair, buyers prying, barterers shouting, and early morning onlookers gaping. And now, the same concept, with an even greater pull as of music wafting from a magic pipe, beckons me again, leading me through rows of the freshest produce at Los Angeles’s farmers markets.

      As I look beyond the crowd, in search of the best locally grown mushrooms and pea tendrils, I always keep my eye out for something else: inspiration! I pick up a piece of fruit and ask what it would like to become. I eat the flesh of blood orange samples, nibble the rind, and breathe in the scent of its zest. While bagging the best quality of chanterelles, I consider them at their finest hour, tasting the stems, the caps, and the gills. I consider a particular impending dining experience. I’m careful to honor the integrity of the product.

      Finally we arrive to the present, where I’ve gleefully brought in an exciting new concept and ingredient to the repertoire—cannabis. But wait, it is actually no different from the fresh corn that my father used to bestow upon us as kids, or the ripened berries, peaches, and crab apples that we’d pick along the roadside. I dissect cannabis as I do everything else: carefully and consideringly. I smell and taste its potential as a full-bodied ingredient, honoring the integrity of the various strains and perfectly pairing them with other ingredients, flavors, textures, and tastes.

      Obviously one of my favorite things about cooking is the creativity which goes into it: the inspiration behind it, the thoughtfulness of its design, the equilibrium of the served dishes, the careful balance within the ingredients, and the smell of the menu coming together. But one aspect of this process that moves me beyond creativity is the discovery, the exploration, and the infinite possibilities of the process.

      Long before this process became my calling, I held the belief that the presentation should be the voice where there are no words. There is magnificence to a project when it takes effort and care to pull together. (Like the extra arch of a brow, or the matching lingerie of lovers; the perfect shade of red lipstick or a heel just high enough that he notices it but still feels empowered.) Every detail of flavor and presentation joins in a grand symphony of piquancy, placed with the deft hand of an artist. This is what I bring to every person who encounters my food or dines with me at a dinner party—the undeniable sense that I care deeply not only about my ingredients, but also about you, the diner.