What is the Ego? Does it even exist? How big should you allow a lettuce leaf to remain in a salad before it becomes cumbersome and obnoxious to eat? Do we actually exist, or are we simply projections of an idea of Who we think we Are, dancing upon a wall, flickering in the half-light, waiting for the fire to burn out?
When roasting a quarter chicken, how long is long enough? Should you coat the chicken in oil, or in butter? If I do good deeds for the people I love, is it still an act of selfishness, serving my Ego to feel validated, allowing myself to know that I am a good person, or am I merely fulfilling a sense of familial duty? Does dried garlic take away, or enhance, the flavour of green beans?
Do I exist outside of myself, to others, or are they simply manifestations of my Ego? Is this world real, in a sense that, with no Ego to experience it, would it continue to exist, or does it require observation to Be? How cold should a rosé be when served?
Menu: Roasted Quarter Chicken, Green Beans, and Rustic Salad with Dill? Apple Galettes with Almond Whipped Cream?
Was the poultry actually succulent, or did we simply project our belief system onto what we think of as “poultry”? Was mixing apple cider vinegar with basil-infused olive oil just a basic emulsion, or was it more of an expression of the constant duality of our notions of self – forever merging and separating as our understanding of the world around us changes, alters, and adapts to an ever-expanding landscape?
And what of the Apple Galettes? Were they propping up the paradigm established by the salad dressing or tearing it down? Was it an example of deconstructionism, or a rebuttal thereof? Did the whipped cream and roasted almond infusion truly blow our minds, or were our minds already blown, and the dessert topping simply arrived late to a party that ended decades ago?
Wine: Palo Alto, Shiraz Rosé, Reservado, Chile, 2010, $118 MXN
Rating: One Bottle
Did the wine let us down with its lack of sweetness and overly acidic nature, or were we let down by our own oedipal expectations of a life less ordinary? Would we have been more forgiving of the sharp and upfront character of this wine had we been more prepared to deal with our private existentialist dilemmas and our nihilist leanings? Would we buy this wine again if someone wanted us to bring them a Rosé, or would we find a more suitable alternative? What is “suitable”?
Wine: Garnacha, Viña Tamprana, Old Vines Selection, Campo de Borja, Denominación de Origen, Spain, 2011
Rating: Two Bottles
Should this wine be referred to as “musky,” or was our friend Lena correct in her assessment that it smelled like “feet”? How did the taste of cherries play into all of this? Were we truly tasting the wine, or were we lost in a labyrinth of our own making, roaming endless down corridors of loneliness, seeking truth but tricked into believing the lie that is our inability to see what we really are, accepting the reflection as reality and never the reflected?
Where do the answers lie? Do we have any answers or can we live with the possibility that there may be no answers?
Cheers?
The Sunday Bottles 