Abstract - Revised

"The gastronomic must no longer serve as mere metaphor for the arts, but must take its place among the muses."


Weiss, Allen S. "Culinary Manifestations of the Genius Loci." Eating Architecture. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. 2004, pp. 25.

Isidore of Seville, in his seventh century work Isidori Hispalensis Episcopi Etymologiarum sive Originum, reminds us of the relationship between cuisine and reason:  he etymologizes the word sapiens (wise, rational) and proposes sapor (taste) as its source, explaining that “just as the sense of taste is able to discern the flavours of different foods, so too is the wise man able to discern objects and their causes since he recognizes each one as distinct and is able to judge them with an instinct for truth.”  Taste, defined as such, is the interdisciplinary means for assessing and appreciating all that exists – and thus the instigation behind creativity and change.

At its base level, taste is intuitive: in our search for survival, we must sense what is good to eat, and in our pursuit of pleasure, we must discriminate.  This primary stage of assessment is what Brillat-Savarin, the 18^th century philosopher who founded the field of gastronomy, refers to as the “first perception.”  The next level, the “first impression”, occurs only after the object is “well-chewed,” after we recognize the depth and range of “flavours” the object possesses.  Comprehension arouses a level of “personal judgment”, in which the flavours we perceive are weighed on our individual scales of pleasure and pain.  Taste, therefore, cannot be forced upon us, but must rather arise out of intuition, be formed by experience, and developed over time through practice.

Naturally, therefore, I turned to another field of interest to develop my sense of taste – gastronomy – after I found limited opportunity to practice architecture, my academic field of study.  As opposed to my current position in the architectural practice, in the kitchen, I have complete license to be the designer, the craftsman and the client, all at once.  As the designer, I take stock of the tools and ingredients available, and find creative ways to accommodate both personal preference and nutrition.  Interactions and connections with suppliers aid my search for sustainable resources, and the insights they offer help me create a composition to maximize the performance and aesthetics of the ingredients.  As the craftsman, I draw on self-taught skills and learn new skills to create the proposed dishes, but, more importantly, take time to dwell on each ingredient, and contemplate the potentials embedded in it – for, in the words of Richard Sennet in his book The Craftsman, all of my “efforts to do good quality work depend on curiosity about the material at hand.”  As the client in the kitchen, I set parameters before cooking, and taste the results after.

The dishes that come out of my kitchen are expressions of both my personal taste and my world.  My methods are revealed by my recipes – or lack thereof – and illustrate how and when I incorporate nutrition, personality, community responsibility and delight.  This “recipe book” is the story of how practical experience – even if in a different discipline – develops our sense taste, and how cooking can inspire and enrich architecture.