Cauliflower Gratin from Thomas Keller's Bouchon Cookbook - How a Book Can Breed a Diva

It's been five years now. Almost six.

It's at that point where we don't really notice each other anymore because we have the exact same routine, sit in the exact same place, maintain the exact same position, day. After. Day.

Every morning, I make a mind-numbing 90-second commute from the bedroom to my "home office," an antique desk (read: "garage sale") shoved behind the couch into a crowded, cramped corner of the living room in the same one bedroom apartment in which we've been for the last six years. I grind and churn there for 18, 19, sometimes 20 hours a day, ignoring the tiny world around me, separated from the rest of the room physically by a 24" monitor. That's nothing compared to the distance created by time, difference, and indifference.

Sometimes a phone will ring. A device will vibrate. But other than that, it's almost dead silent.

At the end of every night, I heave myself out of my chair. I used to stand in a final stretch looking toward the sitting area, searching for encouragement, inspiration, motivation, but those have all long since faded. These days, I've already dragged myself halfway to the bedroom before I pause for just a moment to look back out of the corner of my eye with something of a pathetic hope. Maybe...?

I always go to bed by myself.

Or worse, with my laptop.

Five years now, almost six, of...nothing. Well, no. Once — maybe twice — in a moment of diet-deprived depression mixed with desperation, I mistook heat from too much wine during a silent dinner for lukewarm passion. There was an awkward grab, confusing hope, clumsy shuffling, hopeful confusion, familiar but unfamiliar expressions, stumbling toward the kitchen, before sobering to the realization that, yes, yet again, the magic wasn't going to happen.

And that cumbersome, heavy, too complicated copy of the Bouchon cookbook goes right back to where it always sits.

Northwest corner of the marble slab coffee table, barely broken binding visible to me from my desk, though I never see it.

It's true. I received Thomas Keller's Bouchon cookbook as a gift (from an ex ex Ex who is amazingly now a good friend - it must be the book) way back when it was released with the same excitement as the buzz surrounding the release of TKell's most recent cookbook Ad Hoc at Home. The Bouchon cookbook is beautiful, with full-frontal food porn of tied up birds and glossy orgies of roasted vegetables that ooze off the edge of the page, lots of white space around the text, and silky integration of the restaurant's branding.

When I first opened it, I turned every page. Without reading recipes, I stuck tiny non-committal post-it flags on pictures of foods I wanted to make. Roast chicken! Quiche! Even French words for simple things like a tuna sandwich made them sound too sexy to not make - Tartine de Thon a la Nicoise!

As beautiful as it is though, the book is also big. No, it's huge. The Bouchon cookbook is so enormous that it rivals the marble slab I currently have in front of the sofa for coffee table status. I could barely haul the thing across the room to the kitchen, let alone make room for it on the countertop in my closet of a kitchen, especially when open to double its width. And even when I mustered the strength and space, I realized that the recipes, even for something as simple as a tuna sandwich, are as complicated as their French pronunciation for a girl from Dey-twah.

The post-it flags fell off, one by one.

But something happened in the last few weeks the broke through the monotony that had settled in after five years. A new cookbook, obsessive search journeys through the night for Ad Hoc recipes, giveaways, signings, appearances, and a blowtorch. A new restaurant, VIP parties, red carpet, and the Kellerati. Buzz. Hype.

That wicked feeling which lay crushed under the weight of a book was coming black. Magic.

I was looking at the Bouchon cookbook like it was brand new to me. The PostIt flags came back out, but this time more careful, placed with real intent, cautious reads before more commitment. Roast Chicken, again. No Quiche this time. Maybe the Moules au Safran et a la Moutarde.

Cauliflower Gratin.

It seemed like an uncomplicated way to ease back into a love affair with Bouchon. Side dishes are simple. Gratins are forgiving. Cauliflower is...

...in the hands of Thomas Keller?

A diva.

The list of ingredients for the gratin is not unusually long, and the directions fit onto one page. However, the recipe is complicated. It requires advance planning. A lot of attention. An entire entourage of high maintenance machines. A luxury suite's worth of space to accommodate said entourage as well as a double wide book open to the recipe. Just click on the photo. Zoom to 100%. Yes, that's about how big it is. Print it out, hot glue gun it to your bathtub, then try to put that on your countertop to cook from it.

I was endeared to the use of the oft-wasted tough core of the cauliflower. "Oh, that TKells," I thought. "He doesn't like to waste. He must be Korean on the inside."

Then the rest of the recipe followed and I had to softly wonder, "WHAT THE FOCK?" You need: a cutting board, a knife, a paring knife, a food processor AND a blender (both?!), a saucepan, a large bowl, a slotted spoon, a grater (it's not stated in the recipe, but I highly doubt that TKells expects you to buy a canister of grated cheese), a gratin dish and a metal skewer. This does not even include basic things you have to use in cooking anything, like measuring cups, spoons, bowls, and couple of ritalin.

I didn't have a metal skewer. I have a gawdammed digital kitchen scale, but you don't need one for this recipe. Come on, it's just a cauliflower gratin.

You also have to turn on your stove top, the oven AND the broiler.

All this for four servings of cauliflower mixed with cheese and breadcrumbs.

It sings.