table talk / By Joseph Byrd

Extreme Dining and Copyrighted Food

Unfortunately, it’s a doomed effort. For one thing, literary works are copyright because words can be analyzed and codified. If, however, I want to imitate a protected recipe, all I need to do is change the name. Similarly, if I want to repaint Picasso’s “Three Musicians,” no one can stop me, unless I fraudulently represent it as an original Picasso. (Of course, who would want to buy Joseph Byrd’s “Three Musicians”?)

Nonetheless, Moto’s chef/owner, Homaro Cantu, has set about filing for copyright of both his recipes and his processes. And actually printing “© 2007” on a small card made of cotton candy!

There is an undertone throughout all this controversy that is defensive - after all, chefs are certainly as creative as any other artists, but they receive no royalties, there are few ways of making serious money from cooking, and only a handful are good enough at both art and business to create a restaurant empire. And is creating an empire the solution?

Lost in the controversy is a bigger question: Is this the wave of the future? Will we be eating mango-flavored origami and lobster foam on Mars? Actually, Cantu has been talking with NASA about applying his techniques to space missions. But the expense of such cuisine (ingredients, industrial devices, labor) is daunting. El Bulli is in business only half the year - the other half is used for research and development - and employs 50 cooks, most of them unpaid, for a dining room that seats only 60. Of course, a Guide Michelin three-star establishment can charge a small fortune for dinner, and their entire 2007 season is already sold out.

Returning to Roxanne’s, recall that despite its celebrity and extravagant prices, it ultimately failed - even millionaires have their limits. And as interesting as the evening was, it was hardly something we’d want to do on a daily basis. The word “precious” comes to mind. Cooking is a creative craft, but at its heart are the basic human values of sustenance and comfort. Even Chef Goldfarb eats a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich for breakfast. So I say no, this is novelty, not prophecy; a phenomenon, not a trend.

But what do I know? Forty years ago I would have sworn there was no way Americans would ever eat cold sticky rice and raw fish for dinner.

Joseph Byrd can be e-mailed at eat.your.spinach@gmail.com. He is presenting a paper on whitewashing history in American music textbooks at the American Culture Association Conference in Boston in April.

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