Marsden Gentry’s Finest Meal
A 15 Minute Story of the Day
Once a month, a group of chefs gathered together to dine together, to discuss their great passion for cuisine and drink an awful lot of alcohol. They took turns hosting the event at their restaurants, taking turns cooking for their friends.
The conversation flowed as freely as the wine. On this particular night, the gathering was being held at Marsden Gentry’s restaurant Stefanique. Dinner had been devoured and the scotch had emerged.
The topic of conversation turned to the finest meal one had ever eaten.
One chef spoke of a particularly fine restaurant in the city. Another spoke of a hole in the wall on the other side of the word, still another said his mother’s homemade pasta. When it was time for the host to spin his tale, his face was more serious than any of them would have expected.
“A bowl of rice, “ Marsden said.
Marsden had lost track of how long he had been wandering in the desert. He was having trouble discerning whether it was night or day as his eyes had been sunbleached blind by the white of the cracked earth. He still had water, but he had not eaten in so long that if he thought about it too much he would start crying again.
In the distance he saw a dark blotch. He didn’t want to get his hopes up. He’d been disappointed before when what he thought was salvation was really just a rock or a gnarled and dead tree.
As he got closer, he saw that there was a building. He hardly dared to hope that it was real, let alone that it was a home, but as he got closer, he saw smoke coming out of the chimney. He collapsed on the front door step, only barely managing to knock.
A woman answered the door and pulled him inside, and she gave him a bowl of rice, apologizing for not having more for him.
Marsden licked his lips. “I’ve been trying to recreate the taste all my life, of rice to a starving boy. It was so clean, so pure, so satisfying.”
Marsden wept as he shoveled more of the rice into his mouth. It was the best thing he’d ever tasted.
The End
Written 9/8/2022
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