After a meal fit for kings …

at Aubergine in Carmel, no blogging tonight. Except to say chantarelles, truffles, duck and fois gras with huckleberries, Kobe beef, sardines (that’s right, I ate a sardine and I liked it!), oyster vichyssoise, poached quail egg, tuna tartare, braised oxtail, marrow souffle … Sometime tomorrow, when I am recovered, I’ll say more … about beautiful Big Sur, how gentlemen use the turnouts, our posh Monterey resort, lunch at Hearst’s pier and loving and leaving Paso Robles.

PS A tale of good karma: You know you’ve done something right when the heavily perfumed woman just seated next to you in the middle of your most extravagant and exquisitely subtle meal, insists on a better table all the way across the room! Praise the culinary gods.