Just as I think I’m ready to move on from my own drama, embrace new work, and look down the road to summer, the publication of my forthcoming book, Plum Gorgeous: Recipes and Tales from the Orchard, and my daughter’s high school graduation (and what that means for her, as well as me), My Nepenthe has a way of drawing me back in to the fold, caressing memories I had forgotten or relegated to the back burners of my mind.

Since January, I’ve wracked up some serious book mileage, from Berkeley to Carmel, and south to Santa Barbara for events, where I was well feted, fed, and cared for. At each there is always someone that tells me a story about their Nepenthe that brightens my day, whether it’s happily landing there after driving through a harried storm on their first visit to Big Sur only to discover a fog shrouded paradise, or dancing all night under the stars on the terrace back in the day, to –get this–”I think we are related.”

And naturally, a longer, more winded story about family, and my grandfather’s Fassett family roots in Elmira, New York unfold. That story had to be pursued, at a Monday night dinner, soon after, at the esteemed Bay Wolf restaurant in Oakland, whose owner, I may be related to, via a marriage and two kids. You can see where this is going.

And yet, this is how it goes.

That is, the layers of connectedness that is Nepenthe, and that is also writing, putting yourself out there, making new friends, and discovering the power of food and words to tell a story and draw us in. And so, the grand theatre of My Nepenthe, of food, family, and gathering around the table, continues, this time at San Francisco’s venerable Commonwealth Club. I’ll be speaking along with fellow authors who craft their own delicious stories with food at the centerpiece.

Join us.

Thursday, March 31st.

The Art of the Food Memoir

M.F.K. Fisher set the standard for food memoir with her collection of essays, The Art of Eating, and Ruth Reichl continues to entertain us with her culinary escapades. Food memoirs delight and inspire us. These three Bay Area authors will share their journeys in writing and eating with us.

Dayna Macy, Author, Ravenous: A Food Lover’s Journey from Obsession to Freedom
Kate Moses, Author, Cakewalk: A Memoir
Romney Steele, Author, My Nepenthe: Bohemian Tales of Food, Family and Big Sur
Davina Baum, Managing Editor, Chow – Moderator

MLF: Bay Gourmet
Location: SF Club Office
Date: March 31, 2011
Time: 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program
Cost: $8 members, $20 non-members, $7 students (with valid ID)
Program Organizer: Cathy Curtis

Above Photo Credit: Richard Friedman
See more of his photos from the BPLF Dinner here.