Raccoon and Lobster

I was settling in for a quiet evening curled up with my copy of Ad Hoc at Home when I come across a picture of Thomas Keller lovingly admiring a spoon.

“I do love to spoon,” he says, “I love spoons the way I love eggs, for the beauty of their shape and their multiple uses.”

And as I read those words, something itched in the back of my skull. I remembered a blog post that I had happened across several months ago, while browsing food blogs late into the night. It was an ode by a pastry chef, written to her favorite spoon. I suddenly felt compelled to find that post again and so I began to google. It took me a few minutes to happen across the phrase “pastry chef spoon favorite sauce” and suddenly the words Gray Kunz appeared in several search results. I knew immediately that this was the spoon, even though I had not yet found the post.

One more search brought me to the post I was looking for but my journey was not to stop there. What I had originally thought was one chef’s quirky love affair with a simple utensil suddenly seemed to be much bigger than that. In the comments to that post were two people talking about their own love for their Kunz spoons and a later there was a link by a third person to a post on his blog, also about this Gray Kunz spoon. Why were so many people talking about this particular spoon? It appears second on a list of top gifts for chefs, there is an entire thread about it at eGullet, and several chefs list it as their number one utensil. Everywhere I looked, people were talking about this damn spoon.

He then presents me with two items, a Gray Kunz spoon and a small, offset spatula.  “These are two items that every cook in my kitchen receives.  They are essential tools of this kitchen, and we use them every day.”

When I was at Lespinasse everyone had to work with a special spoon that the JB Prince Company later marketed under Gray’s name. Once you get used to it, you really can’t go back to using any other type of spoon.

My Kunz spoon was given to me by a chef at The French Laundry. I have treasured it for 6 years now. Everyone on the line knows not to touch my spoon.

And so it was that sometime after midnight on a Saturday evening, I suddenly found myself in desperate need of a spoon. A spoon that so many chefs had passed on to their protégés. A spoon that invoked deep love and undying devotion from so many chefs. The mythical Gray Kunz would be mine. After reading all of those comments singing the praise of this spoon in almost fetishistic tones, there could be no other spoon that could fill the spoon-shaped hole in my heart.

Already I am dizzy thinking of the things I can scoop, ladle, baste, drizzle and ye gods, form a quenelle with. Have mercy! I do not know if my delicate heart can endure the eons that stand between me and my fated love.