It's often a wonder what is more important in journey's; the physical aspect or the emotional? Can you have a journey involving just emotions without the physical? Of course, but often, the physical is what makes the emotions real.

The reality that we inhabit is what we perceive as our mind tells us. Perhaps what I see as white you see as green; just that we both agree it's white. So to what extent are our senses and emotions working in tandem with each other to create our perception of reality, and what is good, bad, real or fake?

I thought this was an interesting topic to ponder about after dinner tonight at Swilly's, the restaurant in downtown Pullman which is a lot more swanky then I first thought. The question in particular is about the substantiating satisfaction to what a meal should consist and how one should feel weighing in factors of price, flavor, enjoyment and what primal expectations are for that meal in question.

This arose from a discussion of Le Bernadin in New York where many a guests have complained about leaving not satisfied, physically and to an extent, emotionally - but are the two not connected when it comes to food? Scientists often do tests to subject humans in isolating key components of what is perceived as good or bad to us and we all well know the power of packaging and a way food is sold to us. Emotions are sometimes forgotten but we can never truly re-create that meal in the back of our minds when our mothers fed to us when we were five. These emotional journeys back into ones mind are truly both a physical and sensual experience.

I remember when I was young and probably up until I was about fourteen or fifteen, my mother would dry my hair after I showered. It is perhaps a period of time when the rest of the world could be hell bent on fire, chaos and destruction and nothing would matter knowing the maternal embrace would forever protect me. Losing myself was an option for I knew I would always be found.

So perhaps with food, one can lose oneself into it and be found again. The question of what would your final meal be illicit one answer for me: a plate of steamed rice, a fried egg and soy sauce with a little cut chili. Perhaps my mother made this for me, probably not, probably it was the other mothers I had, maids that made sure we were fed, cleaned our rooms and washed our clothes.

It is perhaps an inconceivable way and need to show respect to those that were there but not always recognized. A perfect plate of steamed white Thai jasmine rice is a thing of beauty. The steam that comes of it is mesmerizing and intoxicating if you put your head over the rice cooker. A perfume that resonates through the mind of the physicality involved in thousands of years of human agriculture. The texture is neither too hard nor too soft and it is the fine threshold too which only someone who has been cooking rice for a long time can achieve. It's not just a ratio and numbers, well, perhaps it is. But to the mind its also these emotional connections to one's food. Jasmine rice is perfumed, but on it's own it is sweet and just yielding. It's flavor is never oppressive but always encourages bonding, for it is rice that will always find friends with others being a character that is never too demanding for anything, and always accepting of everything - a quality that my mother had for me.

A flawlessly fried egg is also a thing of pure joy, beauty and ecstasy. The textural contrasts of a molten hot crispy white imbued with the soft pillow of  just set whites in juxtaposition to the creamy, rich and transcendental over flowing yolk speaks of many things. Those sharp crunches are perhaps the difficulties in life, the physical and emotional when things look tough, when one is sick and the points of which if over done results in a terrible fried egg. But these blisters amidst the soft albumin speaks of character and of journeys not wrought for simply abandonment. Much greater pleasure is to be had if there is a contrasts - work hard and sow the rewards for what is to come. The soft whites then, those fields and plains of which a thin threshold can fall over to recklessness and futile abandonment to self preservation and happiness. It is in these that a fragile existent exists, one knowing all too well that an over cooked egg, is a sad and depressing event. So we come to the yolk, a pure golden flow of fat and protein that can bind together the worst of enemies, temper angers and in its greatest form will always comfort or provide pure pleasure and bliss. The yolk is both dirty and salvation. Perhaps the more primal part of the dish, it is always the good things in life that can metaphorically describe the yolk - pleasure in an orb that can so easily fall apart if not looked after though perhaps, it is the breaking of the yolk which is more pleasurable. The act of bursting open the all that joy, all that hope and all that life has to offer to over flow over the rest reminds us that if we have a good thing amongst us, let it not go to waste ever. All the highlights of the worlds be it past, present or future lies in this very substance, one that cannot be trifled with and should command respect from the greatest of humankind.

To that we have the soy sauce. Again, a process of human ingenuity to find something that is tasty and that can keep - not enough appreciate the fermenting steps that many of our foods have. Wine, cheese, pickles. All great accomplishments which like they say, "are best friends - highly thought off, but often forgotten". The salty component which always accentuates its companions brings a certain joie de vivre to the plate, reminding us of each characteristics and what we have come to achieve. The rice is that much sweeter and toothsome, the egg whites are more crispy, sharp and dimensional whilst the silken yolk elixir becomes richer and that much more rewarding. Yes you can have life without fun, but what kind of life is without the pleasure of those around you which merely wish to have as much joy as you do and are willing to bring it?

Finally it is the cut chili's, a tang of pain which is always the guilty pleasures. You feel terrible but you can't stop. Why? Perhaps it is that negative emotion that we so wish to tap into, a darker place in the soul where opening the door can make you lose yourself. To know that pain in someplace is perhaps better then pain elsewhere. Schadenfreude? Perhaps. Guilty pleasures are the greatest - stealing food from someone always taste better then the stuff you craft or had to pay for. Sadists will be happy in this then, a plate that can compose the will of humanity and destroy its dreams at the same time.

A perfect plate of food that encompasses a physical and emotional journey, through its every crack, trough, spine and valley.

The perfect meal for ones end.