_sera Buena Persona El Cocinero - Javier Marias... «Authentic»

If he were a bad man, his excellence was a deception. We were consuming his discipline, his technique, his professional mask—but never his soul. And yet, if he were a truly good man, why did he hide in the steam and the heat, away from the eyes of those he nourished?

To be a "good person" is a vague, almost decorative concept in our world, a label we apply to those who don’t cause us immediate trouble. But with Custodio, the question felt urgent. If he were not a good person—if he were, let’s say, a man capable of a sudden, quiet cruelty—would that bitterness not find its way into the ossobuco ? Could a hand that had struck a face in anger, or signed a treacherous letter, truly garnish a plate with the necessary mercy? _Sera buena persona el cocinero - Javier Marias...

I have often thought that the person who feeds us holds a power over our lives that is far more absolute, and perhaps more terrifying, than that of a doctor or a lover. The doctor intervenes when the damage is already done, and the lover’s betrayal is, at most, a matter of the spirit; but the cook—the man who stands behind the swinging doors of a kitchen, invisible and methodical—possesses the immediate capacity to alter our physical reality, to sustain it or to subtly undermine it, while we sit in the dining room discussing trivialities or the latest political disgrace. If he were a bad man, his excellence was a deception

My friend Berta, who accompanied me that evening and who has the unfortunate habit of believing that everyone is exactly who they appear to be, laughed at my inquiry. To be a "good person" is a vague,