I HAD called once to make my reservation, and then again to confirm it, but it wasn’t until I telephoned to say I was running late that I really heard the greeting.

“Thank you for calling Ubuntu,” a woman chirped, pausing for a comma before adding, “restaurant and yoga studio.”

And yoga studio?

Somehow that hadn’t sunk in before. And the way she said it, putting the lotus on a par with the lettuce, filled me with skepticism about this promised vegetarian Eden in the Edenic Napa Valley.

Her response when I vowed to hustle there from the San Francisco airport as quickly as possible didn’t help.

“Please,” she intoned in the kind of ultrasoothing voice that only a person with perfectly aligned chakras and the entire Deepak Chopra library can summon. “Drive safely.”

What kind of Kumbaya cuisine was I in for?

Several fistfuls of lavender-dusted almonds, some truffle-flecked polenta and an avocado pudding later, I had my answer: inspired, exhilarating cooking of a caliber I couldn’t have imagined.

Full article in New York Times

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