Rare treats

Rodrick Markus reached for the top shelf of a metal cabinet at the back of his office. "I know, I know, I know," he said to himself. His fingers worked across a row of jars and stopped at a tall glass cylinder. I had asked him about rare ingredients. Rare ingredients is about 40 percent of what he does. He locates tough-to-acquire things for chefs who, being chefs, want something especially bad when they are told it will be impossible to get. Rare vegetables, salts, oils, spices, nuts, fish eggs — he finds the guy who locates the guy who heard of the guy who knows the guy who knows about, say, a place in the Pacific Northwest where, with the right permit at the right time, you can forage for a rare pine bark that grows 25 feet in the air.

Christopher Borrelli

November 29, 2012