“All the flavors lined up, an army getting into ranks: peeled, ground almonds; elderflowers; bread, sugar, the lush heat of ginger. It is hard, looking back, to remember exactly what a mouthful like that would have done to me, but I think it would have told me some kind of small but complicated story, or perhaps I would have seen a piece of carved ivory, for all the white things: almonds, bread, flowers, sugar. Something obvious like flames for the ginger, or less obvious: a sun-warmed brick or a cockerel's comb.
What do I remember about this particular bowl of menestra, though, is that nothing like that happened. I tasted... almonds. I still saw them as bright green in my mind's eye, but somehow it didn't take over the whole world. Instead I thought to myself: There are almonds in this. An almond is a nut. It grows on a tree. A tree with sweet white flowers, of course, and there's the nut itself, nestled inside its speckled, woody shell. I found myself savoring the milky bitterness of almond meat, noticing how the sugar seemed to flow over the bitter, not destroying it but creating a separate taste. The ginger and the elderflowers fell into each other's arms, and all four things sank into the comforting blandness of the soaked bread. To my amazement I discovered that I could keep each clamoring taste, with its color, in its place; and pick out other flavors too, each with its own color and image. I dipped my spoon in again, tasted, swallowed. Another spoonful, then another. The flavors weren't disappearing into nothingness, they were becoming part of me.”