An imagined gathering
1961 · Greenwich Village, New York
Beard and Fisher, two of the great American eaters, spend an evening on oysters, onion sandwiches, and gossip.
Beard and Fisher have known each other for years and need no occasion to eat together. He opens oysters because she likes them, and makes his infamous onion sandwich because he likes to watch people react to it; she brings a bottle of something cold and a fund of stories about people they both know.
They are not writing anything tonight. They are two people who have made a life out of paying attention to food, and the pleasure of the evening is in talking shop with the only other person in New York who takes it as seriously as they do.
Host: James Beard
M.F.K. Fisher — Author of *Consider the Oyster* and a close friend of Beard's.
This gathering is an editorial recreation grounded in the biographies of those present; it did not necessarily take place as described.