A chef battles cancer that robbed him of his sense of taste

CHICAGO

The dining room at Alinea is a rare and special place where dark-suited waiters glide past tables, carrying trays laden with fantastical creations: Steelhead roe in coconut suspended from vanilla pods. Granola-encrusted bison with oatmeal foam. Sweet potato and bourbon tempura pierced by a smoking cinnamon stick.

Dining as performance art. It is one reason people flock to this restaurant named the best in the country by Gourmet Magazine and considered by many to be among the best in the world.

Alinea means new train of thought, and that is what 34-year-old Grant Achatz is all about. He wants diners to be dazzled by his daring, to chuckle at his whimsy and even to weep at the memories some dishes evoke.

But the most startling aspect of that performance is not the food. It is that the man who spends 17 hours a day orchestrating it has never tasted some of his creations.

Last summer Achatz was diagnosed with advanced tongue cancer.

His latest dishes were conceived at a chemotherapy clinic as poison dripped into his body, killing not just his malignant cells but also his sense of taste.

Taste, Achatz says, is more than what happens on the tongue. "It is about emotion, translating a feeling, a memory, an experience."

Achatz is thoughtful and soft-spoken, his thin, freckled face radiating youth and vigor, though he acknowledges the toll cancer has taken.

But illness is not something he focuses on at Alinea, where everything is about creativity and emotion.

"We want to reset your mind," Achatz said, grinning.

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After graduating from the Culinary Institute of America, Achatz landed a job at Thomas Keller's renowned Napa Valley restaurant The French Laundry when he was just 23.

Under Keller, Achatz learned how to prepare classics, but he also learned the sheer force of will it takes to work in a top kitchen.

Achatz reveres Keller. But he was restless to find his own culinary voice. In 2000 he spent a week in Spain with chef Ferran Adria at the El Bulli restaurant in Catalonia. Achatz was mesmerized.

Adria is at the forefront of a cuisine called molecular gastronomy — a kind of fusion of kitchen and science lab. Ingredients like agar agar and carrageenan are used to thicken and mold food in unconventional ways.

Achatz returned to California with a new sense of inventiveness.

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Achatz first noticed the little white spot on his tongue in the hectic months leading up to the opening of Alinea. A dentist fitted him for a night guard and told him not to worry.

Achatz was too busy to worry. Achatz and Kokonas had found a two-story office building in tony Lincoln Park which they planned to demolish and rebuild into a 20-table restaurant with one of the most exotic menus in the world.

The buzz just grew after the restaurant opened May 4, 2005. It exploded after Gourmet named Alinea the best restaurant in America in October 2006.

Achatz was hotter than ever. Everyone, it seemed, wanted to dine at his restaurant or visit the inner sanctuary where his creations are born.

The kitchen at Alinea is as rare as the dining room. Nothing seems rushed or loud and there is a startling absence of smoke.

Here, every cook is called "chef." Everyone sweeps the floor. And when something is wrong, everyone can sense it.

By the summer of 2007, Achatz was barely able to speak. The sore on his tongue was also affecting his appetite and his taste.

His dentist diagnosed stress. A biopsy came back negative. Relieved, Achatz wedged chewing gum between his tooth and tongue and tried to ignore the pain.

And then, in early July, his tongue exploded overnight into a throbbing swollen mass that left him barely able to swallow.

Nothing prepared Achatz for the news: stage 4 squamous cell cancer. Doctors needed to operate immediately — to cut out three-quarters of his tongue in order to save his life.

"That's not going to happen," Achatz muttered.

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There is a late afternoon ritual at Alinea when the wait staff, hosts and sommeliers gather in the upstairs dining room for a preservice briefing with the master. Achatz talks about menu changes, how to serve certain dishes, and who might be dining that night.

When the ritual was broken last summer, when instead the entire staff was asked to assemble downstairs, everyone knew something was terribly wrong.

They gathered around a small black phone consul. Achatz's voice crackled through. He told them he was in New York's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center with some of the best doctors in the world, and he was confident. He hadn't come this far to be beaten down by disease.

Instead of the standard therapy — removing the tumor surgically, followed by radiation and chemotherapy — doctors would reverse the order. Aggressive chemotherapy, using promising new drugs, followed by radiation to shrink and kill the tumor. Surgery might still be necessary later, but it would be less radical.

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From the start, Achatz made it clear that he considered cancer an unpleasant interruption that would not affect his standards or creativity.

His understanding of ingredients didn't die with chemo, Achatz pointed out. Nor did his flavor memory. And though he no longer trusted his own palate, he did trust that of his sous-chef who had worked with him for years.

But all the mental fortitude in the world couldn't conceal the horror of being strapped onto a gurney, a huge, black radiation machine humming as it gunned deadly rays into his tongue.

It was torture for Achatz to stay away from his restaurant. Though he often drove straight to work after treatment, there were days he simply couldn't let staff or clients see how sick he was.

In mid-December, Achatz had a final checkup. He still couldn't taste and his immune system was spent. It would probably be a year before he would feel normal again.

But the scans were clear. The cancer was gone.