I must tell you that I had the most amazing and lovely lunch yesterday at a restaurant called Raw.

For some reason, I have occasionally asked myself where I would invite you to dine should you ever visit San Francisco. It is a perplexing question, because there are several restaurants in this city, some of them quite good. Now I am content that I would simply invite you to dine with me at Raw, and that would be that.

Raw's cuisine is extremely vegetarian. They don't just use organic produce, they use produce from farmers who plant their organic veggies unusually far apart, so they can absorb more stuff from the ground around them. They douse these pampered plants only with spring water. Then, Raw takes delivery twice daily to insure hyper-freshness. All of this, you may think to yourself, is a normal level of excess for a vegetarian restaurant in the Bay Area. Hah! I have not even gotten to the part about how they refuse to cook anything they serve at Raw, because heat is harmful. One reads in their menu-manifesto: You need only hold your hand over a flame to witness how truly damaging heat is. So the food is raw at Raw. Perhaps you are not yet picking up the phone to make a reservation. Silly human! Raw's cuisine is gourmet in the most delightful, how'd-they-do-that sense of the word.

Picture me seated on floor cushions in a window that is warmed by just enough sunlight. My meal starts with a cold soup, Raw's version of a Thai tom ka ghai. Coconut and garlic circulate in this luscious, inexplicable broth. There are cubes of the most juicily marinated portabella mushroom, morsels of asparagus, pungent leaves, bits of walnut, and one little floating lily pad that tastes like the color green.

My entree is called Old Mantobi, or something like that. It comes on an eighteen-inch, circular, painted platter. In the center of the platter is a generous pile of the very same guacamole that Our Father eats in Heaven. The Godly guacamole is surrounded by slices of Jerusalem artichoke (looks like large ginger and tastes like mild turnip) and a kind of radish that has internal whorls of hot pink and white. There are foot-long juliennes of a jolly-tasting carrot that jut, whisker-like, from the guacamole. Red cabbage confetti strands decorate the platter's wide rim. And, I have saved this for last: The guacamole heap is topped with a thick sprinkling of wild rice. But this is not cooked wild rice, because such cruelty is not allowed at Raw. No, this wild rice has been lovingly rinsed in spring water for 30 days, until it reaches such a state of relaxation that it consents to an edible consistency and a rich, nut flavor. Oh, and I forgot, picture a ripe yellow cherry tomato or three atop the whole mess.

I'm told the desserts are not to be missed. Unfortunately, my companion and I had to miss them. We had other engagements, and we had already spent two hours in the wonderful window seats at Raw, chewing, chewing, chewing our veggies and experiencing, as the menu promised, "rejevenation in our sole."

Raw. Come visit some time. Now I'm ready!

Chow! - Marilyn