This year Chakrubs celebrated Earth Day with the launch of our new Forest Line, an all-wood collection of pleasure tools made in collaboration with natural dyer Cara Marie Piazza. Founder Vanessa Cuccia hosted an intimate gathering at Fitzcarraldo in Brooklyn, New York, to debut the line, transforming their rustic interiors into a playground for the imagination, complete with a five-course, floral-inspired cuisine prepared by chef Elisa da Prato.
Elisa Da Prato is a chef dedicated to crafting incredible food and joyful experiences around eating. Da Prato employs an erotic and metaphysical approach to cooking, presenting dishes that celebrate the natural world as well as the human experience tied to cooking, eating, and oral tradition. Her dishes are wild celebrations of edible flowers, handmade pastas, wild game, savory fruit incarnations, and a bent for ingredients that allow one to taste the earth, soil, air and rain whenever possible. She hosts a lively supper club series as well as pop-up dinners and private events in and around New York City.
When describing her inspiration for the Forest Line launch dinner, da Prato said, “I was trying to think of a dinner party thrown for nymphs and Gods, held in the forest. It was a menu celebrating trees, specifically pine, and the energy of flowers. The flower bites are part of my ancient Roman recipe project, where I’m trying to envision passed finger foods at parties thrown by mythological figures.”
Da Prato is Italian-American like Cuccia, and their shared heritage was a huge inspiration in the creation of The Forest Line as well as the launch party dinner. Some of the dishes prepared by Da Prato included pasta made from pine and flowers and pink salad.
The Forest Line is eco-conscious and sustainable, and those themes extended to Chef da Prato’s multi-course meal. “Most everything was local and organic, except for a couple of Italian imports,” she said.
For more information or to attend one of Elisa’s dinner parties, please visit elisadaprato.com.
See the event recap video on our Youtube Channel!