Haute Vegetables Conquer $500 Menus as Meat Demoted to Flavoring

The $500 tasting menu at the Restaurant at Meadowood, in St. Helena, California, begins with a leaf. Four leaves, actually, stuck to two stems and seasoned with salt. “Borage,” my waiter says.

After the leaf course come a kale chip, a ball of carrot cake, a pumpernickel macaron, lily bulbs and radish pods -- a collection of ingredients that, if placed in a plastic bag and sold from a roadside stand, wouldn’t fetch enough money to cover the $40 taxi ride back to my hotel. (The hotel is just 6 miles away; tasting menus aren’t the only expensive thing here in the Napa Valley.)