But that is what Riverstone Kitchen's Bevan Smith, whose Waitaki Plains restaurant won New Zealand Restaurant of the Year in 2010, did for four women who had bid for the privilege at a fundraising auction.
Angela Chamberlain, of Gore, bid $2100 for a Taste of Waitaki package for four, auctioned at the Southland Starlight Charity Ball auction.
She invited fellow ball committee members Loshni Manikam (Winton), Sue Bower (Invercargill) and Jane Smith (Five Forks) along, although she suspected some of them may have been bidding against her.
The package gave them two nights' accommodation at Highfield Mews in Oamaru, cooking and lunch with Mr Smith and dinner at Fleur's Place in Moeraki. The highlight of the trip was the visit to Riverstone Kitchen, where Mr Smith had selected recipes from his cookbooks to prepare with them for lunch.
They were Jerusalem artichoke with hot smoked salmon and creme fraiche, accompanied by freshly-made focaccia bread; roast lamb with sauteed potatoes, baby beetroot and salsa verde; cherry almond tarts; and apple, date and walnut cake with coffee, accompanied by an Ostler Waitaki Valley wine.
All keen cooks, the women were in on the whole process from 9am to dining about 1pm, including smoking the freshly-caught Mt Cook salmon and breaking down a lamb to produce the roast. Fresh ingredients were collected from Riverstone's garden.
''It feels a surreal experience,'' Mrs Smith said about being in the kitchen watching and learning from Mr Smith.
One feature was the practical ways in which he approached complicated processes. Mr Smith pointed out that chefs had to come up with the quickest way possible to produce the best quality, with the best possible ingredients. That was something he tried to pass on through his cookbooks, he said.
