Wondering where to eat last night

Somebody suggested a Japanese steak house

Something I had not done for twenty years

It was almost full on arrival

They squeezed us in at one corner

Nine hungry faces on three sides

A shiny hot plate in the middle

A waiter took our orders

I chose chicken and shrimp

We smiled and nodded at our neighbors

Sipping cold sake and waiting for the show

The chef wheeled in a cart piled high with food

He verified the order for each person

Before performing a juggling act

With a pair of very sharp knives

We were all waiting for a severed finger to drop onto the hot plate

Thankfully that never happened

Next he squirted a pool of oil and ignited it with a lighter

A huge fireball shot up into the vent hood over the table

Everybody checked their eyebrows

He brought out some raw eggs for more juggling

Smashing each one ceremoniously

They sizzled and hissed as he chopped and mixed

Beating a rhythm into the food

The eggs cooked fast

Boiled white rice was dumped over the eggs

More oil and butter was added

Finally a squirt of soy sauce

Moving every grain of rice in a beating blur

Piling each portion onto the side of a cleaver

Expertly launching fried rice onto each plate

We all smiled in appreciation

As the steak, chicken, prawns and scallops danced on the searing hot plate

The razor sharp knife reduced the slices of meat into bite size chunks

Added to our plates alongside the rice

A mountain of vegetable filled the hotplate

Slicing and dicing as they shrunk into an oily hot lake

An onion was expertly sliced into rings

Reassembled into a volcano

Filled with oil and lit for the finale

Flames erupted from the top

Applause erupted too

The show was over

It was time to eat

The food was delicious

Nobody seemed to mind being splashed with soy sauce and fried rice

When we got home our clothes reeked of fried oil

A pungent reminder of an unforgettable meal

I might go again, perhaps twenty years from now