Brother Victor-Antoine d’Avila-Latourrette, a best-selling cookbook author with legions of fans around the world, reflects on his extraordinary life.
As dusk began to fall on Jan. 10, 2001, Ray Patchey just wanted to get home to his family for his birthday dinner.
Little did he know that the monk was a best-selling cookbook author with legions of fans around the world. That bowl of soup, like so many others that Brother Victor-Antoine d’Avila-Latourrette has shared with friends and strangers alike over the course of several decades while living mostly alone at Our Lady of the Resurrection Monastery, was just the beginning.
That first edition reads, in many ways, like a typical community cookbook, a hodgepodge of quotes, images and collected recipes, ranging from Brother Victor’s French-inspired lentil soufflé to a yeasted Christmas bread calling for 2½ pounds of raisins.
The vinegar business brought with it a certain amount of fame. New York City chefs purchased the vinegars for their restaurants; there were television appearances and even a particularly striking photograph by Italian photographer Francesco Mastalia for his 2014 book, “.” Curator Gail Buckland wrote of the photograph, “The book opens with Brother Victor-Antoine looking towards the heavens, allowing the holy light to fall upon him … a bottle of his prized vinegar in one hand, a hoe in the other.