Trying for the Lost Kitchen

There is an elusive restaurant in Freedom, Maine called the Lost Kitchen. It’s owned by a woman named Erin a French, a self taught chef who is regaled by the cooking community. The tiny 40 seat restaurant is probably the hardest reservation in get in America.

The restaurant is only open a few months in the summer. They only take reservations via post card. Yes, post card. Apparently anywhere from 25,000 to 75,000 post cards. It is a lottery system. You send your post card in and hope it gets pulled from the hat. This year the restaurant is asking you to donate to a Maine a farmer Charity to get a code for your post card. I personally find that a brilliant idea. With all the people with plenty of money trying to do anything they can to get a seat at this place, why not ask for a donation. Most people are not going to get picked, but sending $20 to help a Maine farmer will be good for the farmer community and not a hardship to any of those people willing to travel to Freedom for dinner.

Since we will be in Maine a month this year I decided it was time to send a postcard and see if we get picked. The website tells potential patrons you can send homemade or store bought postcards. I went the homemade way. I made a quilted post card because I am hoping that some curious hand that is drawing the winners will feel the fabric with pinked edges and want to pull it from the hat to see what they were feeling.

I appliquéd the word eat on a piece of fabric. Then I sewed two pieces of paper to the other side. As I was sewing the paper on I felt like my post card was not quite stiff enough to withstand the postal system. So before I closed up the fourth side I wanted to insert something a little stiffer. I looked in the drawers of my sewing desk and found a deck of cards.

A card would make the perfect inset. One card was too small, and two fit perfectly. Since I want the cards to fill the whole cavity I sewed them together and slid them between the fabric and the paper. Zigzagging the last seam I had created a little post card with exactly the right weight and feel of a regular post card.

I’m off to bring it to the post office. I want to make sure it is accepted and has the right postage. The Lost Kitchen closes post card acceptance on April 18. They say if you send two cards you are disqualified. I am not sure how they figure that out, but I am not taking any chances and will just send one.