Chef Jacob Boehm wants to serve you dinner inside the largest butterfly house in the South. “Imagine a communal table snaking through the foliage,” he says. “Or a single 200-foot table across a historic bridge, people breaking bread around it.” Boehm, ’11, is the founder and owner of Snap Pea Creative Dining, which hosts pop-up dinners that keep guests wondering until the last minute.
Snap Pea launched with an event in Durham, N.C., where the company moved after a short stint in San Francisco. But the idea took root on the Farm: Boehm held his first concept lunch outside Columbae House. The al fresco affair, with “embracing bitterness” as its theme, was a project for Professor Jennifer Brody’s Food and Performance seminar.
Boehm continues to design each dinner around a theme, and recently some of his events have turned toward the theatrical. For his “Banquet” series last year, he produced a food-driven retelling of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, set in a fruit-packing warehouse. As the play progressed, the two-part feast did, as well, shifting from refined in King Duncan’s court to rough in King Macbeth’s. In the latter, diners tore meat from the bone with their bare hands, their murderous complicity mirroring Macbeth’s.
The location is kept under wraps until 36 hours before the event; the menu is unveiled only after attendees arrive. Snap Pea’s secrecy adds to the appeal: Tickets, typically $125, are available only via email alert and usually sell out within minutes.
Heidi Sigua, ’12, is the former social media manager of Stanford.
