for me it's the gestalt and event. memorable meals: shabu-shabu, tonkatsu, kobe beef, and yakimo as a young child decades ago in Tokyo; a divine leisurely Sunday lunch in Orvieto; xoriatiki salad beach-side as a teen at Skinias outside of Athens; locations - Greens in SF, and I do like Toi's Thai in Helena and drive 250 mi rtrp for her cooking
My most tattered cookbooks:
have very few, but love Deborah Madison's (of Greens)