Eat Lou Kohl

Pollan grudgingly decapitates the hens, then is led to a large shed and handed an icing gun filled with bronco semen. After inseminating half a dozen cows, Pollan is blindfolded and told to open his mouth. Kohl pours a large quantity of Chartreuse down Pollan's throat, enough to ensure the Omnivore's Dilemma author will be at least mildly inebriated when the rest of the guests arrive. After Pollan swallows the liquor, Kohl puts him in a submission hold which renders Pollan unconscious, then has his Thai apprentices give the author a deep muscle massage before transporting him to a guest cottage in a wheelbarrow.

Pollan wakes up an hour later, half-drunk yet fully refreshed, to find Kohl suffocating a 9-year-old thoroughbred named Gumbo Ricky. After choking the life out of the horse and harvesting his innards, Kohl has Pollan assist him in threading a metal rod through Gumbo Ricky, so as to cook him rotisserie-style over a fire pit. Before starting the fire, Kohl instructs Pollan to remove the horse's teeth with a set of pliers, as well as season its entire corpse with a rub consisting of cumin, butterscotch, peat moss, and salt brine.

Kevin P. Casey

Kohl stitched his jacket together from the hides of deer and sheep slaughtered near The Dirt Farm's barn.

Kevin P. Casey

Kohl grows coca on his property, which he ultimately snorts in a manner as cavalier as sipping tea.

Details

VIDEO: Meet Lou Kohl - the man behind the brass knuckles.
UPDATE 4/11/11: Lou Kohl Doesn't Actually Exist, But It Shouldn't Surprise Anyone If He Did

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More About

• Louis Kohl
• Christopher Cross
• Michael Pollan
• Esperanza Spalding
• Asia (Band)

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Once the horse begins slow-roasting, Kohl leads Pollan into the kitchen, designates the author as his sous, and reveals the night's menu: poached seagull served on a bed of cottage cheese, fried emu wings mounted on a foundation of chicken-liver paté, sautéed rattlesnake brushed with tarragon and pear moonshine, and, of course, the horse, which guests will be required to self-quarter in the spit while standing shoeless on scalding embers.

At 5:47, Julian pulls the bus into the holler. The actress/singer Zooey Deschanel is the first to emerge, guiding her husband, Death Cab for Cutie's Benjamin Gibbard, out the door by hand. She approaches Kohl, intent on embracing the mercurial Dirt Farm proprietor, but he strikes a posture which makes it evident that platonic touching isn't his thing. For Kohl, such intimacy is reserved exclusively for killing or lovemaking.

Deschanel and Gibbard are followed by the other 66 guests, a group that includes: Spalding, Cross, Michael Hebb, Stanley Tucci, Ben Harper, Laura Dern, Linda Derschang, Gabriel Claycamp, Matt Dillon (the Corson Building proprietor, not the actor), Jason Wilson, Stephin Merritt, Keren Brown, Colin Meloy, Geoffrey Zakarian, Carrie Brownstein, Anna Faris, Kurt Timmermeister, Marcus Charles, Gwyneth Paltrow, Terence Trent D'Arby, Leslie Feist, Stone Gossard, Maria Hines, Steve Martin, Rachel Yang, Penn Badgley, Tamara Murphy, the Canlis brothers, Dave Matthews, Sarah McLachlan, Edward James Olmos, Alice Cooper, Foxy Brown, Adam Richman, Alex Guarnaschelli, David Eggers, Sarah Polley, the Avett Brothers, and Dame Helen Mirren. (Bono sent his regrets.)

Kohl has suspended his silent-reading rules for the evening, inviting his guests to sip mead and snack on house-cured sardine flanks in a pasture instead. Kohl heads back to his kitchen, where Pollan is sequestered, doing prep work with the assistance of the two Thais. Kohl does a line of his homegrown blow, puts on a pair of riding boots, and heads into the woods, beyond his property's border. There he encounters a llama named Lucky. Only Lucky won't be so lucky tonight.

Kohl approaches the llama gently, and is soon astride it, beckoning it into the pasture. The assembled throng smiles collectively at Kohl and Lucky as they approach. When Kohl reaches the group, he kisses the llama tenderly on the nose before sweeping its front legs, causing Lucky to fall headfirst into the dirt. It dies upon impact.

As Lucky drifts into the sweet hereafter, three members of Ivan & Alyosha emerge from the barn and begin singing a Civil War–era hymn. At the song's conclusion, Kohl steps in front of the slain llama's corpse and says, "Now, who wants to say grace?"

"I do! I do!" yells Pollan, positioned several yards away near the kitchen's rear entrance. The crowd turns to recognize the famous author, and lets out an uproarious, self- satisfied whoop. What a Hoot, indeed.

mseely@seattleweekly.com