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"   I am standing at a small assembly line in a romantically-lit, lovely loft on the Lower East Side, awkwardly chopping parsley, while a man with a heavy Swiss accent\u2014it sounds like sort of a relative of Schwarzeneggerian Austrian, where &amp;quot;onion&amp;quot; is &amp;quot;AHnian&amp;quot;\u2014stands over me saying things like &amp;quot;Flowers are just sex organs of plants&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;The seeds of strawberries are the nipples of nature.&amp;quot; Appropriately, Al Green plays in the background.  I&amp;#039;m fortunate enough to be at one of celebrity cook and restaurateur ChefFed&amp;#039;s super-exclusive, super-expensive &amp;quot;Sex On The Table: Horny Haute Cuisine&amp;quot; classes, which uses odd pairings of aphrodisiac foods like chicken and chocolate, or sage and strawberries, to create the ideal erotic three-course dinner for two. Or, in this case, six: Tonight&amp;#039;s attendance is one young foodie couple; one wine and spirits writer, with a plus-one who carries an artisanal pepper shaker with him; and me, who had Spaghetti-Os for dinner last night and can&amp;#039;t tell a Chardonnay from a Cabernet. YOLO? Michelin-starred ChefFed, a lean, blond and utterly TV-ready man in trendy glasses, began his &amp;quot;Sex on The Table&amp;quot; cooking classes two years ago, when he realized that Americans had been educated incorrectly about culinary aphrodisiacs. He began a quest to consult dozens of doctors and scientists for the truth. Regarding the oyster myth, for example, he says, &amp;quot;Don&amp;#039;t get me wrong, eating oysters is a sensual pleasure. The texture on the tongue, that little drip of seawater that rinses down your cheek and the fact that it&amp;#039;s a finger food make oysters very sexy. Other than a healthy load of zinc there is no reason for oysters to be named in one phrase with aphrodisiacs.&amp;quot;  &amp;quot;But one good thing about oysters is that you will always save some hunger for your partner.&amp;quot; He grins at me. I duck and busy myself with my notes. Always... save... some... On the flip side, says Fed, unexpected foods like garlic, beets and coriander get the blood pumping to the Down Therez. Just make sure you have Tic-Tacs on hand. And yes, some of our best-known aphrodisiacs are tried and true, like chocolate, which contains magnesium, soothing anandamide and mood-boosting phenylethylamine \u2014 in layman&amp;#039;s terms, it creates the sensation of being loved. (That&amp;#039;s why you tuck into Ben &amp;amp;amp; Jerry&amp;#039;s when you&amp;#039;re fresh off a breakup.) Aphrodisiacs enhance the erotic center of our body, says Fed: Food is responsible for our entire love life. Unlike Viagra, they&amp;#039;re not a pill \u2014 they&amp;#039;re a lifestyle. When it comes to the actual act of cooking, the margin between sexy and doofy is very wide; watching Chef Fed doing something as simple as slicing an AHnion is kind of erotic the same way watching an NBA player score a two-pointer or a violinist execute a solo perfectly is erotic. Watching me chop parsley with my clumsy knife-wielding skills, on the other hand, hardly a boner makes. Whether it&amp;#039;s the man or the woman, &amp;quot;whoever provides food will get love,&amp;quot; says Chef Fed as elaborate flames lick from his sautee pan. (This might partially explain why I&amp;#039;m cabable of nuked dinners exclusively and usually end up with &amp;quot;temporary &amp;#039;like.&amp;#039;&amp;quot;) Fed doles out some advice on aphrodisiac-infused meals: Expect the unexpected, eat with your hands rather than forks and knives \u2013 it&amp;#039;s more sensual getting your hands into your food, he says \u2013 and understand that sexy foods work differently for men and women once you leave the kitchen and get into the bedroom. &amp;quot;For men, sexuality is a performance thing, whereas for women it&amp;#039;s much more sensual. So men should definitely eat foods that keep their arteries clean and raise their zinc level,&amp;quot; Fed schools. &amp;quot;I would have to name chickpeas as one of the queens of aphrodisiacs for men. Also, watermelon, due to its high content in citruline, has the same effect on the male body as prescription medication that is supposed to treat erectile dysfunction.&amp;quot; As for women, &amp;quot;nuts are very good for blood flow. But sexuality has much more to do with easing their minds,&amp;quot; he adds. &amp;quot;Only when the mind is in the right place do things fall into place [sexually]. Therefore, I also have to name chocolate as a natural antidepressant. [Also] fresh cheeses - like goat cheese \u2013 come with a load of phenylethylamine up to ten times higher than chocolate and strawberries. Even in ancient times, strawberries were hailed as the fruit of Venus, the goddess of love, and their seeds symbolize fertility.&amp;quot; After an appetizer of mango and fennel and a dinner of chicken with chocolate sauce (trust me: it&amp;#039;s not as weird as it sounds), we sit down with glasses of dessert wine and strawberry-balsalmic-sage-infused-whipped cream. &amp;quot;Given the high aphrodisiac levels of our three-course meal, I ask Fed if anyone ever hooks up during the lessons. He laughs: &amp;quot;Not that I&amp;#039;ve seen. But I don&amp;#039;t know what they go home and do after.&amp;quot; Follow Anna on Twitter: @annabreslaw "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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