Home is where I want to be: Josiah Citrin’s final meal

‘Cooking like this is what I love, ‘ says Citrin. ‘Younger chefs would probably want something really fancy, but at the stage I’m at, I just want simple food.’ Photograph: Louise Hagger/Mateusz Karpow for the Guardian

I grew up in Santa Monica and I’ve lived in the same house for 20 years. Home is an important place to me, so that’s where I’d want to be.

The house looks Mediterranean, Spanish perhaps. Our style is definitely minimalist: we have a few decorative pieces, some sculptures and beautiful glass bowls.

I’d want it to be at dusk, in late September, when the nights are still long, and it’s not super-hot. The light at that time of day is so particular, so beautiful. We’d cook everything on the Big Green Egg barbecue out front.

We’d start with an heirloom tomato salad, the tomatoes sliced thickly, with cucumber, red onion, reed avocados, olive oil, vinegar and basil.

Then a chicken, butterflied and marinated in chimichurri, and grilled skin side only, until the skin is really, really crisp. I’d serve that with a herb sauce made with smoked paprika and pickled mustard seeds and whatever’s in my garden: nasturtium, verbena …

Next up, a porterhouse steak, medium rare, slow-cooked, seasoned with olive oil, cracked pepper and chimichurri. Served with mushrooms and potatoes on the side – the latter smothered with French salted butter and creme fraiche and topped with lots of chives and grated aged gouda.

Cooking like this is what I love. Younger chefs would probably want something really fancy for their final meal, but at the stage I’m at, I just want simple food. And I love that at work, I get to do both – the Michelin-starred fancy stuff, and this simpler food, at my new place, Charcoal.

I’m not really a dessert person, but I do love cheese. I’d want a reblochon and some époisses, with the grilled fruitbread – blackcurrant and apricot – we make at the restaurant.

To drink, I’d want a burgundy, with a subtle nuance: leathery flavour, delicious, sweet. And a nice bourbon, a 21-year-old Jefferson’s – it goes down so smoothly. It’s as good for starting a meal as for finishing one.

My kids, wife, parents, grandparents – we don’t get together as much as we used to, and my grandfather has passed away, but I’d want them all there. Our gatherings are lively, argumentative. With some Coltrane and Monk playing – that’s all you need.

• Josiah Citrin is the two-Michelin-star chef-owner of Mélisse restaurant in Santa Monica, and Charcoal Venice in Los Angeles; @josiahcitrin