Here’s a great story from a city with great food, about a chef who has decided to feed a very different sort of hunger:

There are myriad possibilities as to why a meal at the Upperline could leave a person enriched for reasons that transcend food. One is the communal hug diners feel upon entering the converted Uptown residence. Another is the aesthetic rush of being surrounded by the paintings of local artists while eating food that often pays explicit homage to the work of local chefs.

Diners’ delight also could be a byproduct of the methods Ken Smith employs to get himself through particularly bad days.

“I remember certain parts of Scripture where there is food involved. That’s sort of what keeps me interested in what I am doing if I am having a low point, ” said the Upperline’s longtime chef. “We come into the world needing nourishment to survive and grow and for our existence, to keep us going. It has a purpose, and it has a purpose that can be traced way back to when Jesus was here.”

Anyone who has tried Smith’s food at the Upperline — the dark, dense gumbo, the nostril-flaring Gulf shrimp piquant, the duck-andouille etouffee that is filling in more ways than one — should not be surprised to discover there is a spiritual component to his cooking. Upperline owner JoAnn Clevenger, who has worked with Smith for nearly 20 years, was still shocked late last month when Smith told her he was leaving the kitchen behind to become a priest.

“I was stunned, ” she said. “We are very happy and thrilled for him. We are just sad for ourselves.”

Smith, who will cook his final meal at Upperline July 31, said his decision to enter the seminary had nothing to do with wanting to get out of the restaurant business. “I just started paying attention to my life, ” he said, “to the priests who were around me, to the spiritual type of lifestyle that I saw in them.” Becoming a priest, he said, is “something that I’ve thought about all my life.”

Read on. Congratulations and blessings, Chef Smith!