Michael Pollan , author of the Omnivore’s Dilemma and In Defense of Food, has written to the forthcoming President Elect in the pages of the NY Times Magazine’s Food Issue. The sensational image above is the cover, by Michael Klimas.
You can read the text of the letter to the incoming president, or Farmer-In-Chief, as Pollan prefers here.
Pollan coined possibly the 7 most important words of the 21st century.
EAT FOOD. NOT TOO MUCH. MAINLY PLANTS.
The Kitchen Sisters are Davia Nelson and Nikki Silva, and produce a truly fantastic radio series for NPR, available via podcast called Hidden Kitchens.
Each program explores the world of unexpected, below the radar cooking, legendary meals and eating traditions — how communities come together through food. Hidden Kitchens travels the country chronicling American kitchen cultures, past and present.
The Sisters took a trip to England recently and Garden Allotments: A London Kitchen Vision was the result. Have a listen and read more here . It’s very sad.
Jen at innovation feeder turned me on to this. I include it for its food content.
You can find out more about BANKSY here.
Filed under: Campaign strategies, Halloween, pumpkins, US Election | Tags: vote
A great campaign strategy for when an election coincides with Halloween from Yeswecarve.com.
And here are some of the accompanying slogans:
The Squashacity Of Hope
Glowbama
Change Your Pumpkin, Change Your World
Grab Change by the Stem
Orange State
Every Pumpkin Counts
Carve Change, Glow Hope
Barack O’ Lantern or Jack O’ Bama?
The Change We Seed
Stencils We Can Believe In
Joe Pumpkin Pie-den
Ask Not What Your Country Can Do For Your Pumpkin…
Just to lower the tone a little, you can check out some apolitical pumpkins, including the one below, at extremepumpkins.com
Filed under: ben canaider, celebrity chefs, cookbooks, satire | Tags: laugh
Finally, the Uber chef gets theirs. And it took an Australian to do it.
Gavin Canardeaux is one of the world’s most popular and inspirational power-chefs. His icon restaurants, Cuisine du Moi in New York, Lad Gav in London, Le Auxerre de Gavoir Faux in Napa and Ricky’s Sportsbar and Steakhouse Hamburger Grill and Bar in Sydney, have set standards in cuisine couture previously thought impossible.
Australian-born, English-educated, French-trained, Thai-massaged and American-based, Gavin Canardeaux is a passionate executive icon uber power chef de chef, deeply committed to his art. For him, overseeing via video-link his sous chefs placing slices of ochre truffle over a freshly muddled carpaccio of Cape Barren goose egg is a life-and-death struggle. Find out more.
BEN CANAIDER is a well-known wine writer, or as he likes to put it, a typist who drinks.
Filed under: melbourne, mental illness, schizophrenia, social solutions, somalia | Tags: empathise, help
As we all know, food is huge. And also as we know, some us us have more difficulty fitting in than others. And in these straitened times, the people on the margins get cast on the scrapheap pretty fast. What some people have realised is that using food and eating is a great way to tackle issues of discrimination and bigotry that exist across our fair land.
Here’s a couple of great stories from Melbourne, one of the world’s most humane cities.
The Madcap Cafe assists people with mental illness to skill up, get out, and achieve some skills and dignity.
The Sorghum Sisters works with and trains refugee women from the Horn of Africa, and runs the school canteen at a Melbourne Primary School.
Filed under: community gardens, community spirit, street gardens, sydney, verge gardens | Tags: stolen
Community gardens, gardens in public spaces, growing your own: our city is encouraging us to beautify and green our town. Soo…
Last Sunday I planted up to large planter boxes (which I bought) with passionfruit vines, thyme and great hot pink geraniums and positioned them by my fence in my local inner city back lane. They looked great, and I chatted to a number of neighbours who I’d only ever said hello to in the past.
This is what happened. Within 24 hours ~ gone. I bet those same people are cruel to animals. And I have one word for them, which I won’t use here.
Just a bit more on cupcakes. Have a look at the two pics below. This is from Google Trends and analyses three search terms over the last year and ranks their popularity. One is worldwide (where you’d expect the Pavlova and the Lamington to play a fairly insignificant role. But have a look at the same trend in Australia. And except for a spike around Christmas and again in July (I don’t understand that one) the cupcake is knocking our national sweets into a corner.
Cupcakes hit centre stage in 2002, according to the information contained in the previous post. They took a little longer to hit their straps here in Australia, but are still hanging on. Methinks they’ve got a ways to go yet. We’ve barely scratched the icing surface. Frostines Edibles are now doing online delivery of their little sweeties. And include the following gift suggestions for their cupcakes. Do you think my ‘Sympathy’ they mean ‘Sad to hear about you breaking your favourite stilettos’, or something more serious?
But really, they are an incredibly versatile, all occasion, tick every box comestible (nostalgic, authentic, designer, small, glamorous, homey) and I think they’re going to be around for a long time yet. They lend themselves to almost all flavourings, and can be adapted to go with whatever the ‘flavour of the month’ is. (And I mean that literally). They’re great for a group, or eating solo. Much like a box of chocs. And when we feel compelled to eat something even smaller to stop feeling guilty, watch the petit four come out of the woodwork. Or perhaps a la Seinfeld and the muffin tops, we’ll just be able to eat buy a dozen mixed iced tops. For those of you not familiar with that episode, you can watch five minutes of it here . Hey cupcake tops… I think I’m on to something:
TheNY Mag 40th Anniversary published this for us to reminisce over:
How many do you remember?
