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.
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:
At the 2008 All Candy Expo All Candy Expo it appears the hot flavour for confectionary was… drumroll please… POMEGRANATE.
There were Pomegranate:
Tootsie Pops
Chewing Gum
Jelly Beans
Hershey®’s All Natural Extra Dark Chocolate with Pomegranate
Ice Breakers® Chewy Sours
Organic Candy Fruit Pinwheels
Barton’s Chocotini Pomegranate Milk Chocolate Squares
and
Pomegranate Exquisite Truffles
So you can keep up with the Joneses, Hank Friedman of soulhealing has a recipe for Sweet-Tart Pomegranate Chocolate Truffles here .
These are the trends that the National Confectioners Association, who host the All Candy Expo, will be satisfying our sweet tooths in 2008/09:
Authentic and Artisan, Helpful Helpings, Chocolate Evolution, Traditional Twists, Sensory Experiences, Play Time and Packaging Innovations.
You can read more here.
Filed under: cookbooks, food blogging, self publishing | Tags: buy, eat, publish
Food blogging has been monumentally huge over the last few years. But what next? All those entries and gastroporn photos and recipes and comments just wafting about up there in the ether. Well, if you take a visit to Blurb , you’ll see what next. At time of writing there were 228 self published cookbooks looking for exposure, many of which have grown from a food blog. A lot are family cookbooks, and many seem to be couples giving their wedding guests their own cookbook. Or something. I’m not quite sure. Lots of canoodling couples on covers don’t do it for me. All in all I’m knocked out by the design and level of professionalism.
Some of my particular faves in no particular order are
Cookin’ Cajun , which wins for best synopsis. And I quote: “Over 50 healthy recipes by Playboy Playmate Devin DeVasquez with photos of each recipe taken by soap star Ronn Moss.” Ronn Moss, for those of you have been living under a brick is one of the stars of The Bold & The Beautiful. I rather like the cover of this one, on which it’s difficult to figure what’s more prominent ‘on the plate’~ the food or the author’s bosoms.
Ayi is making dinner , A book full of Western recepies, made with ingredients available in China. In both English and Chinese with the common herbs and all ingredients translated into Chinese to make shopping easy.
From Spanish Gazpacho to English lambsleg, from Dutch Cheese cake to Chinese cabbage. Full colour pictures and some tips to get the beloved offspring with a smile at the table.
How to Feed a Black Man , Part-memoir and part-style guide, mamafeelgood’s debut cookbook, “How to Feed a Black Man,” provides easy to follow recipes, some culinary history, and a little short fiction to season the pot. Along with the pretty pictures, “How to Feed a Black Man” is good for your mind, body, and soul.
Fodo , wins the design award in my book, a high school project, and rather gorgeous. And it’s got very funky things to do with Jell-o.
Stay tuned for what may be worth reporting from Lulu .
POSTSCRIPT: So i went to Lulu to check out what was going on there. The lovely thing about Blurb is that you can preview 15 pages of a book, bit like amazon’s ‘look inside this book’ thingie. But on Lulu ~ no! Unless I’m missing the bleeding obvious there is no way to look inside. How dumb is that. I could quite cheerfully buy half a dozen of the Blurb cookbooks, but in the end couldn’t be bothered seeing what Lulu has to offer. Why would I take the author’s word for it?
Just when you thought there couldn’t possibly be a new subject for a cookbook, Ljubomir Erovic is going to prove you wrong, with his new tome The Testicle Cookbook: Cooking with Balls .
Not content with pushing the subject matter, The Testicle Cookbook is ” a multimedia cookbook complete with how-to videos on cooking testicle dishes. And most handy is the peeling of the testicle video. Including Testicle Pizza, Testicle Goulash and White Wine Testicles.” The book is available to buy on Yudu in both English and Serbian.
Ljubomir is also the founder, organiser and driving force behind The World Testicle Cooking Championship. For more on this competitive cooking ~ Hey, the gals in the competitive eating stakes could get behind it (not just ball breakers, but ball eaters into the bargain ~ visit Ballcup, the championship website , which has been held annually in Serbia since 2004.
Here in Australia we don’t have this Wendy’s. We have this Wendy’s.
The first Wendy’s is an American fast food chain who has a product called The Baconator. It’s got 51grams of fat. But that’s not the point. The point is you can go to the Wendy’s website and find ALL the nutritional info you’d ever want in the Personalize It section.
It’s hours of fun and entertainment. Add some fries and a shake, take off the tomato and lettuce from your burger and see the nutritional fallout at a glance.
So for the hell of it, I “Personalzed” a Baconator, medium fries, a chocolate chip cookie, and a small ~ I repeat small ~ Chocolate Fudge Frosty™ Shake. Not unreasonable for a long car journey I would have thought.
The results:
95grams of fat, of which 37grams is saturated.
3010mg of sodium
1960 calories
and a whopping 8 grams of dietary fibre.
In the south of the United States and the north of Australia, boiled peanuts are a traditional snack.
Nuts are good for us, are they not? We should be eating more legumes, should we not? (It is a legume, not a nut)
Here’s a new take on the humble boiled peanut ~ add some flavourings to the boiling water. Ginger, star anise, chillis. Try cinnamom, nutmeg. Whatever flavours YOU want go with this friendly legume.
You have to use fresh unroasted peanuts in their shells. Cover them with water, put your flavourings in the pot and boil gently for about an hour. Eat when cool.
Which brings me to peanut butter. It must be one of the remaining unflavoured foodstuffs of our age. Maybe it too could do with a little added pep in its jar. Thai Peanut Butter, Vietnamese peanut butter, Peruvian Peanut Butter. I can feel a product range coming on.
Normally, people tend to have a garage sale prior to moving house. But consider this ~ especially if you’re moving to a new town ~ have your garage sale at your new house. Why? Because you’ll get to meet a lot of people in one hit in a pretty informal setting. You can suss out the neighbourhood, while they do the same to you.
Maybe even take a special product from your old town with you. Regional jams, pickles, olives, sweets ~ whatever your old town was known for that you think your new town might like. Obviously some geographical and distance constraints will apply. (Don’t put Tasmanian cheese in your removal truck to take to Far North Queensland)
And as part of your sale consider not selling for money but trading for whatever you need. Maybe you’ll need to plant a garden ~ fruit, veg, herbs, plants & seed of all descriptions ~ swap your stuff for that.
In any advertising you do say you’re new to the area, what you’re getting rid of, and what you need for your new life. You might get a fabulous new garden, kilos of tomatoes and make some new pals into the bargain. All in return for some previously read books and unwanted tchotchkes.
