Kurlansky is justly famous for his earlier works about Salt and Cod, among other things, so when I saw this 2018 Bloomsbury Publishing nonfiction abouKurlansky is justly famous for his earlier works about Salt and Cod, among other things, so when I saw this 2018 Bloomsbury Publishing nonfiction about Milk, I was interested. I was particularly interested to see what he would say about humans consuming milk after infancy, when approximately sixty percent of the world's human population appear to lose their tolerance for and ability to digest lactose. Europeans, Middle Easterners, North Africans and some of the Indian subcontinent appear to lack a gene which shuts off production of lactase--an intestinally-controlled enzyme which digests lactose present in all milk.
In 2006 Cornell University's T. Colin Campbell published his thirty-year study on the eating habits of Chinese people called The China Study. The findings of Campbell's study blew me away, one of which was that consumption of milk products can cause osteoporosis in adults, a finding exactly opposite to what we have been told here in America. Kurlansky does not mention this startling information, sadly. But Campbell's study made me look closely at where the promotion of milk products was coming from—the industry itself, and lobbyists targeting government scientists, commercial attachés, and spokespeople.
Kurlanksy does remark on lactose intolerance briefly at the beginning and again in the section on China. He indicates that while there is a growing tolerance for dairy products gradually in China among the wealthier and more worldly citizens, it fights with the notion that the Chinese are genetically lactose intolerant. It may be that livestock was discouraged in a country which needed all possible land for food production, and that reintroducing dairy stimulates the production of lactase.
Kurlansky mostly elucidates the uses of milk in the part of the world that uses it daily, giving recipes that have survived the ages, showing some changes in those recipes over time. And certainly coincidentally but with a weird synchronicity he discusses breast-feeding throughout the world and throughout history. Breastfeeding has come and gone in popularity, with scientists in the past forty years generally concluding that until clean water and sterile bottles and low pricing for formula could be achieved throughout the world, perhaps breast milk was superior to any industrial formula.
It is now de rigueur to pump breast milk, offering convenience and nutrition. Pumping breast milk induces lactating mothers to produce more than they need, which has led to an oversupply. Some entrepreneurs have endeavored to sell soap made with breast milk; those selling breast milk ice cream in London found they couldn’t keep up with demand. Some sell breast milk on the internet to athletes who believe it makes them stronger. Some people buy it when they are ill, believing it has medicinal qualities. Some testing internet purchases found 10% of the time cow’s milk was mixed in, while 75% was contaminated with bacteria and/or pathogens.
It turns out that yogurt made from yak milk makes that made from cow’s milk seem boring and tasteless due to the high percentage of fat in yak’s milk. Consumption of milk in the United States has declined almost 40% since the 1970s, and now large scale industrial farming is the key to survival of the industry. At the end, Kurlansky takes another quick trip around the world to look at how dairy farms manage and what problems they are encountering now, including some of the profit calculations small producers are making.
Kurlanky is a wonderful writer of nonfiction who manages to take on big subjects and make them intelligible to the non-specialist. If you are looking for specific information, this book may simply be too diffuse, but Kurlansky is a wonderful host for a general reader....more
Teaching tools must be updated often now to keep pace with the chances in our awareness & social development. This geography book was published in 201Teaching tools must be updated often now to keep pace with the chances in our awareness & social development. This geography book was published in 2015, and seems to have taken into consideration most of the complaints about earlier cultural tourism. It looks like a fun book--teachers may find themselves skimming but getting caught in the interesting detail and in imagining how they would present the material in class. It is a colorful round-the-world tour of certain countries and parts of the world, e.g., A for Australia...
To my eye, it looked appropriate for 10-year-olds, but I have seen it listed for third-sixth graders, in the U.S., that would be 8-11. That seems about right.
It has a current feel. Women are shown, not all working in traditional jobs, and there is a sort of poem at the start of each new letter that can be put to a beat, if one wanted. Could be useful for class projects....more
Fuchsia Dunlop may be an original. Certainly she has dedication to subject, in this case, Chinese food.
The recipes in this book I can tell are wonderfFuchsia Dunlop may be an original. Certainly she has dedication to subject, in this case, Chinese food.
The recipes in this book I can tell are wonderful reproductions of Sichuan classics. Probably the way we can tell authenticity is the simplicity of the recipes. A famous cooking show in China gives contestants oil, soy sauce, and rice wine & determines how many different kinds of dishes each can make. It all has to do with quantities, heat, ratios rather than a wide variety of ingredients. How else could everyone have managed for so long?
Anyway, this seems just fine, if beyond my reach. Love that she made a career from this particular fascination of hers....more
Fuchsia Dunlop has tons of personality and a real talent and fascination with food from around the world. The Chinese eat a large number of things nonFuchsia Dunlop has tons of personality and a real talent and fascination with food from around the world. The Chinese eat a large number of things non-Chinese do not, so when she said she'd eat anything, I have be impressed, though I do think she might be slightly mad.
She went to live in China in mid-1990's, and has noticed many changes to the way of life there since then. When she went she could eat for fifty cents or a dollar and be perfectly sated. She often ate at small establishments and tried to learn the local tricks to very special dishes. She gives recipes in this book, but mostly it is an account of her living and traveling in-country.
This would be a particularly good book for someone similarly food-struck or China-struck. Dunlop has a terrific writing style and a keen eye. I grew weary, however, reading someone else's memories. I wish her well & am impressed with her ability to make friends and influence people. I am planning to take a look at Land of Plenty: A Treasury of Authentic Sichuan Cooking. ...more
I came across this book on someone’s Currently-Reading list, of which they said something like, “Thought I should know something about this phenomenonI came across this book on someone’s Currently-Reading list, of which they said something like, “Thought I should know something about this phenomenon everyone is reporting, wheat belly.” Oh, all right, I thought halfheartedly, “Me, too.” I mean, maybe the fat epidemic is mostly caused by wheat. Why not? It doesn’t seem to have been fat, cholesterol, carbohydrates, protein, or any other thing the medical field has targeted for elimination in the past fifty years. Maybe it is whole grains. I should check it out.
I am deeply suspicious of any diet that suggests eliminating an entire food group from a person’s diet. Somehow it seems like a radical fix. Our entire eating regime is centered around whole grains, and Davis, M.D. is suggesting it is probably all wrong. Since most Americans have serious weight issues which the generation before us did not have to the same degree, who’s to say he isn’t right? Certainly fewer whole grains wouldn’t hurt, is my reasoning.
Davis’ amazing status reports on his clients sound like Donald Trump on crack: “Incredible,” Davis crows, “My client lost 64 lbs in 6 months!” Wow, I think, that almost sounds dangerous. Must be because that major food group was supporting every other thing he knew how to cook. Poor guy. But it’s true. Imagine eliminating wheat from breakfast alone, and then go through snack, mains, desserts. What’s left? Carrots and celery? Gee, that sounds familiar…
My suspicions about wheat being problematic run back, oh, several hundred millennia. How could it be that something so central to everyone’s diet around the world is suddenly a problem? Davis suggests, with no data, that it could be genetically-modified wheat. He is trying to keep this book for the non-scientist, I understand, but if his diet works, we’re going to be looking pretty closely at modified wheat to see what’s different.
Davis cites the rise of increased instances of celiac disease, IBS, diabetes, and suggests wheat and its gluten has something to do with it. “Wheat elimination is not just about eliminating gluten. Eliminating wheat means eliminating amylopectin A of wheat, the form of complex carbohydrate that actually increases blood sugar higher than table sugar or candy bars.” No wonder a loaf of fresh French bread can induce a wave of well-being, and a slight follow-on mania.
A wave of exhaustion comes over me. I realize this is a big thing—eliminating gluten and wheat from one’s diet. I have seen plenty of menus by now which concentrate harder on providing gluten-free than they do vegan offerings. Vegans are not, however, known for slim profiles unless they simply eat nothing, which is also a possibility. When one is young, drinking one’s meals is a common phenomenon. Craving protein is common in this group.
In an effort to determine what folks eat who don’t eat wheat, I flipped to the end of the book where Davis has curated a few recipes. He’d mentioned in a couple of places a non-wheat “flaxseed wrap,” and I was curious. Davis’ wrap is made with a large egg, tiny amounts of paprika, onion powder, baking powder and salt, along with 3Tbsp ground flaxseed w/ 1 Tbsp water, and here’s the kicker: 1 Tbsp melted coconut oil. I tried it. It tasted overwhelmingly of coconut oil, which is a little like crack to ordinary folks living in America’s northeast in winter. Wilted kale, mushrooms, onions, and yellow squash in fig balsamic placed in the wrap was delicious, yes. It would work. He suggested it for breakfast. I’m not so sure about that. Lunch, maybe.
But what I discovered in Davis’ other menu items is that he’d also cut out sugar. He used sugar substitutes. I thought the latest word was that sugar substitutes were going to kill us. Well, anyway, here’s the culprit, I thought. No wonder these folks lost weight. I am probably more likely to blame weight gain on sugar than anything, but in the end it is probably processed foods, which contain both wheat and sugar. Whatever, we are eating ourselves into early graves. So, stop eating. Go running—or whatever it is that raises your heart rate and floods you with endorphins. And just remember, getting it all isn't really getting it all. Be happy. Don't worry.
Too much of anything is still too much. That’s the lesson here. We have an embarrassment of riches. Besides the folks with legitimate allergies and illnesses, we could all probably do with less. Strange, isn’t it? We struggle to get enough and then we discover satiety is probably going to kill us, just like lack of satiety. What a dilemma....more
Storytelling and cooking may have something in common—imagination—but they also have a similar way of feeding people, and doing it well can be positivStorytelling and cooking may have something in common—imagination—but they also have a similar way of feeding people, and doing it well can be positively inspiring. Leonardo Lucarelli reminds us that good chefs use very, very sharp knives in the mastery of their craft, and good writers learn the same skill. Lucarelli says repeatedly he did it all “for the money,” while we laugh uproariously as he waxes eloquent about that meal he prepared--alone--for 250 capoeira enthusiasts in the hull of a rusty old ship with no kitchen docked beside Rome in the Tiber…
There is some special delight in listening to a man at the top of his career as a chef in a country known for spectacular cuisine and flamboyant male displays tell us how, by bravado, native (naïve?) talent—but no training—he goes from zero to one thousand in a matter of years. And he continued to manage it, learning on the job, telescoping years of trial-and-error into moments of insight literally seared into his memory...and his hands.
He is arrogant, abrasive, acerbic…and that is just the A’s. Lucarelli began cooking as a teen, when meals his mother left at home for his brother and himself needed a little massaging to be exciting. He cooked for friends, and the first gift to his first real girlfriend was bread, wrapped in a napkin, four corners tied together. (It had been his fourth try, and was the only loaf not obviously wrong somehow.) Taste and presentation: he knew it might have something to do with winning hearts. Though that early attempt failed, his gradual emergence as a rock-star in the kitchen gave him plenty of opportunities to bedazzle the ladies.
Drugs go along with sex & rock & roll, and there are hair-raising moments in this memoir when we are not entirely sure Lucarelli is going to escape with his faculties intact. The momentum he achieves in his writing contrasts with the stumbling advancement of his career as he tangles with the law, makes poor choices in work and in life, wrecks his motorbike…everything revolving about an important friendship with Matteo, the grounded center of who he really was. Matteo was an ‘on again-off again’ roommate in Rome, Lucarelli’s alter-ego. A reprinted email from Matteo late in the book shows us Matteo’s talent seeing, feeling, and speaking truth, and how important he was to Lucarelli’s sense of himself.
It always interests me when “bad boys” discover their inner homebodies. Lucarelli was no exception, and truthfully, the portion of the memoir devoted to his life after rockstar status was some of the most interesting and affecting of what he chose to share. Lucarelli shows us that everything we learn can be used in the next gig, and how teaching cooking skills may have rewards that equal or exceed chefdom when the pros and cons of each are laid side-by-side.
It is not just food or cooking that is so interesting about this memoir, however. Lucarelli reveals insights into the economics of modern Italy from his earliest mention of anti-globalization demonstrations in Genoa in 2001, reminding us that discussions revolving around these issues are not new and have been viewed as critical for many years in countries other than the United States.
More striking even were his revelations about the fluid nature of restaurant employment: under-the-table payments to all restaurant staff, even chefs, to avoid tax; direct wage payments from the night’s take; lack of contracts or protections for staff; the precarious position of most owners when it comes to loan sharks or bank loans. It seems there is no safety. What a remarkably poor investment, one might conclude, unless owners know something investors do not.
Taxes. It is hard to discover from just one memoir how widespread the practice must be, but one cannot but note how commonplace avoidance appears to be for those making even small incomes in Italy. In the United States, poor and middle-class wage earners generally pay taxes while the wealthy exploit investment loopholes that result in little or no tax payments. Tax avoidance may, in the end, be most responsible for both the exuberant display of, and the eventual destruction of, western ‘values.’
The other discussion—a worthy one in Italy, just as it is in the United States—is the importance of immigrant labor, even illegal immigrant labor, in keeping restaurants afloat. Lucarelli even gives a somewhat impassioned defense of the illegals he has known that is well worth reading. These very issues we must consider when addressing our own problem of illegals in America.
Economic issues were not discussed in the Wall Street Journalreview of this title by food critic Moira Hodgson, but Hodgson does give you an exciting look at Lucarelli’s anecdotes. Take a look for yourselves.
P.S. One last thing that warmed my heart: When Lucarelli began working in restaurants and clubs in the early 2000's, it seems every menu contained several vegetarian options, and at least one vegan option. Mediterranean food is especially easy to 'veganize,' but more importantly, it wasn't odd, but obvious. Nearly twenty years later, American restaurants are limping half-heartedly (heart-attackedly?) into enlightenment. ...more
We’ve all been there: we have one or more (sometimes many more) kids to look after or entertain for an afternoon and don’t want to be remembered as thWe’ve all been there: we have one or more (sometimes many more) kids to look after or entertain for an afternoon and don’t want to be remembered as the “boring” one. But maybe we’ve used up all our ideas or can’t use a couple so are sort of desperate for some help. Donna Bozzo is a media personality with three daughters and lots of energy. She has come up with 427 Simple Ways to Have Fantastic Family Fun, and has written them down. That’s one step beyond what most of us do and is ve-e-e-ry helpful when we feel braindead after a busy week.
Looking through this book I could see many time-tried favorites, like mud pies and singing in the rain, but she came up with a few new good ones that seemed doable and something I wouldn’t have come up with on my own. One I thought had potential was Nighttime Driveway Bowling with glow sticks in water-filled plastic bottles and a glow-in-the-dark- painted ball. Not sure your husband would agree to have us paint his basketball, but a ball of that size and weight might work well. Donna suggests an old medicine ball. (WTF?!) That sounds so Californian, but no…she lives in Illinois.
One suggestion that doesn’t require painting anything is making a map on the walk to school. Seems like it could be a useful and fun, and maybe even a multi-day project, depending on the attention span, if the child is youngish.
The book has a few pictures which helps to get some idea of what she means when she describes making a robot, for instance, out of soup cans. But one photograph showed a woman in a beekeeper’s suit holding a hive frame covered with bees. The woman is smiling through her mask, and the activity suggests you bring your kids to see the bees work. Bozzo adds “trust me” and I guess we’d have to…though unless you can come up with some hazmat suits in a small size, I might put this one off until the kids are old enough to give consent.
When I read that you can have the kids report the weather like the folks on TV, using a green screen and some downloaded video footage, at first I thought, “oh come on!” But then I started to get kind of excited about the idea…mainly because I have a green cloth already that could be used for the screening. The cool thing is that everybody learns something with this multi-day project. The kids have to realize how they can speak about weather they can’t see—at least not in back of them. We’d have a little exercise in video-making, and once the kids realize how it all works, they can use real weather outside the window to report…somehow I can see a three-year-old saying dolefully “It’s raining” in front of footage of heavy rain in the yard, or a twelve-year-old pretty quickly learning to film her friends doing real reporting in front of their own footage. This multi-day project has some real potential for fun and learning for all.
So, when you are too frazzled to think much of anything, you might want to turn to a book like this to quickly pull something together for a party or something quieter for after school. You’ll see things you’ve done before, but you’ll also see how a busy, high-energy mother of three makes it work for her family. P.S. I notice there are only 427 suggested projects in the book now, though initially the title had 439 or more projects. Wonder if some of them weren't a little...like the bee hive visit. ...more
It is said the way to deal with loss is to remember. Alexander chooses the most gorgeous memories in her elegy for her husband Ficre, like a bowl of bIt is said the way to deal with loss is to remember. Alexander chooses the most gorgeous memories in her elegy for her husband Ficre, like a bowl of blowsy, fragrant roses or a rarely-blooming South African bonsai covered in pink blossoms that exude a sweet perfume. The unusual capacity of both artists to see beauty and possibility in the world gave them loving friends that each of them gathered about themselves and cherished for one another. They lived a life of such richness and beauty that they cannot now be sad it had to end. That it was a privilege, both of them would acknowledge.
Ficre Ghebreyesus was only days past his fiftieth birthday when he died of a massive heart attack one evening on his treadmill while he waited for his wife and the mother of his two sons to return from a poetry reading. The memories of their meeting, the births of their sons, their life together--he as a chef and painter, she as a teacher and poet--is as wonderful as anything I have ever read, and as mysterious in alchemy as any chemistry.
Neely writes genre fiction that is quite unlike any other out there: crime without the cops, mystery without a clue, and the romance of a strong, opinNeely writes genre fiction that is quite unlike any other out there: crime without the cops, mystery without a clue, and the romance of a strong, opinionated woman. It is beautiful and flawed and very real. Neely has an agenda, yes she does, but it’s revelatory to hear her concerns. She talks it all out on the page, so we get the picture from where she’s standing. She is fun but thoughtful; playful, but looks straight in the eye of some edgy situations. I mean, maybe you’ve thought about what to do when your neighbor is being beaten by her husband inside her house, loud enough for all the world to hear. Day after day. Well, Blanche comes up with a solution that worked pretty well and it didn’t involve a weapon of mass destruction or murder. Blanche constantly surprises us.
This mystery novel, #4 of the Blanche White series, brings Blanche down to North Carolina from Boston. Her sister’s son and daughter who are in her care, Malik and Taifa, are children no longer and are off for summer work in Vermont and Maine. Blanche is going to help her best friend, Ardell, with her catering business during the bicentennial celebrations in Farleigh, her hometown. Blanche had left behind in her hometown both a former lover, now married, and her rapist, so the pleasure of her homecoming was mitigated somewhat by what she might uncover hidden in her psyche. Besides, her Mom was as armored against intimacy as always, and never seemed to listen, even though she was getting older and needed more assistance than ever to keep everything in working order.
Nothing about this novel was ordinary. Almost every page expressed some real truth or revelation. Neely must have decided at some point she might be polite in company but she was going to write what she thought people ought to know. Thank god for it. Thank god for her. You don’t have to adhere to her beliefs, but by golly, she’s going to tell you what she thinks. She might even give some of us the words to articulate our own defense for a course of action we wanted to take but for one reason or another, felt unable. She makes a lot of sense. Blanche is an example to us.
As a mystery, the novel works very well. The denouement is guaranteed to blow you out of the water. As we begin, we imagine this novel might just be another opportunity to spend time with Blanche and hear her wisecracks on everything from real food to what men like. Nothing wrong with that! But Neely is too sophisticated and wise to just give us what we think we want: she’s gonna surprise us with something we can learn from, delighting us at the same time she is instructing us.
Blanche makes mistakes--really big, life-and-death mistakes--in this novel, all the while sounding like she has things pretty much under control. But we all have done that, haven’t we? Just as we think we’ve learned a few lessons and can dish it out, life and people surprise us. Neely makes us think. She teaches us how to think.
As the train from Boston to North Carolina makes it way south, Blanche slips into patios, anticipating her homecoming. It feels perfectly natural, though we know Blanche of Boston looking after teens is less lenient with herself. We want to relax, too, and hear the real Blanche fooling with Ardell, or romancing her new love interest, Thelvin.
The following quote is classic Neely:
”When the children were small and using up every moment when she wasn’t working for money, she’d soothed herself with a one-day-they’ll be grown fantasy. Now that they were practically grown, instead of trying to convince them to be careful of strangers, pick up their toys, and eat their okra. She was urging them to use condoms, to avoid hard drugs, and to become their very best selves. Different topics, more stressful topics. Who started that bullshit about parenting getting easier as the children got older? What parenting lost in intensity it picked up in worriation.
Or this:
”[Blanche] made up her own spiritual practice, including reverence for her Ancestors and the planet, and seeking energy from trees and healing from the sea. Some things she’d learned from African, Afro-Caribbean, Native American, and Asian ways of having a spiritual life, but she always added her personal twist. Until she’d come up with her own rituals she’d been hungry for ways to demonstrate her belief that there was more to life than she could see—ways that didn’t require her being a member of the Christian or the Muslim or any other religion that had played a part in African slavery. She also had no time for any religions that said she needed a priest or priestess to act as a go-between or worshipped a god called He. She was her own priest and goddess.”
The Blanche White series has four books. Each of them is special in its own way. Originally published in the 1990s by Penguin Books, they are now published in eBook format by Brash Books and can be bought wherever books are sold. Neely’s voice is extraordinary and outside the usual genre categorizations. The Blanche books are a little mystery, a little crime, a little romance, a little social commentary, and altogether unique. ...more
The grace and fluency with which James Beard Award-winning Chef Barber relates his experiences in his Blue Hill restaurant in New York City, walking tThe grace and fluency with which James Beard Award-winning Chef Barber relates his experiences in his Blue Hill restaurant in New York City, walking the fields of his Stone Barns organic farm in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and in his travels to Europe and throughout the United States left me wide-eyed with wonder. This extraordinary memoir and field notes is engrossing in a way that few writers achieve. Barber is gentle in his instruction, but he is telling us what he has learned about the inadequacy of the current concept of food sustainability, and it is a lesson we really need to assimilate and organize around.
Happily, his lessons are filled with well-cogitated thought, possibilities, solutions, humor, and beautiful images. I’d heard Corby Kummer interview the New York restaurateur on the New York Times book podcast back in the spring of ‘14, and thought it sounded like something I’d like to look at. I felt no urgency. Only when I obtained a copy for someone else and began to browse through it did I discover the can’t-put-it-down page-turning clarity, and the irresistible humor in Barber’s writing. I am trying now to figure out how many copies of the book I can give away for Christmas without repeating myself.
This book is divided into four sections, called Soil, Land, Sea, and Seeds. You won’t have heard these stories in quite this way before, and if they seem familiar, you will find it enlightening to see what Barber has chosen to highlight. Barber moves gradually through his dawning realization that the way we have been eating, in restaurants and at home, is not actually going to be able to sustain the land, the ocean, nor the planet, no matter that we gradually move from pesticide-grown vegetables to organics. There has to be a greater understanding of the web of interconnections between the soil and our eating habits. We have to be willing to increase the diversity of our diet and think about eating foods that replenish the balance in the soil along with ones we use more commonly.
It may be obvious to those who have paid attention to the concept of sustainability that we haven’t yet come around to actually managing the task ahead of us. Barber suggests it is more than simply changing our diets from meat-centric to vegetable-centric. He concludes that we “cherry-pick” our vegetables and therefore limit the amount a farm can sustainably produce for a given community. A farm has to grow cover crops on at least some of the land, and that is part of the cost of crops we actually eat. He urges us to think about how this works in fact, and what this reality means for pricing, output, and consumption.
But I may be making it sound boring. In Barber’s hands, it is anything but that. His work is filled with enlightening vignettes about the places, the people, the restaurants that led him to learn so much about sustainability and its opportunities. Barber awakened me to certain understandings about plant pairings that I’d sort of heard about, but never really believed possible: like having four different crops growing in the same space at the same time to preserve and replenish soil vitality. Especially, or perhaps only, in small scale operations where crops are harvested by hand might this be possible…but it is possible, in fact desirable!
Vignettes about the fish farmers and restaurants featuring fish were particularly interesting. I hadn’t followed the latest developments in that field and am astonished, pleased, and heartened to know that there are some doing things which enhance wildlife rather than diminish it. He tells of a fish farm in Spain which hosts vastly increased numbers of migrating birds as well as produces exceptional-tasting fish for market. It gives me hope that the work on the west coast of the USA to preserve and restore the tidal salt marshes near San Francisco might be successful for life of all kinds, including our own.
Barber outlines his own learning curve, his oversights and humiliations, and he is very funny in places, showing the reactions of people with different world views meeting (at Barber’s behest) face to face and trying to be civil, or in speaking of finely tuned chefs at their most passionate or most perplexed:
’Dan,’ [Ángel] said, turning to me, ‘have you ever cooked naked in your kitchen?’
Ángel features in another very funny bit:
”[Santiago] goes to different ponds in Veta la Palma [Spain] at different times of the year. Always at the full moon,” Ángel said.
Thinking of Steiner and his lunar planting schedule, I guessed, “Because the fish have better flavor when the moon is full.”
“No,” [Ángel] said, looking puzzled. “So he can see what he’s catching.”
The section on wheat farming was completely new and fascinating to me. In the very beginning of the book Barber reproduces a photograph of the perennial Midwest native prairie wheat (with root system) alongside higher-yielding grain varieties planted to replace it. I was truly shocked by the difference in the profiles of the two plants, and thought it indicative of what modern agriculture has done, in every aspect of our food profile, to the concept of sustainability. The good news is that there are folks around the country thinking about our food future. Barber managed to create an international community of thoughtful practitioners striving to figure out how we can best produce what we will need to live on earth.
This completely fascinating book happens to be very easy to read. Someone in your family, not just the foodies, will love reading of Barber’s researches and spending time with this thoroughly decent guy who is willing to share his successes and failures in the field. ...more
This is a beautiful cookbook with spectacular ideas. Stuffed onions? It makes you want to try everything the same day you see it. I tried a few...didnThis is a beautiful cookbook with spectacular ideas. Stuffed onions? It makes you want to try everything the same day you see it. I tried a few...didn't have time for the whole shebang, but I came away with the thought that the individual pieces here are excellent. Unusual, really, but excellent. In the time I had the book I did have a little trouble figuring out exactly how to use some of the dishes with my repertoire. They are good, undoubtedly delicious. But not by themselves, especially. They'd have to fit with with whatever else was going on.
The book is not vegan, but I think many of the recipes could be veganized easily. And the vegetarian dishes are pretty restrained on the animal products.
Everything just looks so good! I will say I didn't like the Roasted Parsnips and Sweet Potatoes with Caper Vinagrette as much as I anticipated, mostly because it was a little sweet for me. We had two roasted already sweet vegetables, which has the effect of concentrating the sweetness. Ottolenghi then adds some sweetner in the vinagrette, which I thought unnecessary. Also, much as I love the idea of capers with this meal, it seemed like gilding the lily. It's hard to make the argument for further dressing roasted vegetables, already so easy and so good. Small quibble. It was great cold, maybe even better.
Tried the Barley Salad with Pomegranate, an excellent filling salad that is great for travel/work/leftovers. And it is just too easy to modify to suit what one has on hand.
Would love to work with this a little longer....more
Isa does it again, the title should read. This is simply delicious, filling vegan fare and Isa’s intent was to make the recipes quick enough to make oIsa does it again, the title should read. This is simply delicious, filling vegan fare and Isa’s intent was to make the recipes quick enough to make on a weeknight. I have some favorites from this book that will go in my long-term memory.
The ingredients of the Puréed Split Pea Rutabaga Soup are unusual enough that one is glad Isa told us to add star anise. This is memorable, and hearty, and smells so good cooking. Everybody passes up their noses at those big, waxy rutabagas at the grocery, but when they come to my house, they invariably ask what the “secret ingredient” is in my vegetable soups. Sweet potato? Squash? No. That would be the fragrant and sweet rutabaga, slightly orange-fleshed when cooked.
The Briny Caesar Dressing needs to be tasted to be believed. It is laugh-out-loud and talk-loudly-at-a-high-register garlicky goodness. I insisted on salad for days, turning into a minor Caesar myself.
Regarding the Everyday Pad Thai, I’m kind of mad Isa told us about this. She admits she would make it for every meal if she could. That is a little like passing on an addiction, what? It’s is so good, I hid the leftovers and ate them myself after making something fishy or meaty for the others. Even the leftovers are great.
The Sticky Orange Chicky Stir Fry made with her very own Chickpea Cutlets I made with a small can of pineapple juice rather than oranges. It was lovely looking, and the Chickpea Cutlets need to be tasted to be believed. This is the creative mind at work, and Isa does it like no one else.
When I first saw this book, I will admit I was underwhelmed. I thought, okay, this looks like homemade family-style vegan creativity. But Isa has something special and her food always is surprising, delicious, unexpected, and somehow new. For those of you familiar with the splendid Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook, which has been my go-to book since it came out, this adds diversity, simplicity, and depth.
Not everyday can be a big tangle in the kitchen, but this food is fine enough to serve anyone and have everyone go to bed full and happy. This cookbook is another great success for Isa.
P.S. I rarely follow recipes anymore for things like cookies. I note that she riffs, like I do, on the basic formats. When I am in the mood, I add oatmeal and peanuts and chocolate bits…and she has a recipe Kitchen Sink Chocolate Cookies. Try it. I guarantee it will be a favorite. And if you have never added rosemary to chocolate chip cookies, trust her. Her Rosemary Chocolate Chip Cookies have to be tasted. Or substitute raisins. I did that with bread recently and thought I’d died and gone to heaven. ...more
The concept of this book was intriguing--a cookbook that gives us recipes for some of the fictional Paola Brunetti's culinary concoctions from the DonThe concept of this book was intriguing--a cookbook that gives us recipes for some of the fictional Paola Brunetti's culinary concoctions from the Donna Leon series of books set in Venice. The recipes are not meant to be exotic, and to residents of that watery city by the sea, I don't suppose they are. But to inland residents of America they seem unattainable. Partly this may be because the ingredients must be absolutely fresh. There are not many ingredients in these simple home-made meals, so perfection in taste comes from exquisite ingredients. In the summer, this book might make an interesting addition to one's repertoire. In the winter, one can only dream....more
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt deserves much credit for making this book as beautiful as it is. They have really made it the standard to reach. Katzen has Houghton Mifflin Harcourt deserves much credit for making this book as beautiful as it is. They have really made it the standard to reach. Katzen has done her cool line drawings--now in color!--on the endpages so with her tasty, (can I say thoughtful?), modern recipes her unique talents are again on display.
Now that I have had a chance to work with it a bit, I decided Katzen has chosen some real winners here. Her soups and salads are lovely to look at and probably worth the price of the book alone. She guides the beginner through the steps so that success can be yours right from the start.
I will say that she picked already favorites of mine, e.g., I cook greens almost every night and I often use the onion, garlic, red pepper combination that she recommends. I don't know if it is really appropriate to complain that some of the dishes are so simple as to make the cookbook shortly irrelevant. Most people are actively looking for simple and memorable and so great we can eat it again and again without dragging the cookbook out each time. She gets that and delivers.
But Mashed Parsnips? Hmmm. She has a whole section about mashing things up...cauliflower, broccoli, peas. Maybe she's trying to make it palatable for kids? If it is fresh, it seems a sin to mash it up but she makes it look very pretty. Perhaps it is a little like a mystery: one is so intrigued when one sees it on the plate one opens one's mind to the possibilities. Maybe I should just try it and see if it does something for me?
She has an interesting sauces and dressings section which is useful for folks on the go. You can dip crudités or drizzle over roasted veggies...(what is better tasting and easier to cook than roasted veggies?) I like her use of pomegranate molasses. What else I like: sometimes folks have difficulty figuring out what vegans eat. She very naturally makes meals of vegetables and grains that do not include cheese or dairy and reminds us that, by the way, this is vegan. It is a very unobtrusive way to introduce vegan entrees to the mainstream and show everyone how really very simple it can be to cook for vegans.
I also like the "light" quality of the recipes. There were one or two recipes that gave me pause: Bulgur with Spaghetti, and Banana Cheese Empanadas. I think she is just daring us to try them. She also has one that sounds kind of intriguing: Toasted Barley Dumplings. As a side, it can take care of the carb portion of a vegetable meal.
Truth is, The Moosewood Cookbook: Recipes from Moosewood Restaurant, Ithaca, New York was something like the second cookbook I ever owned. Katzen therefore had an outsized influence on my eating habits. I still admire what she can do. What she has produced here is remarkably like what I eat already.
We are not always so lucky to have a bumper crop of tomatoes (they used to be easier to grow when I was only harvesting :/) but if you love fresh tomaWe are not always so lucky to have a bumper crop of tomatoes (they used to be easier to grow when I was only harvesting :/) but if you love fresh tomatoes, you need this book. Farmstand aficionados, vegans, vegetarians, and meat-lovers will all find something here to favorite. Brian Yarvin gives simple, delicious, and diverse recipes using tomatoes for those days when our heat-addled or work-dead brains come to a halt at spaghetti.
I cook a lot. But even I have days when the juices are not flowing and I have used up the repertoire stored in my hard drive. I just need a little inspiration to make something wonderful and Yarvin’s book is so handy to remind me of things I love. He adds a little something I hadn’t thought to use, tells order of ingredients, and length of sauté (things I am sure I never knew), and I have come up with truly splendid cuisine from this small book. Besides, I love his stories, like the one of looking for canned tomatoes in Italy, or judging a chili cook-off in Texas.
I immediately discovered a new favorite, “Sicilian Vegetable Stew (Caponata)” served atop Parmesan Couscous, which is not the same as “French Vegetable Stew (Ratatouille)”, another classic. His vegetable lasagna won over hardened meat-eaters, and was a dream dish on my table. And he tells us how to make our own frozen pizzas for those days we simply will not spend another dime (more like ten dollars) or another minute eating out.
There are many delicious choices here for quick dinners, as well as dinners as aromatic and fragrant as an Italian don’s Spaghetti Sauce. They smell so good you don’t ever want the simmering to end. Yarvin doesn’t stop at the Mediterranean, however, but shares Central African, Romanian, Albanian, Chinese and Japanese (!) specialties featuring tomatoes as well as American favorites from all parts of the country. His stories interspersed among the recipes give one a chance to savor his particular brand of travel writing.
With heirloom tomatoes making a comeback and farmer’s markets getting up to speed for the season, you may want to pick up a copy of this cookbook which is sure to become one of your favorites. There are enough ways to vary your tomato dishes that you will never again say you have “too many tomatoes.”
Brian Yarvin is a travel writer, photographer, and cook. His recipes are simple to follow, and often might be one-dish meals. ...more
When Brian came to stay at our country retreat with his wife and my friend Maria Grazia, I did not know his culinary history. But spending a couple daWhen Brian came to stay at our country retreat with his wife and my friend Maria Grazia, I did not know his culinary history. But spending a couple days with this intrepid traveler and food taster was like taking an international vacation without leaving home. We spent several fascinating hours listening to his opinions on everything, ranging from the state of local and domestic politics to home decorating television, to say nothing of international affairs. He is as enthusiastic and daring a foodie as the legendary Bourdain, and may even look a little like him…
As a parting gift he generously shared two of his cookbooks which have commentary so like his speech that I laughed to read it. The Ploughman’s Lunch… is for those of us who find British food interesting…and when well done, positively comforting. While there is hardly anything in the book that qualifies as vegetarian, let alone vegan, talented vegan cooks can do what we did long before the recent spate of vegan cookbooks—modify and substitute to deliver that singular Britishness that this book radiates from each page. This book will tell you the tastes and ingredients of each traditional dish—something you positively need to know if you want to create a facsimile and reach the familiar standard. (That having been said, vegetarians and vegans can still revel in the authentic spiciness of “The Curry Shop” chapter, which celebrates the Indian curry dishes featuring some delicious vegetarian dishes including Tofu Tikka Masala, One-Pot Balti, Onion Bhaji, and Onion Relish.)
When I asked Brian what qualified as comfort food for him, he said onions, adding that there was nothing so delicious as a slow-cooked onion. This book has a side bar which shares this secret with his readers, called “Onion Cuisine”.
So, this book is the indispensable accompaniment to a British vacation. It will tell you what to look for when you visit, and it will give you the means to reproduce what you loved the most. And since it is written by an American, it demystifies ingredients and gives measurements we are familiar with in our own kitchens, in portions suitable for a family or small gathering. From Pickled Eggs, Potted Ham, Cornish Pasties and Gentlemen’s Relish to Treacle Tarts and Lemon Curd, secrets are revealed and treasures unveiled.
A final note: Brian is a photographer also, and this book had photographs that had everyone in my family exclaiming. I loved the story of the pilgrimage to find the perfect pasty in Cornwall. It felt as though we were still sitting on the porch listening to his adventures. For more adventures, visit his website....more
Eli Brown’s infectious romp of a novel has a thoroughly modern sensibility dressed in the garb of yore. It is the early 1800’s and Owen Wedgwood is chEli Brown’s infectious romp of a novel has a thoroughly modern sensibility dressed in the garb of yore. It is the early 1800’s and Owen Wedgwood is chef to Lord Ramsey, one of the chief shareholders of the Pendleton Trading Company in England which trades opium for tea, silk, silver, and spices in Asia. Enter Hannah Mabbot, pirate extraordinaire, defender of the underdog, and avenger of the exploited.
”Then entered a pillar of menace, a woman in an olive long-coat. Her red hair hung loose over her shoulders. She sauntered to the middle of the room, her coat opening to reveal jade-handled pistols. Using a chair as a stepping stool she walked upon the dining table to Lord Ramsey’s plate and stood there, looking down, as is she had just conquered Kilimanjaro. Her boots added inches to her already long frame…There…was the Shark of the Indian Ocean, Mad Hannah Mabbot, Back-from-the-dead Red…”
Hannah kills Lord Ramsey for his greed and sins against humanity, and takes Owen captive on her pirate ship, charging him with concocting a gourmet meal for her once a week on pain of his life.
Author Brown’s delicious confection reminds us what we loved about stories of old, and adds that sine qua non of righteous vengeance to sustain our sensibilities. It may be that readers are especially susceptible to feats of culinary desperation because we are too busy reading to shop, so finding Wedgwood creating real cuisine from weevily flour and rancid lard is positively inspiring. Some sea captains for large sailing vessels in my family surprised me with the news that those aboard ship rarely partake in the (obvious to me) fresh seafood surrounding them, as they are not fishermen but sailors, but one of the Japanese sailors aboard the Flying Rose, Mabbot’s pirate ship, always has a line dragging from the aft rail, saving Wedgwood more than once in his search for a main course.
This is escapist fun of the best sort, effortlessly inventive, reminiscent of childhood summers, yet with truths adults will recognize and may take to heart. Once, Mabbot must throw overboard the treasure she has looted from Pendleton ships in order to speed her progress away from danger:
”The men will be bitter for having lost their silver, though it saved their lives. It is a complicated thing. With money in their pockets they become lazy and contrary. Heavy and slow, as does the Rose itself…A small part of me is glad to be rid of it. When my men are hungry, with death upon their heels, they work hard and never complain and enjoy their own company. They sing every night.”
And, on the pain one feels when a close friend or lover dies:
”I’ve had this pain. To tell you it will go away would be a lie. It will never go away. But, if you live long enough, it will cease to torture and will instead flavor you. As we rely on the bitterness of strong tea to wake us, this too will become something you can use.”
And on the sanctity of eating the flesh of animals:
”I thought I would take pleasure in skinning that watchful rabbit, but now that it was still, it engendered in me a tenderness for all fragile flesh. I sharpened a knife until it shone, then skinned and cleaned the rabbit, trying to make each cut a gesture of respect. Loathe to waste any part of the animal, I set brains and hide aside for tanning…As I progressed deeper into the body I felt a mystery revealing itself to me and began to pray, not with words but with simple cooking, a prayer not for the soul of the rabbit exactly but for the generous blending of its life and Mabbot’s. She had fed and loved it and now its flesh would become hers and mine, and in this way I understood that all beings lived only to feed each other as even the lion lays down for the worm. In the striations of the rabbit’s muscle I saw eons of breath and death.”
And finally, we have a love story. It has a prudish man’s restraint, told in the voice of Wedgwood, who denies for ever-so-long his interest in Mabbot and in being at sea with pirates. But lord knows how we all love conquering the inhibitions of prudish men—and how much more satisfying and telling it is for the woman to be the instigator. If men are permanently “on” for sex, their sexual proclivities have less value, as it were. ‘Barky holes of trees’ as John Barth (The Sot-Weed Factor) has written, would do as well. Women, more discriminating perhaps, tell us more by their choices.
A fine choice for a summer read. This book deserves to be widely enjoyed for the sheer fun it offers. It is something apart from the usual, and one must always take note of derring-do.
Scrapped my earlier review because it wasn't effusive enough. Noyes has enormous talent in making hearty meals reminiscent of American Classics, or BlScrapped my earlier review because it wasn't effusive enough. Noyes has enormous talent in making hearty meals reminiscent of American Classics, or Blue Plate Specials. In fact, she chooses to even use those names which give us a hint of the originals, e.g., "Salisbury-style Seitan" and "Southern Fried Seitan." These come close to the flavor and texture of those old-fashioned dishes, and I now constantly underestimate the efficacy of having such dishes in one's repertoire if one is serving non-vegans. People are willing to try/eat vegan, particularly if the food is delicious, and some are more willing if the food is familiar. It is hard to believe some people are still eating "southern fried" anything, but there you go...a little treat for those unreformed but without as many calories or cholesterol. I tried it, and it is delicious.
Noyes' recipe for Tempeh Stroganoff (with no vegan sour cream) is terrific and I will use it again and again. I had it on mashed potatoes, but it would be good in any combination with any grain. It is simple, since it is basically oven-baking tempeh in a marinade--no need to steam the tempeh first.
The Fettuccine Alfredo looked gorgeous, and tasted great. I had trouble keeping it hot enough, but that is always my particular problem with pasta dishes.
I tried the All-American Incrediburgers and they live up their name. When the burgers are hot, they even leak a little, like fatty beef (hope that doesn't put you off). Grilled, these would be pretty spectacular, but they were excellent pan-fried in the dead of winter. Non-vegans were amazed. Best of all, perhaps, was the recipe for Burger Buns, which held together under slatherings of sauce and juicy burger. This was the MOST successful recipe I have (found and) tried for these, and bread is my specialty. I'm sure the Tempeh Burgers will taste exceptionally good as well, for they use the same ingredients as that indomitable team, Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Romero in Veganomicon: The Ultimate Vegan Cookbook.
Tried the Blueberry-Oat Short Stack one morning for breakfast & unfortunately couldn't eat them hot because the baking powder made them horrible. I wonder still if that 2 Tblsp of Baking Powder is a typo. I would use yeast instead, but if you must, use only 2 tsp Baking Powder if you try these. The overnight soak is the theory behind museli as well (softening the oatmeal). Anyway, I left the oatcakes stacked on the table, and late in the afternoon, when they were cold, I did not taste the baking powder so much, so they weren't as bad then.
The Corn and Bean Chowder was pretty spectacular, and the Mushroom Barley Stew really had a deep mushroom flavor, especially since I used half an ounce of dried Chanterelles with the fresh mushrooms.
In many recipes, Noyes asks for a spice mix she created: All American Spice Mix. It is very good and useful. For a week or more, when I had run out of Chili Powder and kept forgetting to buy some, I used this spice mix interchangeably in recipes calling for Chili Powder. It is flavorful and has the kick of cayenne.
All in all, Tami Noyes is something of a diva, and going to her house for dinner must be something akin to entering those pearly gates....more
This astonishing compendium of Burmese country foods is a travel guide as well as a cookbook. Duguid has long experience in South Asia, and has workedThis astonishing compendium of Burmese country foods is a travel guide as well as a cookbook. Duguid has long experience in South Asia, and has worked hard to translate foodstuffs and measurements into something Western cooks can create in their own homes. She tells stories, too, of where she gets the recipes and how she’s seen ingredients used. She tells of places she’s visited and people she’s met—after a couple hours with this gorgeously photographed book one feels as though one had spent a week away. It is positively transporting.
Any aspiring visitor to Burma should have a look at this to get a sense of what one will encounter. Duguid makes one comfortable with local greens, and discusses how, despite Burma’s long coastline, river fish are most prized. Contrary to the expectations of many, not all dishes contain red-hot chilies—often these are condiments that one can add to one’s dish after cooking, along with a series of herbs or pastes, so that one may moderate one’s intake.
Interestingly, Duguid explains that Burma may be a vegetarian haven, for many dishes are meatless or can be modified for meatless cooking, using a fermented soybean paste dried into a cracker “tua nao” for flavoring instead of fish sauce or shrimp paste. She introduced me to “Shan Tofu,” a chickpea-flour tofu that she calls “one of the great unsung treasures of Southeast Asia.” Besan, or chickpea flour, is whisked into salted water and heated on a stove until shiny and thick, poured into a shallow dish to cool. It resembles a cooling polenta in texture, but holds together in soups or salads, and it can be sliced or cubed, eaten plain or fried. I made a brilliant vegan Ma-Po Tofu with it and I’m going to try it “savory baked” as well.
Another intriguing dish I’d like to try immediately is a porridge made of jasmine rice and peanuts which resembles oatmeal but which is spiced with chili oil and blanched greens, fried shallots and crushed roasted peanuts. It is a blank canvas on which to riff one’s highly flavored specialties. Duguid suggests this porridge can be amended to become a sort of white pasta sauce to serve over rice noodles…adding ingredients until one has a meal-sized mixture of food held together with a spiced rice paste. Very intriguing.
Every library should have a copy of this book. It is a beautiful, recent introduction to life in Burma and it is indispensable for a traveler. ...more
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