braeburn and bismark

Our heirloom tree having taken this season off, we really enjoyed perusing this gallery of uncommon, and in many cases threatened, apple cultivars (a selection of the seven and a half thousand varieties out there) from around the world, beautiful captured by William Mullan and curated by the intrepid explorers at Gastro Obscura. We especially enjoyed learning about the Api Etoile (la pomme d’api) raised in orchards in France and Switzerland, so named for its star-shaped form.  More to explore at the links above.

table d’hôte

Via the always brilliant Nag on the Lake, we are introduced to a fine dining experience in a restaurant in the cellars beneath Stockholm’s City Hall (previously, quite literally Stadshuskälleren) where one can sample from the multicourse banquets served during Nobel awards ceremonies from years past or by laureate of one’s choosing.
Just below the actual VIP dining area, the Blue Hall that can accommodate thirteen hundred invited guests, and helping cater the event, their kitchens have been recreating the historic menus (here are some examples) for guests for the past fifteen years and put some serious research into the preparation and present, locally-sourced and sustainably plated (on actual Nobel porcelain), to make it as authentic and reflective of the fare presented as possible.

gumdrops and gatehouses

Carrying on a holiday tradition of crafting and featuring Modernist and Brutalist confectionary miniatures, Present /&/ Correct juries a new selection of gingerbread architectural models. It’s fun to try to identify the individual candy-types that make up the different architectural elements and appreciate the designers’ resourcefulness. According to lore, ginger was to be among the gifts of the magi but this particular wise man had to convalesce in Syria (see also) and did not make it to Bethlehem with the others but propelled his gesture onward with the baking custom.

turkey lurkey

Catching up on some post-Thanksgiving podcast listening, we were delighted to learn of the existence of priceless collaboration between Susan J Vitucci and Henry Krieger in their silly and engaging operetta Love’s Fowl that recounts the continuing adventures of Henny Penny, also known as Chicken Little or by her stage diva name, La Pulcina Piccola—but through the filter of opera buffa, with an impressive, classically informed score and libretto sung in Italian, featured in a poultry-themed left-overs episode of This American Life.
Our hero has graduated from her initial hysterical though determined mission (despite leaping to the wrong conclusion, her perseverance is what saved her life whereas her companions all dawdled and became Foxy Loxy’s meal—those without scruples always ready and willing to take advantage of panic and confusion) to warn the King that the sky is falling to face some of the more vexing but equally universal challenges of fairy stories and folklore (the familiar, initial trope is classified as Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 20c but together, we run the entire gamut), a cumulative story like the original premise it begins with, repetitious in some way but always advancing, including swashing-buckling on the high seas, statecraft and romantic liaisons.

compère

Born this day in 1859 (†1923) in Lausanne, Art Nouveau printmaker Théophile Alexandre Steinlen first apprenticed as designer in a textile mill in Mulhouse before joining an artist colony in the Montmarte quarter, where he was introduced to the cabaret owner and entertainer Aristide Bruant (the dashing man in the bold red scarf who was the subject of many Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec paintings), helping to secure Steinlen commissions for poster art in Paris and beyond.
Le Chat Noir (Bruant performed there as well and his most well-known ballad was eponymously titled) itself was the pioneering enterprise, established in 1881, of fellow impresario Louis Rodlphe Salis and is considered the first modern night club, with food, drinks and live entertainment and which soon outgrow its original venue, and the revue was taken on the road and held in music halls across the city.

monster mash

While somewhat deflated to learn that the secret ingredients of horror icons Boris Karloff’s and Vincent Price’s respective recipes for guacamole sauce (a redundancy since the spread is Nahuatl for avocado sauce) was not the exotica of a magic potion or witches brew, I was quite happy to encounter another instance of people engaged and enraptured not by what’s on the menu per se but rather by how one does food and how there are given set of norms for behaviour and etiquette.
I can’t say whether or not it’s a phenomenon specific to any one culture or subset but it strikes me that Americans are particularly sensitive to it—with the deportment of presidential candidates scruntised for “authenticity” by the way they wield fairground fare more memorable than any excerpts from debates. I wonder what that says about the state of the polity. Do check out the recipes at the link up top but also know that placing the avocado pit in the bowl of guacamole, contrary to testimony, will not keep it from turning brown.

pilzfund ii

Having had less success up until this point and a bit envious of neighbours who return after foraging with mushrooms by the crateload, H and I went exploring in the forest again and had some fortune gathering some edible specimens.
Careful to collect discriminately and not spoil the woodland ecology (responsible, surgical removal affords the chance for the fruiting body to regrow) and more careful research so as not to end up poisoning ourselves, we were able to identify, along with the usual fare, Goldröhrling (Suillus grevillea, the larch bolete—for the root of the tree it is often found), Steinpilze (previously) and Birkenpilze (Leccinum sabrum, the birch bolete) mostly.
Though by no means is this rule-of-thumb universal or not without exceptions but broadly, mushrooms with stalks and a spongy, porous underside of its cap, called boletes, literally from the Latin for edible mushroom—as opposed to gills underneath—can signify that it is safe for human consumption.  Please, however, consult the experts before trying to harvest wild mushrooms and know how to contact poison-control, just in case.

We were pretty selective and not more adventurous than is advisable and once H sautéed the mushrooms, that bucket reduced down to a small but very flavourful portion.

world vegan day

In honour of the anniversary of the founding of the animal rights society and publication of the movement’s first newsletter with its first coinage of the term in November of 1944 by English activist and advocate Donald Watson (*1910 – †2005), this day amidst the harvesting (and slaughter), feasting and revelry of this transitional time of year is set aside for education and outreach on living without exploiting fellow animals.
We’re getting there slowly and really admire and respect those who questioned our imagined station and dominion all those decades hence and how easily many of us have it now with the luxury of choice and mainstream alternatives. This older event poster, directly inspired by the banner of Nineteen Eighty-Four’s Ingsoc (Newspeak for English Socialism) Party, strikes me as deliciously ironic, especially for those who seek and attribute cultish overtones to the lifestyle choice out of fear. One party slogan is after all, “Proles and Animals are free.” Do read some of the literature and lean into the science and come to your own conclusions.  

pilzfund

H and I went foraging for mushrooms recently and though we’re not averaging a good return on edible specimens from the field, we are getting exposed to quite the menagerie of woodland types of fungi during our scavenging.

 

Among the diverse exemplars that we find along the trail just metres from one another we encountered the poisonous and hallucinogenic fly agaric toadstool (Fliegenpilz, Amanita muscaria) quite often, others yet unidentified and works of art in their mystery, and another quavering discovery called a wood ear or a jelly ear (Judasohr, Auricularia auricular-judæ, so called from the traditional narrative that Judas Iscariot hanged himself from an elder, the sambucus, Holunder tree and these mushrooms often appear at the base of such trees to remind the faithful of this act of betrayal).

For all of its rather Lynchian baggage, the wood ear is very much edible—if not a bit bland unseasoned, and is a staple for umami flavourant in Asian cuisine. Please click on the images for more detail.  The pharmacological merit of the fungus is currently being studied, research suggesting that its palliative use in folk medicine was not far off.

7x7

sonic smock: a garment that allows the hearing-impaired to experience music through tactile impulses

mixtape: the greatest hits of 1979 in three minutes

apophenia: the state of being exceptionally receptive to imagining synchronicity where little exists, accounting for the resonance of mashups—especially exemplified by The Dark Side of the Rainbow 

it’s got a sort of woody quality about it, gorn, gorn—much better than newspaper or litterbin: celebrating Monty Python’s fiftieth anniversary—via Slashdot 

peacock throne: the nicely framing wicker chair (previously) that’s the stuff of celebrity

bucatini: drinking straws made of pasta instead of plastic stand up in cold beverages—I had wondered about that sort of application but was sure that they wouldn’t last

we’re going to party, karamu, fiesta forever: musician Jacob Collier remixes Lionel Ritchie’s 1983 hit single

hushpuppies

By coincidence, respectively on this day in Tennessee (near the Opryland theme park) in 1969 and then three days later in Kentucky—neither places one would necessarily associate with fresh fish—the first eateries of the seafood themed restaurants Captain D’s and Long John Silver’s began serving.
It’s cannon given the fact that the restaurant is named after the galley-master and chief cook—and undercover pirate—aboard the Hispaniola in Treasure Island. I have no memory of the former—maybe there was a turf battle between these natural rivals—but do remember going to the latter not overly often but pretty regularly as a kid and remember the fishing village kitsch with the planks and the heavy ropes and associated all wooden decks with piers and ships because of it.

agronomy-om-nom-nom

Via Kottke’s Quick Links, we are helped to the realisation that the dominate trend in gaming and by extension, simulations, is your garden-variety agricultural challenge, be that in fostering plants, foraging or cultivating a victory garden for one’s own survival.
I suppose that there’s a universal theme to all computerised games that could admit of the same analogy—though some instances are more obvious than others—and a certain stress-relieving quality that is present in and and common to the stakes of all diversions, though often times progress is measured differently and in the permission to fail and try again, there’s nonetheless something in the Zeitgeist that game architects and engineers are connecting with regarding anxiety and accomplishment. I hope that this skills and rewards can translate to being better, more engaged caretakers of the natural world we increasingly find ourselves estranged from.

a buccaneering buffet

Atlas Obscura presents a fascinating profile of ex-pirate and food writer William Dampier (*1651 – †1715) whose explorations were a span bridging the Golden Age of the exploits of Empire of Sir Walter Raleigh and James Cook with the later scientific expeditions of Alexander von Humboldt, Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Darwin, Dampier’s travelogue accompanying the latter on the HMS Beagle.
Though also responsible in part for propagating the portrayal of aboriginal peoples as less than human, ultimately court-martialed for cruelties perpetrated in Australia and whose valuing of cargo—an exotic staple crop, breadfruit, for export to struggling colonies—over the well-being of crew informed Mutiny on the Bounty (circumnavigating the globe three times, also inspired Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels), without Dampier’s gustatory sense of swash-buckling and adventurous appetite, our palette might not have the taste for soy-sauce, bananas, cashews, barbeque or guacamole—to name a few. Fortunately, other delicacies sampled, like matinees and flamingos, did not catch on. 

time to make the doughnuts

Having famously unyoked itself from one fast-food giant several years back—with the artefacts to prove it—one doughnut (kleinuhringjum) chain has already come and gone and now with a second one to follow, having grossly over-estimated the market demand in Iceland.
I hope that this trend continues and such invasive, unnecessary operations kindly remove their toe-hold in train stations and the high street in cloying hopes of being seen and establishing brand loyalty. Placeholder-boutiques, having dispensed with initial curiosity if the appeal was ever there much less sustaining, are a huge drag on resources and real estate that could be put to much better use.

8x8

blood meridian: two animated maps (see also) chart Manifest Destiny from contrasting perspectives

lobby cards: the iconic film posters and title sequences of Saul Bass (previously here and here)

strong to the finich: because of the leafy green’s steroidal qualities, some are calling for it to be banded like other doping agents

scientific method: brilliant vintage middle school text books via Present /&/ Correct

nineteen eighty-four was not meant to be an instruction manual: workers trialled with beacons and bracelets to monitor performance and productivity

best in show: a curated selection of the winners of the National Geographic travel photography competition

lj: going into production in 2021, the Lightyear One represents the industry’s first long-range and untethered electric vehicle, via Design Boom

pomological catalogue: the 1886 US contract for watercolour depictions of all the world’s fruit

downstream effects

Never mind the fact that you might be ingesting multiple tiny spiders per night—or conversely that if the spiders of the world teamed up, they could consume all the humans on the face of the Earth (or cocaine prawns or antidepressants in the groundwater), the World Wildlife Foundation launches a new campaign to illustrate the awful non-food pyramid that we’ve created. Via the Drum, we learn that on average a person consumes one hundred thousand micro-plastic particles annually, meaning about five grams (a lot of different factors come into play and you can get a more personalised estimate of your dietary intake here), a credit card’s worth of the stuff each week.

swedish neatballs

Exclusive to Dezeen, we are treated to three sustainable, future-proof recipes to try at home from IKEA’s laboratory Space10. By releasing a cookbook and encouraging individuals to experiment in their own labs and incubators, IKEA is hoping to come closer to closing “the gap between future trends and real life” and enable people to become active and engaged agents of positive change. Check out recipes and learn more about Space10’s test kitchen at the link above.

kaiten-zushi

Via Boing Boing, we’re served up a rather delightful little movie from the point of view of a camera mounted on the conveyor belt of a sushi restaurant (回転寿司, literally rotating sushi). Every moment is splendid and captures the joys of dining out with friends, each passing booth telling its own story, some reacting to the camera and other too focused to notice. It’s a sweet one off feat but I wouldn’t want this repeated (the conversations are muffled with a soundtrack) and feel surveilled every time I ate out—especially given my propensity for being clumsy with plates and utensils.  We also appreciated how the source website categorised the video under the label sonder.

Here’s a video of a guy putting a camera on a sushi conveyer belt. It’s wonderful. Every table has a little story! pic.twitter.com/6mwKsTHJ0e

— Drew Coffman (@DrewCoffman) May 17, 2019

ad mensam

Schloß Hollenegg (DE) outside of Graz (the summer residence of the House of Liechtenstein) is no stranger to hosting unique exhibitions and the latest installation by curator Alice Stori Liechtenstein is no exception—with twenty-one site specific pieces throughout the castle’s sculleries and dining hall that explore table manners and dining etiquette as a social wedge that goes beyond the act of nourishment to afford all the chance to gather together and a place at the table (the Latin title). Much more to explore and chew over with Dezeen at the link above.

musterküche

Via the always brilliant Nag on the Lake, we learn about the Frankfurt kitchen (die Frankfurter Küche), which transformed our relationship to food preparation, dining and living, created by interbellum designer Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky (*1897 – †2000) and first Austrian woman to be credentialed as an architect.
Assigned the task of creating the kitchen spaces for a new, post-war housing project to rebuild Frankfurt am Main in 1926, Schütte-Lihotzky took inspiration from the efficiencies of railway dining cars and created kitchens for hundreds of thousands of units and though perhaps not as narrow, one can detect elements of Schütte-Lihotzky’s vision and basic layout in our own new kitchen. Sensing the eminent fall of the Weimar Republic, she and other architects joined Ernst May—the chief designer behind the New Frankfurt project and other rebuilding and re-housing efforts to form the “May Brigade” and went off to the Soviet Union to help with Stalin’s Five Year Plan. Once conditions again became untenable during the Great Purge (Большой террор, 1937 – 1938), their group became unrooted again and Schütte-Lihotzky settled in Chicago and worked on the World’s Fair Century of Progress exposition.