Today was a beach day and we wandered over the dunes to the water’s edge along the plage near where the cargo ship the TK Bremmen washed ashore in 2011, long since cleared away and salvaged due to the pollution risk from oil in the hold.
synchronoptica
one year ago: a visit to a historic hermitage (with synchronopticรฆ)
twelve years ago: Wiesbaden’s Fort Biehler plus an FAQ on FAQs
thirteen years ago: wayside shrines, the Feldenkrais method plus the return of the hibachi
Via the New Shelton wet/dry, we are directed to problem of how most cuisine is reduced to a flag and 
cordoned in by national borders, which is serviceable to an extent but results in a monolithic understanding when regional dishes are in reality much more granular foodways. Chinese cooking has been categorised in popular culture into eight styles, Sichuan, Cantonese, Anhui, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shandong, Fujian and Zhejiang as a start (based off the order of courses presented in banqueting tradition) but is far more rarefied in reality, even to the exclusion of standard dishes which so far not been subject to an official count but seems conservatively to number in the scores with this “coffee table” enumeration of representative recipes, ingredients and trajectories.
ei-ei-o: a comparison onomatopoetic words for animal sounds across different languages—via Waxy
acrostic: textile company’s branding has the aesthetics of concrete poetry
destiny narrative: an omnibus post on the horrors and avoidability of war
analog society: a British group performs live mash-up of notionally similar songs
tectonic independence: why Greenland is an island and Australia a continent—see also
360: Manhattan’s only revolving restaurant to reopen
telephone game: Russia demands details from US before agreeing to any ceasefire agreement in Ukraine
cross-walk: mimes direct traffic in Bogotรก
an old error has more friends than a new truth: proverbs and idioms from around the world
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links to revisit (with synchronoptica) plus more FOIA follies
seven years ago: raising awareness for prosthetic limbs, Japan’s residential towers plus more links to enjoy
eight years ago: provisions requiring employees submit to DNA screenings
nine years ago: what if the Singularity already happened, the doorway effect plus colourful ancient statuary
ten years ago: Disney reboots, even more links plus more made-up jobs
Mapped onto all sorts of anti-social behaviour and privations of gluttony, the real and reputed แฝฯฮฟฯฮฌฮณฮฟษฉ, gourmandise of ancient Greek culture with a penchant for relish or horsd’ลuvre as anything that might 
compliment a staple dish were leveed with a fish addiction, the most desirable morsel of a repast—we learn via Strange Company. There are many accounts of overindulgence by the wealthy and philosophers alike, wishing almost self-destructively for the gullet of cranes and pelicans for devouring the food—the poet Philoxenus of Leucas, for example, an enthusiastic banqueter and seafood lover who caused his own death by gorging on a giant octopus—and the conspicuous consumption was linked in the public’s mind to all sorts of vices, immediate gratification and moral failings, and indeed the spectacle or the rumour of the fish market became a moral panic of the day. More from JSTOR at the link above.
Having previously explored the influence of architect and resistance-fighter through her Frankfurt model kitchen that has become the standard design for the Western world, we were pleased to learn that personal 
domestic space of Margarete Schรผtte-Lihotzsky has been carefully conserved and made accessible to the public in her Vienna apartment. The modern, fitted standard with harmonised features now taken for granted, like broad counter surfaces, tiled Spritzschutz which are reversed for British and American English and plenty of recessed storage room was first introduced in 1926 and the restored 1970s version in her former home. Despite of the impact of her installation, Schรผtte-Lihotzsky, who never was a homemaker nor cook prior and relied on interviews, was understandably resentful for only being remembered for this singular innovation at the expense of social aspect of architecture and urban-planning.
Via the New Shelton wet/dry we are directed to an omnibus article on the research and development of 
producing food out of air, profiling some of the two dozen firms around the world seeking to transform carbon dioxide and water (see previously here and here) into an alternative protein-source, flavouring a substrate of desiccated cell walls of autotrophic, soil-dwelling bacteria. Using a fermentation process already well established in the production of insulin and the rennet enzymes for cheesemaking (eliminating the need to harvest it from the stomach lining of calves), scientists working for these biotech startups have isolated a highly palatable bacterium that thrives in captivity and have launched demonstration farms to show the concept’s viability to mill a nutritious flour and meal using a fraction of the land—allowing more opportunities for the rewilding of fields and pastures—and resources it required for traditional farming. While commercial-scale production is in sight, the largest hurdle remaining may be convincing the public to adopt such a diet of microbes that foregoes the folkways of cooking.
Via Strange Company’s Weekly Link Dump, we were intrigued by this herbarium of apotropaic plants that goes beyond one’s standard staple of garlic to ward off or disempower malign forces and how these superstitions intersect with traditional healing and culinary arts. For instance, testimony from witch trials during the sixteenth century in the Gulf of Trieste revealed the widespread belief that good witches (called Benandanti—see also) engaged in nightly parasomnic battles with their evil counterparts wielding wands made of rue and fennel. Dill was also held to have disenchanting properties and hedges of hawthorn (Weiรdorne) were said to be protective barriers where dark magic could not enter. Much more at the links above.
Although to an extent we get why both websites and increasingly waitstaff, dependent on positive reviews, recommendation, and the former sidelined, scraped, abandoned, bereft of revenue and cajoled into a subscription model, places and spaces one has given a minute of their attention to voluntarily 
are not enough and demand another minute amongst the vortex of algorithmically curated feeds and forced notifications—and the minute after that, no longer allowed to engage and explore on one’s own terms. Nick Heer presents the very apt allegory of a dining experience ruined by an aggressively intrusive server:
Would you like to see the menu again? Here, try this new thing. Here, try this classic thing we brought back. Here is a different chair. How about we swap the candles on the table for a disco ball? Would you like to hear the specials again? Have you visited our other locations?
Such an encounter is highly relatable and corresponds with newsletters, paywalls, diversions that lock one into walled-gardens and promoted content and detract from the whole venture.
cat lives matter: US vice presidential candidate JD Vance propagating false and inflammatory rumours about migrants abducting and eating family pets
beany leeky greens with greeky rampy beans: recipes and foodways becoming a bit less twee, more straightforward—via tmn
an agony, in eight fits: James Earl Jones (RIP) reads Lewis Carroll’s The Hunting of the Snark
may the gods give you everything you asked for: backhanded benedictions and predictions about what AI does next
esh: how AITA took over the internet
a melodrama in three acts: Five Star Finale and other pre-code screenplay original sources
crowd size: Harris-Walz campaign advertisement airing on Fox News
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links worth revisiting (with synchronoptica)
seven years ago: silphium, more on the Voynich Manuscript plus a visit to Trump’s ancestral home
eight years ago: Birobidzhan oblast, fantasy doubles tennis plus the 1970 movie The Phynx
nine years ago: more links to enjoy
ten years ago: WWI periodicals a century on
On this day in 1924, the Caesar salad was invented in Tijuana by restaurateur of Italian-extract Caesar Cardini, from Baveno on the shores of Lago Maggiore, in his eponymous dining establishment. 
Caught unprepared by the large number of Americans crossing the border to legally purchase liquor otherwise unavailable during Prohibition for the long holiday weekend, Cardini improvised to stretch his food supply by mixing a large salad in the middle of the main dining hall, making due with what he had a surplus of on hand with the addition of tableside tossing by the proprietor for some dramatic flair. Several food columnists and Julia Child, who sampled the original sometime in the 1920s, helped popularise the dish whose reputation proceeded it, with the latter celebrity chef helping to codify the recipe with the help of Cardini’s daughter in the 1970s, romaine lettuce and croutons dressed with lemon juice, olive oil, eggs, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, black pepper, Dijon mustard, anchovies (substituting capers and tahini for a vegetarian version) and Parmesan cheese.
synchronoptica
one year ago: the US national anthem (with synchronoptica), David Bowie’s trans-Siberia railway journey plus Uncle Sam’s predecessor
seven years ago: a botched memorial
eight years ago: a space probe arrives in Jupiter’s orbit plus the chemistry of a candle
nine years ago: pyrotechnic effects
ten years ago: hyper-capitalism plus anti-migrant sentiment
who is this imposter: AI ruins classic, static reaction memes with animation
๐ฅ: the bygone baguette boxes of French Polynesia—via Messy Nessy Chic
quantum compass: London Underground hosts trials for a subatomic sensor that could supplement satellite navigation
crystal lake: the preponderance of 1980s horror movies set at summer camp
ball & chain: Nag on the Lake shares a special memory from Festival Express, the touring show of Monterey Pop, when the musicians came to Toronto
message in a bottle: the dozen times humans have tried to communicate with extra-terrestrial intelligences—see previously here, here and here
encarta: the short, happy reign of the multimedia CD-ROM as part of Fast Company’s 1994 Week—via Slashdot
casa bonita: a 1974 amusement park restaurant reopens under new management and with a monumental wait-list
surgeon general’s warning: US top doctor urges health notices for social media
synchronoptica
one year ago: an AI’s take on emoji (plus synchronoptica), assorted links worth revisiting, a human computer plus Adsense (2003)
five years ago: Sweden’s alcohol monopoly, the UK Carbon Brief plus more links to enjoy
six years ago: a Banksy gallery opens, first issue magazine covers, the War of 1812, a space slingshot, more links worth the revisit plus Trump and Merkel
seven years ago: the US withdrawal from the Paris Treaty plus even more links
nine years ago: tobacco introduced to the Old World, more links, Hocus Pocus plus the nobiliary particle
anabolics: the mainstreaming of casual steroid use
cover model: the identity of the individual on the iconic Duran Duran album revealed four decades on—via Miss Cellania
rank and file: a woodland-themed chessboard that rolls up into a log
the imitation game: researchers claim that GPT-4 has passed the Turing Test—see previously
london underground: spelunking through the strata of the ancient city
non-playable character: determinism versus emergence and the question of free will
ticino: a cache of five-thousand photographs spanning from 1900 to 1930 taken by a poor seed-peddler captures life in a remote, Italian-speaking Swiss canton
food that makes you gay: stereotypes and gender in what we eat—via Web Curios
priority seating: an account jammed packed with patterns for mass-transit upholstery—see previously—via Kottke
ux: in the age of AI, perhaps it’s time to retire the term “user”
voter turn-out: historically high temperatures in parts of India may skew election results
๐↔️: this year’s bracket for most misinterpreted emoji
described herein as a beverage carrying assembly: a patent for a beer puppet for festivals and sporting events
the second soul: a thoroughgoing essay by Anton Howes on the history of salt—via Clive Thompson’s Linkfest
instructions to the jury: closing arguments in the Trump trial and deliberation begins
wasteful by design: digital technology and internet habits are becoming major contributors to the climate catastrophe
transakcja: an endearing animation on courtship rituals in 1950s rural Poland
Originally self-published in 1931 as means of coping with the loss of her husband, the jacket design which captured the popular poster, cut-out style of the day was created by the author’s daughter Marion Rombauer Becker, who helped write subsequent editions. The Art Deco cover features Martha of Bethany, the patron saint of Home Economics, vanquishing the dragon of domestic drudgery—according to the Golden Legend, the Tarasque, a fearsome chimera that tormented the people of Gaul, that Martha tamed with her faith, though once obedient and docile was unfortunately beset by angry villagers with rocks and spears until it died. Rombauer Becker was the director of the Art Department of a school in Ohio and the typeface is inspired by a Cassandre specimen of the contemporaneous excess of the decorative font Bifur. In print continuously since with over twenty-million copies sold, it is considered the quintessential American cookbook, its popularity sustained by Julia Child, and is a snowclone for many topical overviews.
the function of colour: more scans from a beautiful 1930 volume on design in schools and workshops
sporulate: scientist create a plastic first strengthened then digested by bacteria
wck: resuming their mission of feeding people in Palestine, Josรฉ Andrรฉs’ cookbook is nominated for a prestigious gastronomical award
aim high in creation: a survey of North Korea’s popular culture
barnard 33: JWST captures a sharp image of the iconic Horsehead Nebula of Orion
dead reckoning: the history of the Etak Navigator and other cartographical innovations
architectural renderings: the Art Deco illustrations of Charles Perry Weimer—via Messy Nessy Chic
The unusual triplicate name of the wine region of Montefiascone in Lazio (Latium) originated in a possibly apocryphal legend from the twelfth century when in April of 1111 bishop Johann Fugger, a noted gourmand and member of a house of prominent bankers and venture capitalists from Augsburg who supplanted the Medici family and controlled much of the economy of Europe through the seventeen 
hundreds, travelled to Rome to witness the coronation of Henry V, King of Italy, Germany and Burgundy, by Pope Paschal II and sending ahead his prelate, possibly called Martin, as majordomo to scout out places along the route offering the best wine, instructed to write in chalk “there it is” on the doors of the finer establishments serving vinum bonum, and so impressed with the offerings of one local tavern punctuated his rating with urgency for the entourage. Though not heavily exported, the name has certainly proved as good marketing for the Etruscan Montefiascone and with the final resting place of Fugger in the commune’s main church of San Flaviano, with the inscription, “Est est est ∙ Propter nimium est ∙ Johannes de Foucris ∙ dominus meus ∙ mortuus est” (Here, here, here [a common epitaph, or possibly cause of death was ruled too much Est]—because it is too much, my master is dead) it is reported that Fugger decided to stay and not continue the journey. The wine pairs particularly well with Roman cuisine like fried artichokes and calamari.
one year ago: technological anti-solutions, a classic from Blondie (1980) plus Neil Agarwal gives us a stratospheric tour
two years ago: another MST3K classic, persistent COVID denialism plus renovating the Kodak R&D building
three years ago: the Salyut programme (1971), more MST3K, a Google Earth time lapse, shelters build after San Francisco’s 1906 earthquake plus the changing interiors of the Oval Office
four years ago: the Lada, keeping up with the news, Mambo No 5 (1999), more McMansion Hell, Animal Crossing tarot, St Expeditus, a pioneering virologist, failed attempts at wildlife photography plus a goatforsaken place
five years ago: an extended weekend, Mid-Century Modern maps, the bees of Notre Dame, more accidental art plus an optical illusion to parse
chambre de bonne: disappearing top-floor tiny apartments of Paris
semifreddo: the origin of Neapolitan ice cream
the united states of division: a prescient 2004 release by Prince & The New Power Generation
court dress: the pink sleeves of the supreme courts of Labrador and Newfoundland are in deference to the former summer robes for sittings in England and Wales—via Super Punch
geoengineering: Tennessee legislature outlaws (see also) so called chemtrails
bpm: Chechnya announces ban of music considered too fast or too slow
backsplash: mosaic of the day
warehouse-to-loft-conversion: a tribute to the last of New York’s artists’ dwellings—via Messy Nessy Chic
Via TYWKIWBI (indeed), we learn that Dr Lecter’s famously creepy quip from Silence of the Lambs, the psychiatrist turned cannibalistic serial killer consulted for insight to help catch another, “A census taker once tried to test me—I ate his liver with some fava beans and nice Chianti” is more than a memorable quote but also a subtle joking admission that he’s not presently adhering to his prescribed pharmacological regimen. 
The fictional doctor’s most aberrant tendencies could be managed with a class of drugs called monoamine oxidase inhibitors (a rather blunt instrument from the 1950s used to treat a whole range of disorders with various levels of success), which Lecter would of course know as well as the contraindication of this particular repast, all noted for having high levels of tyramine (as well as blue cheese) and could cause dangerous side-effects—the kind of adverse chemical reactions that the poor grapefruit usually gets blame for. In the novel by Thomas Harris that the 1991 film is adapted from, mostly faithfully, the better-paired wine is Amarone is mentioned but was presumably substituted for cadence in delivery by Anthony Hopkins and as something audiences would be more familiar with.
post-amazon era: monopsonic retailer’s workers’ are writing about the dystopian company to fight back—via Slashdot
sublet: tech startups are relinquishing office space office space back to their landlords
stop making sense: negative manifestos, rule-breaking and by defined by what one is not
deci-lon 10: an outstanding collection of slide rules curated by the analogue computer’s appreciation society—named after their seventeenth century inventor, William Oughtred of Cambridge—via Web Curios
dancing delicacies: 3-D printed plate and nano technologies promise interactive meals
primer simposium tecno: a 1981 electronic music concert in Madrid
piramida: updated plans for the restoration of Tirana’s Brutalist landmark
destroilet: an automatic combustion plumbing solution popular in the 1960s and 70s
down in the underground: agencies of the subsurface
fiver: a new adaptation of Watership Down as a graphic novel
proposition m: San Francisco passes a punitive tax of vacant housing speculation
the faanmg index: the blush has worn off Amazon’s rose—via Nag on the Lake’s Sunday Links (lot’s more to explore there)
synchronoptica
one year ago: brittle egos bristling at Karen’s Garden plus modern sundials
two years ago: the International Meridian Conference of 1884, The Last Picture Show plus an early alternative currency
three years ago: the father of psychophysics, red food dye, another failed doomsday prophecy plus the Humument series
five years ago: the US Gun Control Act of 1968, the WWII bombing of Kassel, the spread of disinformation, anticipatory libraries for other worlds plus RIP to the inventor of the Little Library
Via Colossal, we are directed to the latest ambition of Uli Westphal (previously) his current series 
photographic taxonomy of all the world’s edible seeds—so far collecting and shooting with the portrait studio treatment around four hundred of the estimated three-thousand cultivated and wild botanical parts ranked highly palatable. Much more at the links above.
synchronoptica
one year ago: the lingua cosma of SETI, assorted links to revisit plus building the fake, composite bridges shown on euro bill
two years ago: typographical ornament, a plan for Italy to be annexed by the US plus Jesus Christ Superstar
three years ago: an AI makes memes, Free-Thought Day and other celebrations, a Khrushchev colouring book plus foliage studies
four years ago: รtienne de Silhouette, the founding of Iran plus social media’s sins of omission
five years ago: more links to enjoy, mapping returns on solar panels plus the miniature world Tatsuya Takana
