From the monthly archives:

August 2007

Argentine Modern

2007.Aug.20 Monday

 [Cooking] is spontaneous. It’s what hits you at the moment, not the result of years of carefully crafting details. It doesn’t follow a strict formula, though you might notice similarities and consistencies of style. All the rules are open to reinterpretation. – paraphrase from Chip Camden, software developer Buenos Aires – With strains of the [...]

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Sorry, No Rijsttafel Here…

2007.Aug.19 Sunday

 The task of keeping food vibrant and interesting, particularly food that belongs to a long tradition, is the challenge of any cook, professional or amateur. For those who have a repertoire of their own, the repetitive aspect of cooking and the demands of our relentless need to eat can easily turn cooking into a dull [...]

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Natural Disasters

2007.Aug.17 Friday

Buenos Aires – Just a quick note, a public posting, to thank all those of you who sent e-mails enquiring after Henry’s family in Peru with the now two earthquakes in the last two days. They’re fine, they live up on the far northwest coast, about an eight hour drive north of Lima, and the [...]

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With Liver and Giblets for All

2007.Aug.16 Thursday

 The wickedly entertaining, hunger-inducing, behind-the-scenes story of the revolution in American food that has made exotic ingredients, celebrity chefs, rarefied cooking tools, and destination restaurants familiar aspects of our everyday lives.” – back cover blurb from… Buenos Aires – …The United States of Arugula, by David Kamp, catchy title, no? Wish I’d have thought of [...]

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Queen for a Day

2007.Aug.14 Tuesday

 Sure ‘Queen’ was vulgar and sleazy and filled with bathos and bad taste,” wrote producer Howard Blake in an article for Fact magazine. “That was why it was so successful. It was exactly what the general public wanted….We got what we were after. Five thousand Queens got what they were after. And the TV audience [...]

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House of Pastas

2007.Aug.13 Monday

 If you take a picture of a human that does not make him noble, there is no reason to take this picture. That is my way of seeing things.” – Sebastião Salgado, Photojournalist Buenos Aires – As I’ve mentioned many a time, I love finding little, out of the way, hole in the wall type [...]

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Flee for your lives!

2007.Aug.12 Sunday

 I have wandered about for weeks without encountering a single decent meal. With precious few exceptions, the hotels of America all cook alike – and what they offer is hard to distinguish from what is offered on railway dining-cars.” – H.L. Mencken, Writer, Journalist Buenos Aires – You know, I know that it’s hard to [...]

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Helices

2007.Aug.10 Friday

 It’s hard to say how far they walked. They were in the forest for nine months, eating snails and leaves and whatever they could get.” – David Brandon Buenos Aires – I’ve just finished reading through the famed The Whole Beats: nose to tail eating by Fergus Henderson, a fun little recipe book for the [...]

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Southern Charm

2007.Aug.09 Thursday

 The saying of John Peale Bishop is worth recalling, that the South excelled in two things which the French deem essential to civilization: a code of manners and a native cuisine. Both are apt to suffer when life is regarded as a means to something else. Efficiency and charm are mortal enemies, and Southern charm [...]

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