Adam D. Roberts's Blog, page 68

Who Was Stendahl the Food Writer?

The other day, at another used book store (this one in Atwater Village), I stumbled upon the cookbook you see above and what caught my attention wasn’t the picture or the title but the name of the author. Like Madonna or Cher, here was a food writer with a one word name. Are there any other food writers with one-word names? I can’t think of any. So I opened to the back flap to read more. Here’s what I found.

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Nigel Slater’s Herb Salts

Lots of good ideas in this Nigel Slater piece (is he the most prolific food writer of all time?); I’m most intrigued by the thyme/juniper combination. Oh and the chicken skin popcorn.

Chocolate Cranberry Oat Cookies So Good They’ll Stop Your Kid From Crying

Parents of three year-olds, I salute you!

We have house guests this week, our friend Celia and her three year old daughter, Johanna. And while I’d been told that the terrible twos are nothing compared to the terrible threes, that really had no significance for me since I don’t have children, I just have a cat and she’s 14. But Johanna is three and very adorable and fun (last night she tried to read me a bedtime story and confessed, midway through, “I don’t quite know how to read”) but also prone to screaming tantrums. And when she arrived at our door on Saturday, she was in the middle of a fierce one. “She just woke up from a nap,” explained Celia. Thankfully, I had cookies on hand to sooth the savage beast.

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Learning To Cook at 78

This is a sweet, sad, moving account of a 78 year-old man’s struggle to cook for himself after his wife dies. [From The Guardian.]

A Real German Breakfast

Don’t miss Luisa’s post about A Real German breakfast which includes gorgeous pictures (hey, where’d you get that tablecloth Luisa?) and lots of hunger-inducing photos of bread, cheese, jam, and, believe it or not, liverwurst.

Tasting Notes: Flemish Sour Ale, Delirium Tremens, Centine Toscana

My literary muscles have been flexed thoroughly on the subject of food, but not so beverages. And yet I drink beverages every day. I am drinking beverages right now! (An overly sweet Chai tea and a glass of water, for the record.) Last week I decided to throw my hat into the wine/beer writing ring by taking notes upon sipping from various bottles. What follows are my tasting notes for the various beverages I tried. I hope you will find them as useful and insightful as my regular work here. I hope to make this a regular feature.

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Why Small Things Still Matter

Many people on Twitter (and the like) are complaining about frivolous food Tweets in the face of the tragedy unfolding in Boston. Time Out New York theater critic Adam Feldman, though, ReTweeted a quote from Leonard Bernstein that echoes my feelings precisely: “This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before.”

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A Trip to L.A.’s Grand Central Market

There was a moment, driving to L.A.’s Grand Central Market, that I started to regret my decision. Downtown L.A. can be a hassle and there I was chugging along listening to “On The Town” (I’m still obsessed with it) with my windows rolled down and the street was closed due to some construction, so I had to make a difficult right, then a difficult left, all the while searching for the parking garage while Leonard Bernstein’s sailors sang about the Bronx being up and the battery down. By the time I parked I really questioned whether this journey was going to be worth it.

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The Ticket System

Today it was announced that Trois Mec, the highly anticipated new L.A. restaurant from Vinny Dotolo, Jon Shook and Ludo Lefebvre, is going to use the ticket system first popularized by Nick Kokonas at Alinea and Next in Chicago. The idea is this: instead of making a reservation for dinner, you buy a ticket to dinner. A ticket to Trois Mec costs $97.13 a person and entitles you to five courses and includes tax and tip but not drinks. That means, if you don’t drink anything, you can just show up, sit down, eat your food and leave. If you don’t show up, though, you’re out the 97 bucks.

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Re:Find

And speaking of hotels, my good friend David Prior (who I met while cooking with Alice Waters for my cookbook) has a fantastic new web show called Re:Find that really showcases his pesonality and his extraordinary taste in food, culture, and off-the-beaten-path destinations. Episode 1 features the Wyth Hotel in Brooklyn and its proprietor Andrew Tarlow (of Marlow & Sons and Diner).