Dan Perlman's Blog, page 7

Open Sesame!

First, apologies for going “radio silent”. We’ve been, more or less, without power for just over three days now. Until yesterday evening, we had a sort of hint of it available. It was, interestingly enough, sufficient to keep both our cellphone chargers working, the modem and wi-fi router, and one LED based lamp. Intermittently there was enough to run my laptop charger and/or Henry’s tablet charger. After about 30 hours, our water tank ran out, because the pump couldn’t work. There’s still wa...

The Random Algorithms of Life

These days everyone has an algorithm. It’s all about predicting our behavior, our impulses, our purchases, our viewing habits, surfing (web) habits, and anything else that some potential advertiser, obscure government agency, or fad non-profit organization might pay for in order to target us with some pitch, product or panacea that 99% of the time we’re going to say no to. They’re gaming for the 1%-ers. The problem is, none of these algorithms seem to work.

Not that they don’t do something predictive. They do. A recent conversation over the dinner table involved one-upping stories of the sudden onslaught of targeted advertising after clearly precipitating events, that simply weren’t substantive. One person related having responded to an email with a hearty congratulations to a friend who had just bought a condo on a beach in Spain. Within 24 hours he was receiving both email and sidebar ads as he surfed, offering up connections to real estate agents on the Spanish coast. Another had clicked “Like” on a picture of a friend’s dog doing some sort of trick and found Facebook suggesting pages of pet training services on a daily basis. And more.

Like everyone else, I’m subjected to algorithms from the moment I wake up in the morning….

I make my coffee and then sit down to peruse my email. According to Google, the gmail application learns over time to predict what sorts of mail should be shown as priority, what shouldn’t, what should go to spam, and what not. I can count on that at best, maybe half of my mail will be sorted correctly. I have a filter for mail coming from the Casa SaltShaker website reservation system to automatically put those into priority mail. Maybe 2/3 of them will be, despite a very clearly worded filter. I’m on several mailing lists for which I get a daily email. Roughly half the time, those emails are marked as spam – despite the fact that they arrived from the same address and with the same subject line, daily, and every time, for years now, they go to spam, I mark them as “Not Spam”.

On the flipside, I get junk mail that I regularly mark as spam which continue to arrive from the same addresses and with the same subject lines, daily. Well over half the time they end up in either my regular or even priority email boxes. I have whitelists and blacklists, neither of which seem to have any effect on where mail ends up. One algorithm down.

My favorite has to be the Netflix “Top Picks for Dan” queue. Yours probably says “Top Picks for Joe” or “Top Picks for Shannon”, or maybe even “Top Picks for Elspeth”, a charming personalization touch meant to make sure we feel loved and cared for. By Netflix. Mine currently has 40 “top picks”, I guess that hearkens back to the days of “Top 40 Hits” or something. Now, if you use Netflix, you know it has a rating system, of 1 to 5 stars. After you watch something, you’re invited to rate it, and that goes into an algorithm, along with the genre and style of film or show, to help create a predictive algorithm. Now, I’ve rated a lot of films over my time on Netflix, so it ought to be narrowed down pretty well, right?

When they show you their recommendations for top picks, they also show you what the algorithm predicts you’ll rate the film or show. So one might, reasonably, predict that almost all of the top picks would have either five or four stars, no? No. Of those forty, currently, seven of them have five star predictions, fifteen are guestimated to receive a four star review from me, three for three, a whopping nine for two, and even five for one star. Oh, and one television series which I’ve already watched and rated. Four stars. So, why recommend anything that they predict I’ll only give one or two stars? Given the vast catalog, why even three stars?

They are good at picking out some four and five star recommendations that I might not otherwise have picked. It recently led me to binge watching through two different TV series. Nowhere Boys, which I only clicked on because it looked like mindless entertainment with cute boys, I figured I’d watch an episode or two of one evening when I just didn’t want to think. It turned out to be an Australian series, in the all-popular genre of teen witches, but with some dark twists, and it’s well written and well acted, and, well, the boys are cute.

It also led me, inexplicably, to a one-season Korean medical telenovela (soap opera), titled Good Doctor, that likewise looked like there were some cuties in it (maybe that was the predictive element?), which turned out to be the travails of a young surgical resident who has more or less overcome being autistic, enough to just barely function in day to day life, but he’s a savant in the world of medicine. It was, at times, sweet, at others painful, and not only was it well written (the English subtitles probably missed a lot of nuances, but even so), but it didn’t stint on the medical stuff – getting right in, close-up to the blood and guts in the operating theater (I was, at one time in my life, a paramedic, considered going to medical school to become an ER doctor, and am still fascinated by that whole world). But, those were also predicted to, respectively, receive four and five stars from me. Not one or two.

Until recently I was using a Samsung Galaxy S4 phone. When I would start to type a message, it would automatically detect whether I was starting off in English or Spanish, and switch dictionaries for predictive entry accordingly. I recently “upgraded” to a Galaxy S6. It doesn’t do that. Apparently (despite the fact that the S4 did it really well, it rarely made a mistake in which language I was working in after the first couple of words), too many people complained that it either a) didn’t pick up the correct language within one or two keystrokes (seriously?) or b) switched to the incorrect language.

So Samsung scrapped it because it wasn’t a good enough predictor, and now has a button to select your language (but every time you start typing a new message, it switches to your main language, which means if you’re having a back and forth conversation, you have to re-select, in my case, Spanish, if you want to use predictive entry, over and over again. It also, annoyingly, sometimes tries to switch me to Chinese (apparently the “international version” phone I bought was pre-programmed with Chinese language bloatware that while I can disable, I can’t remove, and now and again, some of it resurfaces). Thankfully, there are apps you can download to overwrite the Samsung keyboard and give it back automatic switching (thank you SwiftKey).

Foursquare is another one. There’s a bit of rating involved – Liked, Neutral, Didn’t Like – that goes into it. But more, they have a service of recommending restaurant alternatives – “If you like that place, you’ll like this place.” It’s a mystifying selection process. If I look at the listing for my restaurant, a reasonably upscale, albeit casual, experience, with a five course tasting menu, paired wines, at a communal table, FS recommends on the basis of having liked us (we have an 8.6 rating out of 10), one will like: a Mediterranean café and bistro on the opposite side of the city (rated 7.4 out of 10); a Mediterranean restaurant in Palermo (7.0 out of 10); and a bar in Palermo (5.3 out of 10). They’re not in the same neighborhood, they’re not, well, in the same class, nor even the same style of food, or even cuisine. Go figure.

LinkedIn – I’m not sure if this is the same as a predictive analysis, but I get a weekly email from them with “job openings you might be interested in”. The only predictive part of that seems to be that they’re located somewhere in South America, not even always in Argentina. Not once, over more than a decade, has any of the jobs related to either gastronomy or journalism. Generally they’re things like “Chief Operating Officer of a Petroleum company”, or “Executive Director of an Animal Rights Foundation”, or “Receptionist and Whipping Boy in the Fashion industry”.

Coursera seems to think the courses that I would like best are things involving teaching English as a foreign language. I’ve never taken a course from them remotely tied to that theme, they’ve all been either food or history related. Pocket keeps recommending articles for me, on a wide variety of topics. I don’t use Pocket.

I could probably keep going, finding other examples from daily life, but enough. We all know it’s happening around us, we can’t really do anything about it except make annoying blog posts. So be it.

The Bread & Soup Project #8 – Armenia

One of the things not many people outside of Argentina know, is that there’s a huge Armenian population here. Roughly 100,000 Armenians live here, having arrived in two waves, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, following genocidal periods wrought by the Turks. It’s one of the largest Armenian disapora communities in the world. And, we have some great Armenian restaurants here, particularly Sarkis and El Manto (hmmm, time for re-reviews of each, although I eat at both regularly, I haven’t writ...

Wine-ing Away

Bodega Chandon Cuvée Réserve Varietal Chardonnay – beautiful light yellow color, clear rim, fine bubbles; fruit forward nose with ripe apple and a hint of vanilla; on the palate, dry, medium high acidity, medium body, apple skin and ripe apple, lemon pith, vanilla; long finish, slightly bitter with lemon pith most prominent. [Recommended]

Cruzat Rosado Extra Brut – pale pink tinged with orange, clear rim, blend of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, fine bubbles; forward nose of apple and strawberry;...

Bite Marks #22

New sushi spot just opened up here in Recoleta, Mir O’Hashi, Azcuénaga 1284 (branch of a Martinez based sushi bar), so, of course, had to go check it out. Take-out and delivery only. Basically a hole-in-the-wall with a teeny kitchen and a one person sushi bar. While enthusiastic, the three staff members seem a little clueless about the whole sushi world, I sort of got the impression that maybe they took a class in sushi making and not much more. None of them knew of any of the more well known...

It’s Jake With Me

I haven’t been keeping up with my Heluenis. A few months after my round-up of the various family members and their associated food outlets early last year, the granddaughter of the folk who run the take out spot at Córdoba and Larrea, Cythia, opened up her own spot, along with a partner, Andrea. The idea behind hola Jacoba, Thames 1801, Palermo, is to share the tastes of their childhood with the general public. This is, and isn’t cross-cultural cusine – it is, in the sense that there are dish...

The E Files #2

Time for another round of this month’s favorite emails.

—————

This one seems innocuous at first….

I don’t eat seafood, can you make a substitution for me?

“Not a problem, there’s one seafood course, it’s a ceviche, I can do a vegetarian version for you, I’m doing that for another guest as well.”

Great! See you soon.

…at the dinner…

“How come you’re not serving me the same ceviche as everyone else?

“You said you didn’t eat seafood, we agreed on a vegetarian option.” (the ceviche is fish and shrimp)

I didn’t mean things like fish and shrimp, I meant seafood. Everyone knows what seafood is.

Everyone is studiously observing their plates, including her husband. I’m still wondering what seafood means to her. Luckily, an easy fix, just a new plate of, apparently, non-seafood fish and shrimp ceviche.

—————

In the same vein, but sort of the reverse….

We eat everything, no allergies, no worries.

…at the dinner… thankfully off to the side before the dinner started…

The menu doesn’t look vegetarian. We’re vegetarians.

“It’s not vegetarian, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were vegetarians, you told me you eat everything.”

Obviously we’re vegetarians, otherwise why would we have reserved at your table instead of a regular restaurant. We eat all kinds of vegetables.

“Umm, but we’re not a vegetarian restaurant, and we did post the menu in advance. But let me see what I can come up with in the kitchen.”

You advertise as a vegetarian restaurant, and you always were one. Isn’t that what puertas cerradas restaurants are all about?

“No, not really, and no, we’re not, and never have been. But give me a few minutes and I’ll put something together.”

…read the f*ing website people…

—————

From someone who has referred numerous people to Casa S over the years…

“I just referred a couple of people I know from work to you and I understand they’ve already booked their spots. I just wanted to give you a heads up – they’re probably the two most boring human beings on the planet that I’ve ever had to sit with. Nice people, but add absolutely nothing to a social conversation.”

“Umm, you’re kidding me, right? They’re going to turn out to be the life of the dinner party…?”

“No really, they’re excruciating to be around, but they wanted something different to do, so I thought of you.”

“Did I do something to offend you?”

“No, why?”

…sigh… “I was just wondering why you’d send me people that you can’t stand to be around, to my home, for dinner?”

“Oh, but you just say hello to them and then you’ll hardly talk to them, you’ll be cooking, and they don’t speak Spanish, so it won’t bother Henry.”

“But what about the other guests at the table?”

“They won’t even notice that the other people are bored to tears, and they’ll have a good time, so it’ll be good for my business, since they’re clients.”

…there are no words…

[Followup: The people came, they were charming, great conversationalists, they had a great time, so did everyone else. And it turns out one of them has never even met the person who sent me the original email and had no idea who he was. Not that I told them what he said, of course.]

—————

Group of 8 requesting a reservation for a private dinner. They’re students from an MBA exchange program, one of the most expensive ones in the U.S., and one which we’ve had numerous students attend from over the years while they’re here in town, so these aren’t kids with no money. All is well with the request, and response… then:

As you know, you have a very good reputation with students at XXXX, and I’m sure you’d like to keep it. We’re just students and your prices are very expensive for us, and I’m sure we could eat for less somewhere else. We could maintain that good reputation you have at our school in exchange for a 50% discount on the price.

“Thanks for your interest in joining us. We feel our price is fair, and reflects the quality of what we do, and past students from your program haven’t had any problem meeting it. We have a list of recommended restaurants on our website, I’m sure you can find somewhere else to dine for that evening, but at this point we’ll be cancelling your reservation.” [That’s the politest version of “Go fuck yourself” that I’m able to muster.]

The Bread & Soup Project #7 – Argentina

You would think, living in Argentina, that this would have been one of the easiest stops in the project. But it’s not, because, you see, Argentines don’t eat soup. They really don’t. They eat stews, and my first impulse, and several people even suggested it, was to prepare locro, easily considered the national stew, if not national dish. But a) I’ve done that before; and b) as I said, it’s a stew.

Now, what’s the difference between a soup and a stew? It’s a fine line, and a fairly blurry one,...

Plate by Plate: The Cavolfiore is Coming!

Over time, I’ve been playing with various versions of vegetable gnocchi that don’t involve potatoes. It’s not that I don’t like potatoes, I love them, but, just to do something different. It’s not some invention I came up with – various vegetable gnocchi are out there in the canon of recipes, and as I’ve been honing down to a favorite version of our cauliflower ones, I’ve mentioned gnocchi di cavolfiore at least once (and as of today, there are over 32,000 hits on the term on Google, so I’m...

Scenes from An Italian Restaurant

Specific to “Southern Cone” Spanish, i.e., basically the area encompassed by Chile, Argentina and Uruguay, a recova is a “covered arcade” in architectural terms. Tossing it out to friends in various places who speak Spanish far more fluently than I, the general suggestion seemed to be that it’s a local adaptation of recoveco, a nook, cranny, corner, or hidden away spot. In other parts of the world a recova is more of a butcher shop, a meat market, and, here, throughout most of the 1800s, the...