Viewers in the UK have strong feelings about their cooking shows. So much so that bookies take bets on who will win the nation’s most beloved culinary competition, The Great British Bake Off.
Ladies, are you in the kitchen right now? Because if you’re putting any thought into what you’re cooking, you’re probably doing it wrong. Whether you’re making an egg in a custom-crafted egg spoon or drying out chicken skin with a cleverly repurposed hair dryer, society would like to point out that you’re using the wrong tools. In fact, unless you were intending to cook a mediocre casserole or some brownies from a box, you should probably just hang up your apron now.
Americans spend a surprising amount of money on Easter. According to the National Retail Federation, 2017 was a banner year for chocolate bunnies—Americans doled out $18.4 billion for Easter celebrations, or $152 a person. This year spending is projected to fall a smidge, to $150 per person. That’s not all jelly beans, of course. Candy topped the list of categories NRF survey-takers said they planned to spend on this Easter, but was closely followed by food, gifts, and clothing.
Many years ago I was talking with a friend about love. Even at its best, he said, there is always a slight undercurrent of sadness in a marriage, a dark irony that undergirds everything, because you live with the knowledge that eventually you’ll both die, and that it’s very, very likely one of you will be left to live without the other.
Don’t read the comments. That’s a handy piece of advice for anyone navigating the internet who wants to maintain sanity and some faith in other humans.
A few weeks ago I struck up a conversation with another parent at our local indoor playspace. We chatted about our small town and how hard it is for toddlers to get enough activity in the winter while my son climbed the pirate ship and hers banged on an old piano. When she packed up to leave we didn’t exchange phone numbers or email addresses—we confirmed that we’re both on Facebook and vowed to friend one another, which we did later that day.
Mercury goes into retrograde on March 22, the first time it will do so in 2018. This a very real astronomical phenomenon in which Mercury appears to move backward as it passes Earth on its much more rapid cycle around the sun. It has also become a recurrent astrological cliche to remark that “Mercury must be in retrograde,” when wires get crossed or there’s a misunderstanding of any kind.
I’m usually fairly immune to kitchen envy, but when I’m scrolling through Instagram and spot a proper pantry—lined with neatly labeled jars of lentils, bulgur and oats—I get a little pang of longing. A pantry is like a walk-in closet for your kitchen. And I’m certain that if I had one for all of my dry goods that a delicious, healthy dinner that my children would love would practically make itself each night.
If your freezer isn’t already stocked with emergency boxes of Thin Mints (they make an excellent last minute gift if you’ve forgotten a birthday), there’s still a little time left in Girl Scout Cookie season.
Every St. Patrick’s Day my mom cooks the same meal—corned beef with carrots, potatoes and cabbage, with a side of Irish soda bread. Growing up this was one of my least favorite meals of the year, aside from the soda bread, which I would eat any day. The texture of the corned beef freaked me out and the vegetables were somehow too salty, yet always too bland.
Until recently I thought that pies were immune from the aesthetic arms race of Instagram. Sure, they could be nicely crimped along the edges or neatly-cut to make a pretty vent in the top crust (I once carved a cute chick on the top of a chicken pot pie using a sharp knife), but there was no real way to fancy up the humble pie. Then I started seeing Twin Peaks-themed pies, David Bowie-themed pies, and incredibly intricate lattice pies in my social media feeds, not just on Pi Day, but all the time.
To look at the world of baking through the lens of Instagram is to gaze upon an unending stream of beautiful birthday cakes, gorgeous pies with complicated latticework crusts, and new ways to make chocolate chip cookies. That’s a lot of well-lit perfection. Coupled with Pinterest and YouTube—where there seems to be an equally insatiable demand for ever-more-complicated and ingenious desserts—it’s enough to send a home baker screaming from the kitchen without ever cracking an egg.
It’s not available outside of China yet, but Bite of China III, one of the—best food shows produced anywhere on the planet—premiered during the recent Spring Festival (happy Year of the Dog!). The first episode highlighted woks made by ironworkers in Zhangqiu, Shandong province, and after it aired the factory featured on the show saw its entire inventory sell out in an hour. Even more impressive, the factory booked enough orders to keep its 50 artisans occupied for the next two years.
Welp. Harissa. Glamping. Embiggen. Merriam-Webster just added 850 new words and definitions to their archives, including an updated listing for “unicorn” that explains the noun not just as a mythical beast, but also as a start-up company valued at $1 billion or more. On our short-list for a similar update next year? Dank.
The Quarter Pounder is breaking up with the heat lamp. Close to 3,500 McDonald’s in the US are now serving burgers made with fresh beef instead of frozen patties. By the end of May, all 14,000 McDonald’s franchises across the country will cook both Quarter Pounders and their line of Signature Crafted burgers from raw patties. It’s a major supply chain change and a big deal in the kitchen as well; the new burger program requires special handling and grilling, and has taken four years to implement.
When David Chang was growing up in the suburbs in Virginia, kids made fun of the way his family ate. Friends who visited the Chang residence and caught a whiff of his mother’s kimchi would joke about the smell in school the next day. This, more than the renowned chef’s classic French culinary training, more than the success of his Momofuku restaurants, seems to be the single most important factor that defines Chang’s outlook.
Americans really want to lose weight. And we want it gone now. That’s why so many turn to the latest fad diet promising a shortcut to weight loss—even though those claims are often built upon complicated logic and dodgy science.
Last summer my husband and I spent hours hacking and then rototilling through tough patches of grass in our back yard, and a small fortune on the fancy fertilizer MooDoo, along with seeds and tiny tomato, tomatillo and basil plants—only to watch our first attempt at a real garden fall into a weedy state of despair.
Last week in Malaysia, Prime Minister Najib Razak caused what The New York Times referred to as a “tempest in a quinoa bowl” (paywall) by stating that he preferred the South American grain over rice—the staple food in his country. Despite its nutritional value, quinoa is far more expensive than rice, and political opponents used the opportunity to cast Razak as out of touch with the Malaysian people.
Cream is not an intuitive mixer for alcohol, as lime juice and ginger ale are. You might try a creamy cocktail as a kitschy throwback, or make one for a themed party, but how often do you crave what amounts to a boozy milkshake? At least that was my thinking, until I read about the history of the Brandy Alexander in 3-Ingredient Cocktails by Robert Simonson.
If you’re in the US watching the Olympics on NBC, chances are, you’re saying Pyeongchang wrong. Both the way the name has been written in Roman script and the way that the TV network has persisted in pronouncing it on air would lead you to believe that the final syllable rhymes with “twang.”
As a culture writer I’m supposed to turn you on to some cool Euro detective drama on Netflix. Sure, I’ve watched them, and I have to say, not only are they mostly humdrum or clever without being smart, they’re not as interesting as what’s happening on Law & Order: SVU every week.
Maybe you’ve had this sandwich: A thick layer of garlicky chickpeas, smooshed to the consistency of mashed potatoes cementing cucumbers, sprouts, tomatoes and havarti cheese between two slices of wheaty, seedy bread, avocado optional. When I was in college in the 1990s it was my lunchtime go-to. The hummus functioned as the main event and the primary condiment at the same time, providing a meat-free source of protein that wasn’t a spongy slab of marinated tofu. The whole thing was vegetarian heaven to my twenty-year-old palate.
The Blue Apron box from hell. That’s how the internet has been characterizing the Trump Administration’s bright idea to replace benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, with a “USDA foods package.” Shelf-stable milk, canned fruits, vegetables and meat, and yes, government cheese, (but no fresh fruits or vegetables) were among the grocery items the Trump Administration would include in the “USDA Harvest Box” outlines in the President’s proposed budget for 2019.
