Whether out of relief, admiration for piloting skill, or sheer exuberance, travelers applaud when the plane lands in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The scene, part of a new JetBlue commercial, might seem over the top, especially to jaded travelers. The ad, though, celebrates a custom in Puerto Rico in which clapping upon a plane’s landing is the norm, not the exception.
Yesterday (Sept. 15) a boogie boarder at Cape Cod suffered the first fatal shark attack (paywall) in Massachusetts since 1936, and the first in the US since 2015.
For anyone who has watched and loved The Great British Baking Show, but eyed the latest season on Netflix with suspicion, go ahead and whip up a traybake and make a cup of tea—it’s still worth watching, even with new hosts.
Update: As of this morning (Sept. 14) the Frying Pan Tower live stream is no longer live. Richard Neal, the owner, wrote on the tower’s Facebook page, “winds were gusting into low 80s last night with averages in 60s! We lost power a little after this so either a connection somewhere between there and here failed or the tower is um, missing. I’ll put my bet on a simple power failure but will not know for a while.”
Alexandra Waldman, the co-founder and chief creative officer of Universal Standard, started the company out of frustration at not being able to find stylish clothes that fit her as a size-20 woman. In 2015, she and her co-founder, Polina Veksler, put out an eight-piece collection that sold out in a week. Now the company has raised $8.5 million in funding, including investment from the lifestyle guru Gwyneth Paltrow.
Given the size of the The X-Files cannon—218 episodes over 11 seasons, plus two films—it’s easy to forget the Burt Reynolds cameo as a benevolent, hands-off God who favors games of chance and Hawaiian shirts.
Pyrex nesting bowls and bakeware occupy a special place in the pantheon of vintage cookware. They’re functional, beautiful, and in some cases, valuable—coveted collectors’ items that can also be used every day, and a powerfully nostalgic reminder of childhood kitchens for those who grew up with cookware. Indeed, some devoted fans identify so deeply with the American brand that they get inked with Pyrex pattern-inspired tattoos.
Ever since I can remember, there have been occasional nights where sleep just refuses to settle into my bones. I’ve developed some strategies for dealing with these brief bouts of insomnia. If it’s cool weather I’ll open a window, then lie on the bed without any covers until I am very cold, then cover myself up and let the soothing warmth of the comforter pull me under. I get up and read on the couch and drink something warm and non-caffeinated until I feel drowsy. Or, I just accept my fate and get up and do something.
Pumpkin spice latte season is officially upon us, even though in most of the US it’s not exactly sweater weather. Starbucks announced the return of the seasonal drink known to its fans as “PSL” today (Aug. 28), in both hot and iced forms.
It’s midnight and you need a steak. What do you do?
Maybe it’s because I follow a lot of chatty types, but my Instagram Stories feed tends to be really wordy. Long missives in typewriter font, superimposed over a selfie, or a child, or a completed batch of cookies is pretty much the norm.
Neil Simon, the American playwright, died today (Aug. 26) at the age of 91.
If Instagram and Pinterest are to be believed, there are parents who take real pleasure in lovingly crafting beautiful lunches for their children to take to school every day. Fruit medleys of citrus stars studded with blueberries, kid-friendly sushi rolls with smiley faces, and bright veggie kabobs with dipping sauces fill cuter-than-cute bento boxes, taunting the rest of us with their seemingly boundless creativity.
It’s been 60 years since the first freeze-dried waves of instant ramen noodles relaxed into boiling water, transforming from flaky brick to salty bowl of flavorful soup in just a few minutes, and for just a few yen. Within five years of releasing its first packages of chicken-flavored instant ramen on Aug. 25, 1958, Nissin Foods was selling more than 200 million servings of ramen a year in Japan.
A few years ago my husband and I bought ourselves a wafflemaker for Christmas. We were about to become parents and suddenly it seemed crucial to welcome our son into a home that had the ability to make a plate of waffles at a moment’s notice. Still, at the time, we saw our waffle iron as a weird impulse buy, and fully expected to leave it on the curb for a curious stranger the next time we moved.
Let’s get one thing out of the way: coconut oil is not poison.
When I got married in 2009, I walked down an aisle flanked not by church pews, but by long tables covered in simple white tablecloths, burlap runners, and napkins in harvest hues of russet, gold, and plum. Instead of floral centerpieces, local apples filled wooden bowls. I carried a bouquet my sister fashioned out of brightly hued Indian corn. Our guests drank water from mason jars and sipped wine during the ceremony, which was in the backyard of a hundred-year-old house built over a creek. There was technically no barn, but it was a barn wedding.
Mayonnaise is the stuff of strong opinions. Whether you’re pro, con, or deeply brand-loyal, there is no more polarizing condiment—and perhaps no more polarizing food—than the creamy emulsion.
It’s a weekday in midsummer, you’re preparing dinner, and you suddenly really want a glass of wine. A cold glass of wine. But the bottle you have on hand is as warm as bathwater, and that sounds, well, not optimal.
Oatmeal, with its hearty dose of fiber, is a great breakfast choice for staying full and energetic. It feeds a crowd for pennies. It also, likely, contains a hearty does of glyphosate, better known as the Monsanto weedkiller Roundup.
There’s a tried-and-true formula that many food-focused travel shows adhere to: A host, generally male and white, swoops into a country and is taken to a region or neighborhood where he proceeds to “discover” an ingredient, dish, or entire cuisine—one that locals have been happily chowing down on for years.
A certain kind of person takes pride in announcing that they will only eat tomatoes when they’re in season. I’ll admit that I buy plenty of tomatoes in the winter too—to douse with lime and mix with onion and cilantro for pico de gallo, or roast to a shrunken, umami-rich mass to pile on toast or toss with pasta.
Insatiable, a new Netflix show that debuted on Aug. 10, has been widely panned as tone deaf, offensive, and just plain bad. It traffics in outdated ideas about beauty, weight, and intelligence, and plays a false charge of sexual abuse as an outlandish joke. There’s also bad fat suit. On the whole, it’s a mess.
The humble aluminum can is going through a bit of a renaissance. Once relegated to airplane beverage carts and vending machines, cans are no longer the sole domain of lawnmower beers—the light, fizzy, American pilsner-style brews you might down at a barbecue. Thanks to the distinctive aluminum ubiquity of La Croix seltzer and of high-end craft beers, the can is cool again.
