Thanks for posting this! I opened RIF this morning to see what would and I was surprised to see that it seems to still work (I didn’t try logging in). I hope it’s what you described and not some kind of mistake that’s going to cost RIF millions of dollars!

On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee is such a special and unique book. I wish there was a book like it for every one of my hobbies! It’s an explanation of what happens during cooking at a molecular level, which gives so much insight into how and why cooking techniques and ingredients work well together. In addition to that it blends in hlthr history of cooking (ancient recipes) and literature. It’s such a wonderful book! I can’t recommend it enough.

I also like Jeffrey Steingarten’s writing. His two books The Man Who Ate Everything and It Must Have Been Something I Ate are a joy to read. He is a good columnist for Vogue, which gives him time and money to do all kinds of elaborate cooking projects and travel. The essays are such a pleasure, full of passion and enthusiasm. and humor. Just as an example, the conceit of the eponymous essay of his first book is that a food columnist should eat all foods – after all, a film critic wouldn’t be allowed to hate whole genres of film. So in the essay he tries to get himself to enjoy all the foods he doesn’t like.

This is pretty out of the box. It’s just something we’ve wanted to do for awhile and we’re using the 4th of July as an opportunity:

DIY nacho bar: everyone gets a cookie sheet, there’s a table with various chips, cheeses, and toppings, and you take turns under the broiler

DIY sundae bar: same thing, but ice cream (and no broiler!)

I love how paprika will extract the ingredients and cooking instructions from a recipe site so I don’t have to hunt through a page that’s a mile long!

Interesting! I wonder if other countries will follow suit and if alcohol packaging will eventually go the way of tobacco labels. I also wonder if it will have less of an effect than tobacco labelling – so often you get a drink at a restaurant or bar where the consumer wouldn’t see the labels, compared to a cigarette that’s almost always purchased as a back by the smoker.

Wonderful long read exploring the personal and national identities of borsch! Thanks for sharing.

Great point!

Wow, it’s finally approved. I feel like I’ve been hearing about lab-grown meat forever and I wasn’t sure it would ever come to market. Then in the meantime Beyond/Impossible came onto the scene with their technology. To be honest their products are such close imitations of meat, I wonder how much better this lab grown meat could be. I also wonder about the cost.

I’m intrigued!

You can make pizza dough with sourdough starter and get the protein through toppings. Here is a recipe by Paul Hollywood for sourdough pizza, with a little yeast thrown in to help it rise. “Strong white bread flour” is the same as bread flour, in case the “strong” throws you off.