Chef's Table: Jeong Kwan Jeong Kwan, Chef's Table www.imdb.com 172. Garden Growing WildThe garden is a riot gardensfoodzen
The true meaning of tea There is no true deformation that does not follow the laws of necessity. In later years, when deformation came to be consciously created, when the rejection of perfection became a matter of deliberate manipulation, the true meaning of tea began to be lost. To put it in somewhat contradictory terms, true tea existed only before the advent of the tea ceremony. After the coming of tea, when deformation came to be consciously sought, common everyday beauty disappeared and unnatural manipulation began. Yanagi Sōetsu, The Japanese Perspective food
Substitutes for the thermal experience Such clues from other senses can become so strongly associated with a sense of coolness or warmth that they can occasionally substitute for the thermal experience itself. For example, the taste of mint seems refreshing and cool regardless of what temperature it is. Similarly, the pressure of heavy blankets conveys a feeling of warmth quite independent of their actual thermal qualities. Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture You can taste it with your eyes sensesfood
You can taste it with your eyes It was one of those good rides, where the motion of the train is soothing, and the interior temperature pleasantly warm but not hot. I imagined the subway car as a rapidly moving load of bread. The motto "You can taste it with your eyes" occurred to me. Nicholson Baker, The Mezzanine Substitutes for the thermal experience food
Madness All our madness comes from having our stomachs empty and our heads full of air. Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote foodmadness
If you can't beat the classics Choi: I love [this contemporary banana cream pie] because sometimes new presentations create that iconic or nostalgic thing, but then they don't taste like nostalgia. But this one tastes like a banana cream pie. Puck: So many young chefs today forget that food has to be delicious. If it's not delicious, why do it? If it's just interesting, you go once, that's it – "okay, I get it, but I don't want to go back." Choi: I hear you chef. That's what I teach my cooks. I say, "You can do anything you want, but if you can't beat a banana cream pie, then the banana cream pie still wins." In most cases they don't. They can't beat the original. Jon Favreau, Roy Choi & Wolfgang Puck, The Chef Show: Wolfgang Puck foodnostalgiaprogress
Waiting there to be experienced "Paintings are like what you can barely make out through a keyhole compared with the richness of perception that's just waiting there in the world to be experienced all the time. It's strange. With food, for instance, people seem able to understand what's involved: you savor the taste rather than just feed the body. But people have a hard time understanding that it should be the same way with visual experience." Lawrence Wechler & Robert Irwin, Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees perceptionfood
Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat A Book by Samin Nosrat www.saltfatacidheat.com Research, empathy, simplicity, speed foodcraft
The Incompatible Food Triad An Idea www.georgehart.com Can you find three foods such that all three do not go together (by any reasonable definition of foods "going together") but every pair of them does go together? food
Art of the Menu A Blog www.underconsideration.com Cataloguing the underrated creativity of menus from around the world. foodcollections
I recommend eating chips An Essay by Sam Anderson www.nytimes.com Join me. Grab whatever you’ve got. Open the bag. Pinch it on its crinkly edges and pull apart the seams. Now we’re in business: We have broken the seal. The inside of the bag is silver and shining, a marvel of engineering — strong and flexible and reflective, like an astronaut suit. Lean in, inhale that unmistakable bouquet: toasted corn, dopamine, America, grief! We are the first humans to see these chips since they left the factory who knows when. They have been waiting for us, embalmed in preservatives, like a pharaoh in his dark tomb. Looking Closely is EverythingOne brick seeingdetailsfood
In Praise of Small Menus An Article by Rachel Sugar www.grubstreet.com The best way to experience a restaurant, I have always felt, is by eating exactly what it wants to feed you. I do not want choices. I want the best thing. A restaurant might have five or ten best things, but it cannot have 45. There are many infuriating things about the world, but one of the more fixable is the sensation of acute regret from having ordered wrong. Why are there possibly wrong orders? Recently, I was at a fancy restaurant with great pastas and bad pizzas. So cut the pizzas! A kitchen that focuses on its strengths turns out consistently excellent things, even if that results in fewer total things. fooduxchoicesimplicity
On onion cutting An Article by Ana Rodrigues ohhelloana.blog In the television show Masterchef there was an episode where the judges did a test on what they call “basic skills”. One of the judges often says that in order to be a “true chef”, you must know how to quickly and finely cut onions. ...This was really bothering me and I am stubborn so I wanted to win this fake argument really badly so I looked up why the way one cuts onions is important: as it turns out, the shape and even the surface area affect the end flavour. I thought the whole “chop chop chop” was about performance in the kitchen. Cut quickly to serve quickly! I was wrong. craftfoodwwwskill
Several Short Sentences About Writing A Book by Verlyn Klinkenborg www.goodreads.com Here, in short, is what I want to tell you. Know what each sentence says, What it doesn't say, And what it implies. Of these, the hardest is knowing what each sentence actually says. Sonorisms VBoth models are completely uselessThe shape of the sentenceThe Anxiety of SequenceYou can get anywhere from anywhere+18 More Wittgenstein's MistressWrite SimplyThe most important thing you do writing
Sonorisms V Leave space between them for the things that words can't really say. To suggest more than the words seem to allow. Perhaps it renames the world. The Anxiety of Sequence. It was all change until the very last second. The debris of someone else's thinking. You'll never run out of noticings. Names that announce the whatness of the world. What were you trying to protect? You were protecting the memory. The tyranny of what exists. Do any of them sound first? It sets an echo in motion. Try writing for the reader in yourself. So call it "perfection enough". Toward the name of the world—yours to discover. euphony
Both models are completely useless In your head, you'll probably find two models for writing. One is the familiar model taught in high school and college—a matter of outlines and drafts and transitions and topic sentences and argument. The other model is its antithesis—the way poets and novelists are often thought to write. Words used to describe this second model include "genius", "inspiration", "flow", and "natural", sometimes even "organic". Both models are useless. I should qualify that sentence. Both models are completely useless. genius
The shape of the sentence You've been taught to overlook the character of the prose in front of you in order to get at its meaning. You overlook the shape of the sentence itself for the meaning it contains, Which means that while you were reading, All those millions of words passed by Without teaching you how to make sentences. meaningstructure
The Anxiety of Sequence Much of what's taught under the name of expository writing could be called "The Anxiety of Sequence." Its premise is this: To get where you're going, you have to begin in just the right place And take the proper path, Which depends on knowing where you plan to conclude. The Age of the Essay essays
You can get anywhere from anywhere And if you can get anywhere from anywhere, You can start anywhere And end anywhere. There is no single necessary order. progressending
Significant everywhere Writing isn't a conveyor belt bearing the reader to "the point" at the end of the piece, where the meaning will be revealed. Good writing is significant everywhere, Delightful everywhere. goodness
It was all change until the very last second Every work of literature is the result of thousands and thousands of decisions. Intricate, minute decisions—this word or that, here or where, now or later, again and again. It's the living tissue of a writer's choices, Not the fossil record of an ancient, inspired race. A concept of style decisionscraft
A renaming of the already named A true metaphor is a swift and violent twisting of language, A renaming of the already named. It's meant to expire in a sudden flash of light And to reveal—in that burst of illumination— A correspondence that must be literally accurate. metaphornames
The debris of someone else's thinking A cliché isn't just a familiar, overused saying. It's the debris of someone else's thinking. cliché
How each sentence got that way When the work is really complete, the writer knows how each sentence got that way. intent
This small internal quaver Pay attention now: No matter how much you know or learn about syntax, grammar, or rhetoric, This small internal quaver, this inner disturbance, Is the most useful evidence you'll ever get. Someday, you'll be able to articulate what causes it. But for now, what's important is to notice it. Noticing is always the goal. ...the faint vertigo caused by an ambiguity you can't quite detect. What matter is what it points to. Find out what's causing it and fix it Even if you're not sure how. Notes on the Synthesis of Form attention
The urge to be done "Flow" is often a synonym for ignorance and laziness. It's also a sign of haste, the urge to be done. productivity
Talking and writing Talking is natural. Writing is not. It may seem strange that the manual dexterity needed to hold a pencil—or use a keyboard—comes later than the lingual and mental dexterity needed to speak. But it does. speech
What were you trying to protect? As the piece evolves, you try to protect those original, effusive sentences. Only to realize, at last, that what you're writing won't come together until they've been removed or revised. What were you trying to protect? The memory of the excitement you felt when those words "came to you." (Where did they "come" from?) You were protecting the memory of the excitement of really concentrating, of paying close attention to your thoughts and, perhaps, your sentences, the excitement of feeling the galvanic link between language and thought. memory
The discoveries you make in the making Style is an expression of the interest you take in the making of every sentence. It emerges, almost without intent, from your engagement with each sentence. It's the discoveries you make in the making of the prose itself. Where ambiguity rules, there is no "style"—or anything else worth having. Pursue clarity instead. In the pursuit of clarity, style reveals itself. The idea grows as they workFour principlesExpressing ideas helps to form them styleclaritymaking
The virtue of already existing It can be overwhelming—the inertia of the paragraphs and pages you've already composed, the sentences you've already written, No matter how rough they are. Whether you love what you've written or not, Those sentences have the virtue of already existing, Which makes them better than sentences that don't exist. Or so it seems.
Composition and revision Revise at the point of composition. Compose at the point of revision. Think of composition and revision as the same thing. 104. Site Repair design
Squander your material Squander your material. Don't ration it, saving the best for last. You don't know what the best is. Or the last.
Do any of them sound first? Just try out some sentences. Lots of them. See how they sound. Do any of them sound first? You're holding an audition. Many sentences will try out. One gets the part.
When you're interested in what you're working on It's never hard to work when you're interested in what you're working on. But what if you hate what you're working on? It helps to examine the content of your loathing. What is it you hate? hatework
The work selects its audience Imagine a cellist playing one of Bach's solo suites. Does he consider his audience? (Did Bach, for that matter?) Does he play the suit differently to audiences Of different incomes and educations and social backgrounds? No. The work selects its audience.