Edibles & Potables

Edibles & Potables: Eastern European Sauerkraut Soup (with proper beer accompaniment)

 Once upon a time at Facebook, I observed that “beer is good food.” Somewhere in the deep recesses of my brain-wave labyrinth, I knew the Dead Kennedys recorded a song back in 1985 called “Soup Is Good Food,” the title of which will make sense to certain more chronologically advanced readers as a Campbell’s […]

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Edibles & Potables: “Bread and Oil,” and a Majorcan way of eating

It’s time again to spin one of the columnist’s favorite broken records, because for me, Europe is a recurring fascination. New discoveries forever await: history, geography, music, art, food and drink. So it was a few years back when I discovered the relatively recent English translation of The Island of Second Sight, written by the […]

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Edibles & Potables: Among the autumn rituals, behold the persimmon

I grew up in the Southern Indiana countryside. During my 16th birthday year of 1976, the surroundings were hastily being repurposed into tidy residential suburbs. But we still had pastures and woods, raised some Angus, kept a garden, and looked upon a single gnarly persimmon tree just down the hill from our house. When late […]

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Edibles & Potables: Gaga over Wawa? Nahnah. WHYWHY?

Recently it was revealed that New Albany’s North Side would be GETTING A WAWA. Knowing my luck, they’ll probably have a float in the Harvest Homecoming Parade. Perhaps appropriately, given the usual fan boy ‘n’ girl hosannas greeting the prospective arrival of a glorified convenience store, NA’s new gas station-cum-driver salvation dispensary will displace a day […]

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Edibles & Potables: Marmite and the persistence of umami

(This column originally appeared at F&D in 2021) In 2011, the British Broadcasting Corporation published a list of ten things “you’ll love/hate to know” about Marmite, the longtime British culinary staple which, we must concede from the outset, is a divider of opinion. Marmite does not just come in jars. Other products in the range […]

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Edibles & Potables: Vegan restaurants in the UK are closing (“or adding meat to the menu”)

The plant-based problem is complicated. Granted, the following is Brit-centric (so am I), but the issues are in all likelihood universal. There is no paywall at The Guardian, so feel free to indulge. The plant-based problem: why vegan restaurants are closing – or adding meat to the menu, by Isobel Lewis (The Guardian) There seem […]

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Edibles & Potables: Garum, the (better) ketchup of the ancient Roman gods

Roman fish sauce, along with oil and wine, formed a triad of commodities which dominated Mediterranean trade. The fish sauce is garum, and the quote comes from a publisher’s tout for The Story of Garum: Fermented Fish Sauce and Salted Fish in the Ancient World, a book by Sally Grainger published a few years back […]

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Edibles & Potables: Food halls, from Market at Malcolm Yards to Hietalahden Kauppahalli

In 2022 we booked an Airbnb in Minneapolis and took a few days off to see the Twins play the Tigers (twice), search for home plate from the team’s former ballpark as ensconced at Mall of America, explore the respective Twin Cities downtown districts (the other is St. Paul, of course), eat a lot, and […]

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Edibles & Potables: Why do eateries turn up the volume?

We dropped into a local restaurant for lunch just before noon on a Monday in July and elected to sit at the bar. The hip hop-influenced contemporary pop music was so loud that I could barely hear the bartender, so we moved outside, where it was far too hot, but the traffic at an urban […]

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Edibles & Potables: Check out a fully regenerative restaurant in Mexico City

Baldío was co-founded by brothers Lucio and Pablo Usobiaga and chef Doug McMaster, best known for his groundbreaking zero-waste spot Silo London. “In my eyes, bins are coffins for things that have been badly designed,” says McMaster. “If there was a trophy for negligence, it would be bin-shaped.” In British English, a bin is a […]

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Edibles & Potables: Spare me the “speakeasy,” tearbender

(This essay originally was published here.) Allowing for the possible exception of Mick Jagger, we’re all destined to awaken one morning and find that we’ve pole-vaulted past the invisible line in the sand that delineates prevailing fashion. Whether or not we ever cared about “cool” in the past, from this point forward the choice is […]

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Edibles & Potables: Is there a right way to say “taco”?

During the past few weeks, tacos seem to be enjoying an inexplicable resurgence, even though they never really went away. I’ve been seeing the word “taco” everywhere on social media, and it started me thinking about first causes, although I must concede that chicken is not my personal favorite choice of taco filling. At the […]

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Edibles & Potables: The Regimen Sanitatus Salernum (or, a medieval diet revisited)

 (Originally posted on May 3, 2020) The medieval period of European history — the Middle Ages, or the Dark Ages — encompassed 1,000 years between the fall of the Roman Empire and the arrival of the Renaissance, approximately 500 to 1500 A.D. The 15th century saw the beginning of the Age of Exploration, as […]

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Edibles & Potables: What is “normal” food, anyway?

Previously in this space, Alicia Kennedy’s book No Meat Required was offered for your consideration. Edibles & Potables: Alicia Kennedy’s book “No Meat Required” During the past few months, Kennedy has discussed two books that I intend to read when time permits. The first is Eating to Extinction: The World’s Rarest Foods and Why We Need […]

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