Had
the opportunity to watch the entire 6 eps of Chefs’ Table via Netflix. The stand out for me
was Francis Mallman, who I have never heard about, but who convinced me that a
frozen island in the middle of Patagonia is where I need to go and eat. https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Mallmann. No fiddly fuddly
micro leaves and petals in mini splodges in mid plate. Nah. My fondest image is
of Mallman crucifying the carcasses of three beeves and sticking them in the
snow in front of a roaring fire. Or it may also be several chooks suspended by
strings from a sapling dome smoking. Or even the brilliance of a smashed Andean
pumpkin that has emerged out of the Argentinean version of a hangi. The others
all come across as, dare I say it, prissy; the exception here being Massimo
Bottura and maybe that’s my prejudice for his food over the others, but he had
less bullshit and agonising and needing to psychpatholigise than the others. I
think basically I am sick to death of chefs who keep yakking on about how their
food has to be an expression of themselves versus actually being about
conviviality and sustenance.
The
other series I have delighted in of late is Heston Blumenthal’s In Search of Perfection on SBS on Fridays. I
have to admit to a total soft spot for all the series I have seen of Heston’s
because of their combination of erudition, humour, and inventiveness.
I’m
also enjoying Susan Parham’s new book Food
and Urbanism. The Convivial City and a Sustainable Future. In her words ‘This
book explores the complex ways that food
and cities interconnect through urbanism: the study of the art of building
cities.’ It’s a survey of the changes in the spatial positioning of growing,
marketing, cooking and consuming food working out from the kitchen table to the
food region reaching as far back as written records and archaeological digs
will take her focusing mainly on European, US and Australian studies (Jean
Duruz it’s lovely to see you cited every several pages J ) but including
material from Asia where it is available. She’s excellent on tracking the
shifts toward and away from and then back toward small scale arrangements, and
again the informal to the formal and back to the informal again, and the forces
that have driven the changes. I’ve just finished her look at Food’s Outdoor
Room, meaning markets in their many forms including and I am walking with her
now through The Gastronomic Townscape of food precincts and eat streets. It’s already
has me looking at the spaces I move through on my daily feeding differently; a
whole new dimension to the term foodways for me to explore.
What climate change
will do to your loaf of bread
‘AgFace
leader Glenn Fitzgerald said the effect of high carbon dioxide on
grains is complex. On the one hand, it makes plants such as wheat and canola
grow faster and produce greater yields but, on the other
hand, they contain less protein. Elevated carbon dioxide also alters
the ratio of different types of proteins in wheat, which, in the case of bread,
affects the elasticity of dough and how well a loaf rises.’
Give
me protein and elasticity over high yield anytime.
Smashed avo anyone?:
Five Australian creations taking the world by storm
Can you guess which other ones?
‘Try to describe Australian cuisine to a visitor and you’re likely to
struggle a little. But there are some dishes that as a nation we recognise as
quintessentially Australian – and they’ve started to pop up on menus from
Brixton to Brooklyn.’
Let the debates begin on which is or is not Australian – Dr Newton I turn
first to thee.
Burger wars: the battle
of the beef patties
‘Among the new entrants to the market are Grill'd, Mary's,
Chur Burger Express, Burger Project, Burger Edge, Burger Shed, Ribs &
Burgers, Burger Bro? and Melbourne's Brother Burgers. That doesn't include the
numerous pubs that offer their own versions as a drawcard. Giving the sector
even more power is that these are run by an array of top chefs, including Neil
Perry, Luke Powell (ex-Tetsuya's) and Warren Turnbull, among many others.
Property agents say the backing of these top-shelf foodies has meant they know all
about the real estate business and have exact locations in mind... Other operators such as The Pantry and Trunk Diner have
created high-quality burgers that provide customers with a premium experience
within a casual dining offering. ’
Give me a thick bun with lashings of butter, grilled onions,
a good everyday mince pattie, some slices of canned beetroot and a leaf or two
of iceberg lettuce that I can carry away in a greaseproof paper wrap and eat
one hand while I walk or sit with mates in the park...but save me from a
‘premium experience within a casual dining offering’ at a price that will
compete with my mortgage.
The pic this week is of a beef brisket bun from The Counter in Audley Street, Petersham
The 4 Ways People Rationalise
Eating Meat
And in more news from the meat eat front, Helen sent me this.
‘This combination — eating meat while being opposed, in principle, to
the acts that are required for meat-eating to take place — suggests that
omnivores come up with psychological ways to justify their dietary habits.’
In case you wonder, I fit firmly into the fourth rationale – ‘it’s nice’.
Stop Romanticising
Your Grandparents’ Food
‘In short, Laudan has delivered an evocative corrective
to the culinary romanticism that pervades our farmers markets and farm-to-table
culinary temples. Yet her "plea for culinary modernism" contains its
own gaping blind spot. If Laudan's "culinary Luddites" feast on tales
of an imaginary prelapsarian food past, she herself presents a gauzy and
romanticized view of industrialized food.
A short critique of Rachel Laudan’s Plea for Culinary
Modernism (see Compost May 30 at my blog http://buthkuddeh.blogspot.com.au/)
In praise of fast food
‘Of course, all of this is in sharp contrast to the
brutalist fast-food culture that has risen up since Ray Krok wed standardized
burger-and-fries production to the post-war expansion of car ownership. But the
corporatized vision of fast food, as embodied by global powerhouses McDonald’s
and Yum Foods, represents a mere tick of the clock in the long and mostly proud
history of fast food.’
I think we have to find some other term for most of
what Philpott talks about here, and what Laudan also talks about. A meat pie
from a bakery shop is not fast food as far as I am concerned nor is a good snag
sanger from at the footy nor a bowl of pho whipped up in a road side stall in
Hanoi nor a naan with mutton curry on some dusty road in Gujarat. Street food
doesn’t fit across the whole of these examples either. Convenience food would
be a good term if it also were not so debased now.
No comments:
Post a Comment