In response to yesterday’s post about censorship on the FIFA.com “Have Your Say” discussion board after the USA’s third goal against Slovenia—which was controversially nullified by referee Koman Coulibaly for reasons that remain unclear—commenter bdr on my blog has observed that FIFA is also now widely suppressing video of the disallowed goal under the guise of Full Article…
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Barack Obama, weed warrior
Is President Obama keeping the Sinaloa drug cartel in business? Here’s the news from today, according to the New York Times: 1,200 members of the National Guard have been sent to the border to “combat drug smuggling.” More drug-related violence can only be dealt with through greater enforcement, goes the Bush-McCain-and-now-Obama story. We’ve got to fight the Full Article…
Bicycle inflation in paradise?
Portland, Oregon, the current darling of America’s food and environmental writers, is arguably the county’s most bicycle-obsessed city. Bike use was up 28% in Portland between 2007 and 2008, and on the Hawthorne Bridge, a main thoroughfare, bikes now make up 20% of all vehicles. The New York Times estimated in 2007 that there were Full Article…
The problem with fetishizing pork jowl
Over the course of a road trip across America, I was lucky enough to spend plenty of interstate time with my friend Andrea Armeni. One of the things we discussed at length was the question of in what circumstances the search for culinary authenticity turns farcical. Florence Fabricant, in a recent article, embodies a common Full Article…
GQ’s Alan Richman trashes Italian pizza, but makes a glaring mistake
It’s one thing for a food writer to opine about which pizza style is his or her favorite—everybody seems to do it, whether in New York, New Haven, or Naples. But it’s a breathtaking mistake for a seasoned food writer like Alan Richman, in his widely read new GQ evaluation of the top 25 pizzerias in Full Article…
Do you think the Spanish and Italians are drinking wine? They’re really drinking beer
The wine cultures of Spain and Italy are idealized. But much of the time, in real-life situations, their populations—whether it’s old men guzzling at midday or twentysomethings at night—actually favor beer. Wine is still the thing to accompany a family dinner or elaborate restaurant meal in southern Europe, which is why their per-capita wine consumption Full Article…
Do the molecular gastronomists have no clothes?
On culinary televangelism and the Parkerization of cuisine In the introduction to his book La Cocina al Desnudo (roughly “The Kitchen Laid Bare”), the chef Santi Santamaría writes: “one of the greatest challenges faced by today’s chefs is to avoid becoming the court jesters of the snobs and the posh.” One of the highlights of Full Article…
Gold frills for the Russians, mighty warriors for the Japanese: on wine versioning
Spain’s Felix Solís Avantis is probably the biggest wine producer you’ve never heard of, pumping out more than 200 million liters per year. The company’s industrial facility in Valdepeñas (in La Mancha, near Ciudad Real) is more or less the Death Star of wine factories. The warehouse alone is the size of an airplane hangar, Full Article…
The Boston Wine Party: Letter from FENAVIN, or why archaic US wine policy robs consumers
Should we stage a Boston Wine Party, and throw our wine into the Atlantic? Perhaps the most striking aspect of the bewilderingly diverse wines on display at this week’s FENAVIN, Spain’s national wine fair, is the price range: 2€–5€ is most common, trailed slightly by <2€ (a significant category, with strong representation from La Mancha, the wine Full Article…