Category archive for: Locative Food
Back homeOne little kid
Chad Gadya
חַד גַּדְיָא
Happy Pesach! Are you 6 kilos? Although we had sworn to recreate Pesach Ultra-Lite, Superior Powers and my own stubborn determination to not sit on the floor like my ancestors in the desert, dictated that we drop everything and become a trans-regional trucking company. We had a truck all right,... Read more
Posted on April 19, 2008 11:12
Turnip green & pumpkin
ohitashi style sushi
Rescued from the bin: forgotten vegetables transformed into a memorable vegan sushi 40% of all produce is wasted on the route from field to fork. The number is actually more like 60% and it's easy to understand how the waste becomes heavier if we buy industrially produced food from far away pla... Read more
Posted on April 17, 2008 11:35
Local warming
Potager au feu. The lower bit of the Occitanian kitchen garden is clearly a chic-free zone. Burn marks indicate the size of the original fire. Yesterday in the lower garden I made an enormous fire. It was the first time in my life I was able to get it going in one go, normally it can take me th... Read more
Posted on March 5, 2008 12:14
Homegrown
Sprouted sunflower seeds in the dead of winter Read more
Posted on February 15, 2008 20:43
Bone marrow
Roasted cow bone right out of the oven. Maybe it's because I was sick with flu for the past 2 months and had no appetite. Maybe because bone marrow used to be considered a restorative food for ill people. Maybe because yesterday, going to and from yoga practice, I just wore 2 pairs of sweats un... Read more
Posted on January 30, 2008 4:14
Speaking of pomegranate
Last year I did my utmost to eat food that was grown and produced locally. But because Amsterdam is excruciatingly far north, more or less deep inside the Polar Circle, this meant that my diet didn't have much in the way of citrus fruit, bananas or mangos. At first I didn't think this would be a... Read more
Posted on January 16, 2008 10:05
Subjective Atlas of Palestine
and also of food
Just another beautiful picture of Palestine by Majdi Hadid, used entirely without permission Say 'Palestine' and the first thing that pops into your head probably isn't an image of undulating hills speckled with date palm oases and creased with a babbling brook, or an image of lush olive orchar... Read more
Posted on January 13, 2008 20:37
Harvesting rhubarb by candlelight
Of the BBC’s ‘100 unexpected facts that we didn’t know last year’, I’ve edited the list to include only the 13 food-related facts. Apparently harvesting rhubarb by candlelight is a way to preserve even more rhubarb flavour. Because 2008 is a year for pumping up the volume, I have de... Read more
Posted on January 4, 2008 12:05
Consumer trends 2008
Taped to the door of Rotterdam’s most charming North African bakery Fes, there is an update of the global commodities price for cereals and sugar. Bakery Fes situated in the Afrikaanderbuurt, a neighbourhood on the lift and the owners of Fes find it important to offer their clientele an explan... Read more
Posted on November 12, 2007 15:33
How stuff is made, even the food kind of stuff
Techno artist and design engineer Natalie Jeremijenko, in Amsterdam last Friday presenting at the STIFO/Sandberg workshop showed us a wiki site where her NYU students were sharing information about how common products are made. Among the foodstuffs, shrimp, fortune cookies and eau de vie. For e... Read more
Posted on November 5, 2007 1:52
Water, pure thyself
Trickle-down theory, solar disinfection water purifier by Herman Lijmbach, image used with permission Gawd knows I'm a sucker for water purification, so even though there was a goodly handful of other wonderful work and pretty thingy-thingies at the Design Academy Eindhoven's graduation show la... Read more
Posted on October 23, 2007 16:55
Urban landscape architecture as a source of new recipes
Saint-Étienne public landscape architecture featuring curly and red kales, fennel and bananas. Based upon this planter I can imagine a dessert Stephanoise: a bed of flash fried caramelised kales with banana fritters and sprinkled finally with powdered sugar and pulverised fennel seeds. I... Read more
Posted on October 12, 2007 16:22
Foraging with Fred
He'd warned me already we were five days too early, and the mushrooms we kept smelling were underground and still spores. So we changed our tack and switched focus to chestnuts, foraging two half-loaded baskets between us, out of the mouths of boars. (Who are real pigs by the way.) Read more
Posted on October 9, 2007 1:17
The neglected autumnal
kitchen garden
Prolific biomass obscuring the cabane After 6 months of neglect, I returned to the Occitanian kitchen garden to find that in my absence it had produced 400 cubic metres of exuberant biomass. In the upper garden the cabane was completely obscured by a thicket of weeds and I'm not even emotionall... Read more
Posted on October 5, 2007 16:52
Whose bread I eat,
his song I sing
Euroforum's Foodservice Congress 2007 was held in conjunction with the FRESH food trade fair in Rotterdam. A lavish display of fruits. With increasing frequency I've been attending expert meetings, symposia and congresses relating to the food industry. More and more these points of contact with... Read more
Posted on September 19, 2007 14:19
Carbohydrates and conviviality
Pasta shapes developed by Valentina de Lorenzis What is it about carboydrate-rich food that just screams conviviality? Valentina de Lorenzis, a recent graduate of the Man and Humanity Masters at the Design Academy Eindhoven, chose pasta to investigate this very subject. The result was an array ... Read more
Posted on September 10, 2007 12:39
The Knödelist
Son of a bakerman, keeping up the family tradition I am blessed with a goodly many friends who, feeling my temporary loss of Heim, have been inviting me over to dinner nearly every night of the week. Dear Friends, please pace yourselves but keep up the good work and continue to rock the kitchen... Read more
Posted on September 1, 2007 13:28
The gentlemen farmers’ summer party
Dancing with wines, dahlia fetishist, celebrity hayseed, gentle farmer-man en silhouette All natural, all gentleman, slash Friesian agro-history adept, organic farmer-man Guus yuks it up with Lisette. Then gives us a reed-obscured all-natural history lesson moving Madeleine and Hans... Read more
Posted on August 27, 2007 19:21
The arabised ‘H’ of EL HEMA
Joann digs EL HEMA packaging, image of the chocolate letter 'H' by Mediamatic used entirely with permission EL HEMA, an Arabised version of the Dutch five and dime, will be selling chocolate letters for the disputably secular Dutch winter holiday Sinter Klaas. The Arabic letters are in one of t... Read more
Posted on August 25, 2007 10:49
Annual “oregano” harvest
The family that bags trim together, stays together Back from the cloistered life that is a yoga retreat I am welcomed with images of the fambly's summer harvest. Behold my completely blissed-out Mom multi-tasking. She insists that the homegrown herb she's trimming is "oregano" and that she's li... Read more
Posted on August 22, 2007 19:47
Birthday Cake ultra-lite
When you've inhaled enough buttercream for one life... So would your life be any less fab if you never ate birthday cake again? What is worth more, satisfying 1000 desires or learning to control just one? Birthday boy John B. & buddy Betty D. & basking cake In lieu of the same 'ol same... Read more
Posted on August 9, 2007 15:15
Dude, lay off my
ubiquitous Dutch weener
Dutch postage stamps with images of quintessentially Dutch design items incl. HEMA tea kettle Lapin. Producers of the objêts du design Ne'erlandais paid big dosh to have their stuff immortalised. In Dutch media circles this time of year is called 'Cucumber Time'. Supposedly all of our real jou... Read more
Posted on July 27, 2007 14:33
Made in Transit,
growing food
in a waste of time
Mushrooms of the future are grown in situ in transit When it comes to the food supply, there's a lot of waste to go around. Agata Jaworska, a recent masters graduate from the Design Academy Eindhoven, has designed a way to use the time and space associated with transportation to grow fresh prod... Read more
Posted on July 10, 2007 16:43
Superused food,
2012 Architects host
a freegan dinner
Freegan designers trapped in a 2012 iPod commercial Normally when architects invite you to dinner they don't advertise that they're planning on serving you trash. Completely unbound by convention, 2012 Architects held a freegan dinner last night and were rather loose-lipped about the fact that ... Read more
Posted on July 4, 2007 14:20
Exhibition the Edible City
at the NAi-M closes
The Edible City exhibition at the NAi-M (the Netherlands Architecture Institute) has finally come to a close. Showing more than 40 architectural, design and urban planning projects, the exhibition was about food systems and the urban environment. There was a time when city-dwellers could more or... Read more
Posted on June 27, 2007 15:09
Tomato marmalade
à la Tal who is
back in the Old Country
Tal taught me how to make this most delicious tomato marmalade. Actually, when Tal makes it, it's tomato jam. When I make it, it's tomato marmalade. He uses bay laurel, I was about to and then decided on rosemary. Tal's jam is wetter, better to serve with a chopped liver paté that will blow you... Read more
Posted on June 19, 2007 20:56
Butternut Update
week 24
What, you don't like my hand job? Some might call it karmic justice, but I think that I have homosexual butternut squash growing in my living room. Not that there's anything wrong with that and maybe we can chalk it up to to the fact that I can't tell the difference between the male and female ... Read more
Posted on June 18, 2007 13:04
Nasturtium shots
A toast, "To a nasturtium leaf holding a pearl of vodka" What a pretty shot. The nasturtium leaf tastes like horseradish and is a perfect pallet cleanser after the wodka di buffalo. And because it's just a drop, you can keep on drinkin'. Read more
Posted on June 14, 2007 8:58
Butternut Update
week 23
The first butternut squash flower in full bloom This week the butternut squash settled into their new mid-living room location and I started to wonder about their lack of contact with actual sunshine. I always thought of my house as light-filled, especially during the 8 month-long Dutch winter,... Read more
Posted on June 11, 2007 12:19
Capture the yeast within
That's a chopstick for stirring, not a straw for slurping. My girlbud and twisted lifecoach K'tje has been baking bread for hoards of guests and is in desperate need of yeast. Fresh yeast. Down in Occitania it seems that many a masterbaker is in fact a boulanger truqué. Dang faker bakers don'... Read more
Posted on June 5, 2007 21:21
Edible Estates breaking ground in London
Butternut squash and nasturtiums about to go vertical Looking to get your hands dirty in London this weekend? Edible estate agent Fritz Haeg will be breaking ground on his 4th edible estate, this time in collaboration with the Bankside Open Spaces Trust (BOST) and commissioned by the Tate Moder... Read more
Posted on May 26, 2007 12:43
The Future of Food
A molecular gastronomic cocktail served at yet another 'future of food' event last week in Amsterdam The next two days I'll be venturing even farther into the Polar Circle to speak at the Poker Club and visit the Six Cities Design Festival. I'll be speaking with Dr. Peter Barham (who will hopef... Read more
Posted on May 21, 2007 9:16
Dike break at sunset
Each time I leave my Occitanian kitchen garden to go back to the Polar Circle, my neighbour Sidi ElGouche agrees to water for me a few times a week. Although he just has to divert the pipe between our allotments, let 'er rip and redivert once my garden has had a good soaking, it's a generous ges... Read more
Posted on May 16, 2007 14:28
Monument of Sugar
Secretly snapped photo of the installation Monument, now on exhibit at the Palais de Tokyo Monument en Sucre is an installation by artists van Brummelen & de Haan documenting an artist attempt to avoid European sugar tariffs by re-importing European sugar dumped in Nigeria back into Europe as a... Read more
Posted on May 9, 2007 13:24
Pomtajer is the New Cocoyam
a friend of kugel and latke
Food is synonymous with identity and culture. And in case you hadn't noticed, cultural identity is all over contemporary art these days. Amsterdam artist and culinary historian Karin Vaneker has been studying the dynamic history of the tropical tuber called the New Cocoyam, aka Pomtajer (say puh... Read more
Posted on April 19, 2007 13:00
Passover ultra-lite,
ultra-late,
ultra authentic
Our first matza ball ever. Don't believe the hype. More than half of us had to be at Schiphol Airport the next morning on planes boarding well before 7. We should've blown the whole thing off. I mean, isn't Pesach synonymous with multi-day preparation? To make matters worse, an unfortuitous div... Read more
Posted on April 14, 2007 13:06
Left leaves
Author with 36-point fresh kill Yesterday it occured to me that it's only because the garden was neglected for such a long time that we're able to enjoy these spring flower salads and everything-but-the-squeal brassica eating experiences. The romanesca shown above was at one time a compact lig... Read more
Posted on March 25, 2007 11:08
Spring salad bouquet
After 6 months of neglect and a rather substantial flood, I really didn't expect to find much in the Occitanian kitchen garden. But in fact, we will have trouble eating our way through the sheer amount of over the top, beautifully bolted brassicas, flowering mizuna and rucola, brussels sprouts a... Read more
Posted on March 22, 2007 12:18
So, uh,
what are you doing?
M: mostly alcohol, occasionally a teensy bit of coke. T: weed, coffee and cigarettes, definitely no coke, recently recovered from a Tony's Chocolonely addiction but now I'm into the Euroshopper alternative. It tastes just like slave-free. P: I don't normally do chocolate, but I went throug... Read more
Posted on March 19, 2007 20:56
Doors 9 JUICE reports:
Delhi’s Sabzi Mandi
That's vegetable market to me and you. At the crack of dawn, dodging raindrops the size of wild peaches, a small delegation from the Doors9:JUICE urban agriculture workshop heads out for a reconnoitre of Delhi's Sabzi Mandi, the wholesale vegetable market off Mehrauli-Gurgaon Rd. Through a haz... Read more
Posted on March 15, 2007 12:15
Food supplements
In Ayanagar Village on the outskirts of sprawling Delhi, the urban agriculture workshoppers accidentally stumble upon a food supplement store. A result of the Green Revolution? Read more
Posted on March 12, 2007 15:07
Golgappa,
1 of the top 5
most sexy things
you can put in your mouth
Try to imagine all of the sexy things that happen in your mouth. Now try to imagine a food that embodies these sensual experiences. You are imagining the Indian street food golgappa, unquestionably one of the most exciting things you can do to your body with food in public, a molecular gastronom... Read more
Posted on March 10, 2007 13:29
Psycho-gastronomy
and the
‘Honey, I’m home from Delhi’
breakfast
The kimchi chapati breakfast What could be a more obvious combination than the ubiquitous flatbread of India flavoured with a dash of pro-biotic pickle juice from the Heimatt? Rolling out a kimchi chapati breakfast seems just the ticket to remind me that I'm home from Delhi. It's been a whirlwi... Read more
Posted on March 9, 2007 10:49
Chai styling
This is how chai wa served to the Doors 9 JUICE urban agriculture delegation at Delhi's Sabzi Mandi (wholesale vegetable market). Beautiful and neat. Read more
Posted on February 28, 2007 22:04
The Edible City
For the past few months, together with colleagues Hans Ibelings and Anneke Moors, I have been curating an exhibtion for the Netherlands Architecture Institute in Maastricht titled the Edible City. The exhibition is about the urban environment and its food systems. There was a time when city-dwel... Read more
Posted on February 26, 2007 2:26
Visiting a langar
The entire meal, the ingredients, the preparation and the cleanup, all of it is donated by the community. Everyone eats together as equals, sitting side by side at the langar. In one week's time the Doors of Perception: JUICE round table workshops will begin in Delhi. Despite all of the tragic... Read more
Posted on February 20, 2007 2:30
Wild Fermentation
My friend Anita Lozinska made these pickles last summer in Poland, where they know a thing or two about pickle making. These are perfect pickles. A few weeks ago, a friend asked me if I believed in the theory that we should eat foods according to our blood and body types, according to our ethni... Read more
Posted on February 12, 2007 20:28
Foodmiles design competition winners win some JUICE
Image of judging panel used with non-tacit permission Tuesday, one week ago today was devoted to a most ironic activity. I swam back and forth to London to jury the shortlisted entries of an international competition to find design solutions to the problem of foodmiles. And by swam, I mean fle... Read more
Posted on February 6, 2007 13:18
DOTT07
(Designs of the time)
Urban Farming
Urban regeneration, edible grow zones, kitchen playgrounds and town meals In many communities fresh fruit and vegetables are hard to source and expensive. There's little awareness of local food production, the possibility of growing your own and next to no supply chain for existing producers ... Read more
Posted on January 27, 2007 9:25
Industrial yet green
Sunflower roots make a stab at world take-over There's something about the Montessori School poster-child in me that loves a good self-diagnosed field trip. I can never be too busy or have too many double-booked days to find time for some on-topic hookie, leaving the warm and productive nest th... Read more
Posted on January 17, 2007 15:31
The amazing
Sprout (loves) Ikebana
contest
Choreographer Martin Butler's winning entry for the category, 'Fleugalité (bamboo leaf, sango sprouts, rock chives, pea shoots) The amazing Sprout (loves) Ikebana contest was carried out in honour of chef de cuisine Tal Amitai, who was not able to be with us this last week due to the loss of h... Read more
Posted on January 10, 2007 13:02
Sprouts love ikebana
My neighbours won the 2007 Sprouts Love Ikebana competition for the categories: 6 and under, 5 and under From more than 300 images of the sprouts love ikebana competition this weekend at the Grow Yer Own Dang Food sprout restaurant, these are the first, last and middle ones. We had winners in m... Read more
Posted on January 9, 2007 1:55
Dang Freegans, eatin’ our trash, stealin’ our women
See what I mean? Used entirely with permission Actually, Freegans don't so much steal our women as eat our trash. And, not so much our trash, but perfectly edible food and produce that shops and restaurants end up throwing away because the products have passed their sell-by dates. As of tod... Read more
Posted on January 1, 2007 2:39
Smoke yer marijuanakkah, it’s time to celebrate Channukah
Latkes prepared in 1969 and preserved for lifetime use The continental posse is curious about my visit back to the Heimatt and has requested some reflection on my own personal hotbed of culinary inspiration. When it comes to holiday cooking, Mom (not her real name) says, 'You only need to m... Read more
Posted on December 22, 2006 20:53
Terroir of the ‘burbs
Encountering a stand of claytonia perfoliata during the morning constitutional So it's not like my folks ever said, 'Find yer own dang food!' it's just that I've always really enjoyed foraging. In fact it's their own dang fault since identifying plants, particularly the native and poisonous was... Read more
Posted on December 19, 2006 7:22
Compost heaps of the rich and famous
The Seyferth house sports a compost heap! Well, at least of the famous. This is a shot of a compost heap in the back of the in-process home being built by designer/architect Christoph Seyferth. Although the house isn't even finished, I was pleased to see that the happening kitchen infrastructur... Read more
Posted on December 14, 2006 14:45
Cooking with supermodels
Kitchen Princess Erga always wears herbs, Seattle Public Library carpet by Petra Blaisse Maybe it's the phermones, maybe it's the new varieites of sprouts, (fennel, coreander, sunflower and pea shoots to name a few) but it seems that everything just keeps getting more beautiful at the Grow Yer ... Read more
Posted on December 1, 2006 10:33
Food-related film at the IDFA
You would be wise to print this simultaneously with the programme of the Shadow Festival if you want to plan your days and nights between the 21st of November and the 3rd of December 2006. 22 films in this year's the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) are food-related. 3 of th... Read more
Posted on November 20, 2006 7:40
A sprouting lesson:
you’ve already got
what it takes
Counter-top sprouting installation chez culiblog When I remind my guests at the Grow Yer Own Dang Food micro-green cuisine concept restaurant that eating seasonal, local food is one of the most revolutionary actions that you can take against petrol consumption, right fists usually fly straight ... Read more
Posted on November 18, 2006 23:47
Micro-green restaurant officially open
Jeanette likes sprouts because they're seed-related Roqn-ass opening btw. Merveilleuse! The dear friends showed up, the food was devoured, folks asked for seconds (and got them without a wince) we danced our tocheses off until 4ish and the whole thing ended sloppily with bottles of bubbles (cav... Read more
Posted on November 4, 2006 18:56
Grow yer own dang food
Radish and leek sprouts in the low-angled polar sun FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: November 3, Restaurant prototype to open Grow Yer Own Dang Food, micro-green cuisine A restaurant devoted to sprouted seeds and micro-greens could only be called a Sproutstaurant. And at a Sproutstaurant one eats,... Read more
Posted on October 29, 2006 15:47
More mushroom foraging and gloating
In the woods near Amsterdam, culiblog covergirl Marlein O. takes a break from mushroom hunting to relax into a moss covered chaise and carve at a piece of clove-studded cheese. Just one hour into the hunt, and the basket is half-full. Back home we marvel at the abundant harvest. Let the ... Read more
Posted on October 21, 2006 20:17
In Praise of Shadows
In Praise of Shadows by Jun'ichiro Tanizaki, cover art by Yukio Futagawa used entirely without permission "The sun never knew how wonderful it was, until if fell on the wall of a building," said architect Louis Kahn. I didn't expect to bump into him so soon, having just returned My Architect to... Read more
Posted on October 19, 2006 12:31
Lady seeks mushroom
Dang if foraging for food doesn't make us giddy! The days don't get too much better than this... Not particularly edible, but there was coral growing out of the forest floor that looked like cartoon flames. Marlein is sharing big treasures, secret spots in the woods where the tasty mush... Read more
Posted on October 18, 2006 2:09
South Central Farmers
urban agriculture
North American style
Image courtesy of South Central Farmers Urban agriculture in North America is still only an occasional cultural novelty or, in the case of the recently bull-dozed South Central Farms, an inconvenience whose value goes unrecognized. Los Angeles once housed the largest concentration of vineyards ... Read more
Posted on October 17, 2006 16:22
Blettes noires pour Yves
Sometimes it's nice to eat really dark food. (more...) Read more
Posted on October 13, 2006 9:41
Get the vault out:
Vote for la Voute!
Image courtesy of La Voute Nubienne. What does nubian vaulted architecture have to do with food culture? It's a stretch, but suffice it to say that good cookin' and eatin' requires stable communities and a stable kitchens requires a stable roof. My buddies at La Voute Nubienne are among the 13 ... Read more
Posted on October 6, 2006 8:13
Got confusion about the nature of natural food?
This block print from Masanobu Fukuoka's 'One Straw Revolution' is used entirely without permission. This is what I'm re-reading right now and I'd like to share it. Here is a short quote from Masanobu Fukuoka's One Straw Revolution. It should definitely be on the reading list for anyone interes... Read more
Posted on October 1, 2006 3:33
Come to your senses, and fast
The Ramadan Festival logo Loving the lunar calendar convergence this year. Since Friday, I have celebrated the beginning of no less than 3 religious holidays, 2 of which are devoted to forms of fasting. It was a veritable autumnal fasting kickoff weekend as the new moon signaled the start of th... Read more
Posted on September 24, 2006 23:09
Shana tova
Get a gander at the cool card I got from my friends Liora and Carlos. 'My First Rosh Hashana Art' was made by Carlos Jadraque who channeled himself into the body of an 8 yr. old Jewish girl with impossible hair, in order to create this work. That's the spirit, Carlos! Dear Friends, Friends of F... Read more
Posted on September 21, 2006 1:21
What, you don’t like my not cooking?
The only thing that bothers me about this Soil Association press release is that the 'mums' are getting the lion's share of the blame. Surely in 2006 both parents are responsible for feeding the cubs? 18 September 2006 - for immediate release Soil Association Dinner Lady, Jeanette Orrey an... Read more
Posted on September 19, 2006 14:55
Got a cutting-edge food-related project?
A Delhi street kitchen doing booming business The deadline for the DOORS OF PERCEPTION 9 conference on “JUICE” (FOOD, FUEL, DESIGN) has been extended until September 30, 2006. If you think your project should be included in this event, please put your nose to the grindstone forthwith. Any q... Read more
Posted on September 18, 2006 15:23
The issue of financial gain with regard to an allotment
My neighbour Sidi ElGouche is smokin' again. Yesterday my dear colleague (from the Dott07 CityFarming project) posed the very good question of how much one could earn from one's kitchen garden. Apparently he had read two disparate studies and the numbers varied ten-fold as to what a garden allo... Read more
Posted on September 5, 2006 15:41
Cèpes are proof that Gawd loves us, and wants us to be happy
Today in the market it was all pointy elbows and wingflappenings. Watch out for elderfolk in packs. 'Cèpes are proof that Gawd loves us, and wants us to be happy...' Also sprach Ben Franklin. At least that's what folks down here in Occitania are saying he said. Then there are the other folks w... Read more
Posted on August 29, 2006 16:38
This year’s potatoes, last year’s mushrooms
Peruvian purple potato mash with pickled grisets (tricholoma terreum). Colours unretouched. It's a luxury to wear yer bikini top as a bra and to get sick of peaches and yer own homegrown tomatoes, but now that the temperatures are regularly dipping below 28°c, Lawd knows we need our carbs. I'm... Read more
Posted on August 26, 2006 23:39
Inside the secret gardens of our culinary elite
Photograph of photographs of Terrance Conran and his cabbages by Peter Dench © Telegraph Magazine Last Saturday's Telegraph Magazine reported on the kitchen gardens of twenty-three of England's most 'renowned' 'cooks'. From several versions of elaborate kitchen gardens, to modest collection... Read more
Posted on August 19, 2006 12:22
Ziggizagna, pasta folds of summer harvest
Julie Upmeyer puts her face in a bunch of freshly picked purple basil and miraculously sheds 16 years! Normally mid-August is time of change in the Occitanian weather; no more highs in the 40's and we can start expecting violent thunderstorms. But this year Mama Nature has heralded an abrupt an... Read more
Posted on August 16, 2006 11:50
Actually, this IS my harvest
Back to square one, but with better soil composition At the kitchen gardens, the question on everyone's lips is, 'Don't you feel utterly demoralised by the fact that since January, you've only been able to produce a shitload of weeds?" But because I can't admit defeat in front of my neighbours,... Read more
Posted on July 28, 2006 19:14
Daddy brung home the bacon
Jamón Iberico, oooh Mama! If you haven't been home for six weeks, there's really nothing that screams 'I love you, Mama!' like a big fat ham. Especially when that ham was raised on acorns, rooting around under the dappled shade of oak trees in Southern Spain. I swear these animals lead better ... Read more
Posted on July 26, 2006 10:42
In Memoriam
Anna de Casparis
ANNA DE CASPARIS 15th August 1947 – 18th July 2006 Anna died on Tuesday evening. Her extraordinary, indomitable spirit was evident to the end. We will miss her as a comrade, mother, sister and friend, as someone who lived life with relish and brought great beauty and delicious tarte oign... Read more
Posted on July 20, 2006 18:40
Grow yer own dang biomass inadvertently
Occitanian kitchen garden in May, as neat as you please Way back in January, and then again in March, and again in April and May, I had big plans for my kitchen garden. Big and neat. Knowing that I would have to return from Occitania to the Polar Circle for two months of gainful employment, I a... Read more
Posted on July 16, 2006 15:54
A midsummer garden dinner at Marlein’s
Marlein's tuinhuis rhymes with town house but means garden house or cottage On an island between the Amsterdam-Rhine Canal and the IJ inland shipping lands, sandwiched between harbours, dubious car re-painting garages and tucked under a freeway flyover, there is a hidden paradise that I was totall... Read more
Posted on June 20, 2006 13:24
Let farmers be bygones
Let bygones be farmers? On the other side of my neighbourhood park there is a monument in honour of the 'lost farmer', farmers lost to change. The text on the back of the pedestal says, The Bygone Farmer by artist Henk Gomes commemorates the farmers that for thousands of years lived and worked in ... Read more
Posted on June 17, 2006 6:48
Juice fasting recipes, start with forgotten vegetables and then forget them again
I'm the kind of gal that likes to pad her New Year's resolutions with seemingly achievable ambitions like, 'Improve handwriting' and 'Find ways to enjoy ancient root vegetables', but 5 months into the year, I haven't exactly achieved success in integrating parsnips and burdock into my winter diet ... Read more
Posted on June 13, 2006 11:08
CPULs when bad acronyms happen to good people
It's pronounced 'SEE, PULSE' and stands for Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes. Architects Viljoen, Bohn and Howe's positively radical notion of combining productive urban landscapes with continuous landscapes, proposes a new urban design strategy that would change the appearance of contempo... Read more
Posted on June 9, 2006 13:51
Grow yer own dang biomass inadvertently
Way back in January, and then again in March, and again in April and May, I had big plans for my kitchen garden. Big and neat. Knowing that I would have to return from Occitania to the Polar Circle for gainful employment, I alphabetized my seed beds and planted sticks for beans and gourds to cli... Read more
Posted on June 7, 2006 15:06
Here as the Centre of the World, in terms of food
Here as the Centre of the World banquet with local food from Twente and Overijssel. Guests getting giggly on the bubbly. A week and a half ago, my colleagues and I at the Dutch Art Institute (DAI), were in the throes of an international symposium on 'all things periferal' for artists and mediat... Read more
Posted on June 3, 2006 14:35
Joe’s Fish Net in Newcastle
The ladies of Joe's Fish Net This last week I was in Newcastle to meet up with the old and new folks from Dott 07 (Designs of the Time). As part of our getting aquainted with the area we were asked to do some directed wandering and meet some people outside of Newcastle's shiny centre. I wandered i... Read more
Posted on May 21, 2006 23:18
If you like fresh leafy greens and pork, you’re going to love kruudmoes
First impression: I may have taken an overly Californian approach to making kruudmoes this time, but although I should probably increase the gooeyness to make it just the way the natives do, kruudmoes is just crazy delicious. If you're like me and: - love to chomp away on all sorts of lea... Read more
Posted on May 14, 2006 22:31
Dead nettle
crude mousse for dinner
Kruudmoes leafy green selection from 9 o'clock: white deadnettle (dovenetel), kohlrabi leaves, spring onions, curly leaf parsley, chicory and ground elder (zevenblad). Ten days before the Here as the Centre of the World dinner and I'm busy testing traditional recipes from Overijssel for the mai... Read more
Posted on 19:29
Wild tomatoes
for guests
Here's a clump of wild tomato seedlings with the exploded tomato skin still attached to the roots like a busted balloon. They're popping up everywhere in my kitchen garden, and to think I wasted all that time fussing with the foetuses and a propagator when they can grow themselves all by their l... Read more
Posted on May 7, 2006 10:02
Love difference,as in we love difference
Of course the artistic movement for an intermediterranean politic is into food. And it sports a big fat Citta del Arte logo right on it's homepage. Which led me to click on the Ministry of Nourishment link because I always wonder what folks mean by the word nourishment. I'm none the wiser, but th... Read more
Posted on April 24, 2006 8:00
Locative eating in Overijssel at the end of the Hungry Gap
Image of a shopping centre under contruction in Enschede, NL. Soon to be a banquet location Speaking of starving oneself, although it seems like it's spring, crop-wise we're right in the middle of the Hungry Gap, the period before the spring crops have come in, and when foodstocks stored from f... Read more
Posted on April 19, 2006 20:57
Episode 1, emergency food distribution and the role of the cameras
This entry refers to food distribution as discussed in yesterday's entry about the World Food Programme's computer game, Food Force. video still from Episode 1, © Renzo Martens In January 2004, Dutch artist Renzo Martens produced his forty-four minute art film, Episode 1, a documentation of... Read more
Posted on March 19, 2006 11:17
Food Force computer game: force-feeding inaccurate notions of the causes of hunger
images courtesy of Food Force, © United Nations World Food Programme - all rights reserved Two weeks ago I sat dumbfounded watching a French TV report in which journalism students practiced reporting a fictional national emergency. I couldn't help but think that what's cool about practice ... Read more
Posted on March 17, 2006 18:26
Fritz Haeg’s Edible Estates
homesteading on the suburban lawn
Start with one suburban home in Middle America (images of Salina Kansas Edible Estate © Fritz Haeg, used entirely with permission) Situated on what was once a massive sugar beet plantation, the iconic housing development of Lakewood is an embodiment of an American Dream in which each single-fa... Read more
Posted on September 26, 2005 12:34
How to feel a food mile
If it takes me eleven days to really feel at home, just imagine how a piece of fruit must feel after travelling under much worse conditions and for a far greater distance! No wonder one must go to great lengths in the urban environment to find tasty fresh food. My head finally adjusted to being he... Read more
Posted on September 19, 2005 10:00
French disaster relief local food challenge
I should have cancelled heading up north last Wednesday morning when by 6 a.m. I had already made my way across two rivers, almost ruining the treasured Martin Margiëla heels! The bus ride down to Montpellier was spectacular, spectacular meaning that there's something in the scene that can kill y... Read more
Posted on September 10, 2005 11:43
Terrine du terrain
This will be a recipe after the busy party days end. Mille pardons, but I find cooking for 14 and 60 still quite difficult to combine with self-actualisation in other areas of my life, yurt set-up, being a warm friend and hostess, kitchen garden ownership, and going to watch to Tour de Franc... Read more
Posted on July 15, 2005 11:50
Dear Dad, please get crackin’
Look what Auntie Kristi made me from the first harvest of her very own garden back in the Old Country. This raspberry/berry jam brought tears to my eyes, so delicious. None too sweet either, just the way I like it. Now there are two people in the world that make me jam that makes my heart leap wit... Read more
Posted on July 2, 2005 13:14
City Food
wild and edible
image courtesy Marjolijn Dijkman It's not an urban myth, edible food is growing wild in the city. In the Basel street where the artist initiative Filiale is located there are a myriad of little green grocers, representing just as many nationalities of people that populate the neighbourhood. Dij... Read more
Posted on June 29, 2005 16:05
Fortunately the food was slow and dry
When the 'slow' is the Slow Food Movement and the 'dry' is Dutch design collective Droog Design, the combination of slow and dry is a good thing. In Dutch, droog means 'dry', and it refers to the dry humor of many of the collective's designed objects. Droog is celebrating their Amsterdam Staalst... Read more
Posted on June 10, 2005 0:17
Strawberry stories
I took home some of those organic strawberries from Brabant last Sunday and by Monday morning I had turned eating strawberries into a yoga breathing practice. Inhale; pop a strumberry in your mouth and squish it against the roof of your mouth with your tongue, wait. Exhale; get high off the strawb... Read more
Posted on June 9, 2005 9:52
Art is, art was fluid last Sunday
Due to the good company and delightfully engaged audience, artist initiative Artis in Den Bosch showed this Sunday (05.06.2005) that they really know how to throw a happening. Margriet Kemper opened the salon with a presentation of her book, Speak, Image! (unfortunately only in Dutch) in whic... Read more
Posted on June 8, 2005 9:57
Fallen Fruit
Red apples on the left, yellow apples on the right. All of the apples were going to waste. As a fan of food foraging and fruit stealing, and as a woman who had never bought fruit except for bananas, mangos and the occasional avocado until she moved up North to the Polar Circle, I applaud the Fa... Read more
Posted on May 7, 2005 1:58
Brain Food
This terribly sad but well written book by Mark Kurlansky is a gripping history from the perspective of the cod. Kurlansky tells how fishing for this gadiform has deeply affected the wealth and development of many nations and technologies. I'm thinking the Flounder by Gunther Grass that I read bac... Read more
Posted on January 20, 2005 20:54
Making Roti with Jogendra (play with your food)
I have my way. Jogi has his way. But you can tell by his name that its his birthright to know how to make a better roti. If you make the roti MY way they puff up like pillows. My way involves a lot of not doing anything and getting the heat right. (Plus you get to use up some of the chicken ... Read more
Posted on December 31, 2004 0:51
Adam is the genuine article…
The very attentive Adam Kuban raced over on his, his, (whatever sort of motorcycle he's riding) to assure me that his weblog Slice is purely about offering the best possible pizza fieldguide and not about I-Pod applications, 'not that there's anything wrong with that...' One lengthy browsie-brows... Read more
Posted on November 23, 2004 0:10
Recipes for Geese and People
and Jeremijenko’s OOZ
2nd course of the dinner for geese and people was called Vegetable Matter Underfoot, (salad carpaccio) visually references the trampled vegetation at the sides of ponds and lakes where waterfowl like to hang out. Natalie Jeremijenko is developing a zoo without cages, and she's calling it 00Z. T... Read more
Posted on March 2, 2004 17:50
