Let’s start this post with a bit of fiction: It’s 1944, you’re a bomber pilot in the United States Navy, flying missions over Southeast Asia. It’s a dangerous job, but you’ve got a great crew: there’s Knute, a.k.a., “Swede”, the navigator, a quiet, big-hearted 18-year old blonde kid from northern Minnesota; Tony, the bombardier, a […]
Charting Mexican Restaurant Chains
This post was inspired by Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America, by Gustavo Arellano (2012, Scribner), an ambitious and entertaining book that reviews the history of America’s love of Mexican food using profiles of business people, restaurateurs, cooks, and more (my 2017 review of Taco USA). Chain restaurants played a critical role in expanding […]
Which Country Grows the Most Avocados?
At the 2017 International Food Blogging Conference in Sacramento, one of the sponsors was Avocados from Chile, the avocado promotion agency from that nation. The logic behind their promotional efforts in California is sound: United States avocado growers can’t meet growing U.S. demand The California avocado harvest is typically between April and September Chile is […]
The Seven Kinds of Catsup (Ketchup) You’ll Meet in a 19th Century Cookbook
As I’ve discussed before, in the olden days, catsup/ketchup was about much more than tomatoes. Cookbooks from the 18th and 19th century are ripe with recipes for catsup/ketchup that contain ingredients that are decidedly non-ketchup ingredients, like walnuts, anchovies, and oysters. In the early 19th century cookbook The Cook’s Oracle, author William Kitchiner shares seven […]
You Like Tomato, I Like Tom-ah-to, Dr. Kitchiner Likes Apples
After posts on 19th century complaints about plagiarism and the evolution of recipe writing style, we finally get to the recipe that originally attracted me to William Kitchiner’s 1818 book, The Cook’s Oracle: Mock Tomata Sauce [sic]. When I first saw Mock Tomata Sauce on my screen, I had a few thoughts. First: ????. Next: I need […]
The Evolution of Recipe Writing Style
Last time, I wrote about an important 19th century cookbook, The Cook’s Oracle, by William Kitchiner and noted that his book was published during an era of significant cookbook evolution. One of the most important was how recipes were written: the structure and style of recipes.
Cookbook Author Rants about Cutting and Pasting in Cookbooks
The following Receipts [Ed. note: recipes] are not a mere marrowless collection of shreds, and patches, and cuttings, and pastings, from obsolete works, but a bona fide register of practical facts, accumulated by a perseverance not to be subdued, or evaporated, by the igniferous terrors of a roasting fire in the dog-days. The Receipts have […]
A Word Cloud For Insects as Food (Entomophagy)
For a little while, I was collecting articles about Insects as Food. I thought it would be fun to feed them into a word cloud generator, so I piled the articles into a giant text file, made some small adjustments and pasted the text into one of the free on-line cloud generators. Initially, I used […]
Three Businesses That Fight Food Waste
Countless initiatives have been launched to fight food waste. Traditionally, these have been non-profit, volunteer-driven efforts like San Francisco’s Food Runners (which collects prepared food from restaurants or events for distribution to the needy) or food banks (which might collect surplus food from manufacturers or groceries). Recently, bunches of for-profit companies have been wading into […]
Tracking Retail Cricket Powder Prices
I have been following the field of entomophagy (insects as food) for a while: watching the news, and occasionally writing news roundups or more detailed pieces (see archive section below). So I have been wondering, as news coverage has increased, new products are launched, and companies start scaling up their insect-rearing operations, what is happening […]