catfight

I'm gone until the Kalends of December. Surely you can amuse yourself until then.

If not, keep an eye on this egullet thread where the self-important navel gazing was just interrupted by John Mariani himself. John, you will recall, has been taking a beating for frequenting those outrages known as "familiarization trips" (i.e., free shit). One wonders when food writers will finally figure out what they're paid for (In this sense, Ruth does deserve credit for hawking the Vikings).

Also features plenty of somnolent pontification from the usual suspects, including the one Regina likes to call the porcine pantload. Mee-oww!

And don't brine your fucking turkey.

Let me tell you about my mother

Inspired by Julia's success, we wondered what would have happed if gastronomic mastodon Ruth Reichl hadn't "predated the internet":

Although I stumbled on all of my knowledge about food accidentally, like a dusty bottle of Cheval Blanc in a Hollywood Boulevard convenience store, I can actually be quite smart. I like to wear ridiculous disguises and expose myself at the same time. I've distilled the wisdom of my many years writing about food to this: you really need to buy some expensive stainless steel appliances if you want your neighbors to take you seriously.

Huh. That's really not very funny, is it?

Is coherence necessary?

Now, I'm no media critic, but I do understand the necessity of mocking Maureen Dowd as much as possible. Surely, however, we can all agree that the real menace -- to the English language as well as our democracy -- is not, unfortunately, locked away in a TimesSelect box. From Judy Miller's letter to MoDo:

I was unaware that any such campaign existed, and if it did, that I did not think that I had been a target of it.

Suitable responses range from "as were we" to the Coxian "fuck you," but (oddly) Arianna says it best:

Fine, Judy didn't screw Libby. Just the American public. Good riddance.

Pending the inevitable "Paris is Burning," coming soon to a New Yorker near you, Judy may be the most hateful writer in America.

ADHD

• This isn't "Babe." It's "Battle of Algiers."
• Hey, let's get Libby Lewis to cover I. Lewis Libby's indictment.
• The best possible name for a housing development outside Beijing: Chateau Regalia.
• I've decided that this is the best two word blog post ever [inspiration?].
• I don't see why you think the French are going to do anything: I don't even subscribe to the Economist, and I've been reading this article for at least ten years.
• On postmodernism: when did a paradox become what critics call a paradox?
• Never underestimate what you can learn from Yahoo's most emailed pictures. Update: I've been following this story so closely it didn't even occur to me to inform you.
• For some reason I neglected to mention this last week: you need these books.

T:bag addendum

How funny that La D. brought up Marie Antoinette; I was just thinking about her for some reason.

She was, of course, hardly the the last to indulge in agrarian fantasy.

But the Times today raises an interesting question: what does it mean when the peasants themselves join in?

The short answer

What is it about the ethics of eating that is so confusing for everyone? Daniel Patterson is right about one thing:

I'm troubled by the possibility that, as the Bay Area has become increasingly wealthy and more ideologically self-selecting, the Chez Panisse ethos has become a touchstone for the tastefully furnished stone houses and rolling, lavender-covered hills of an elite preindustrial agrarian fantasy. I worry that we have begun to reflexively equate an aesthetically beautiful lifestyle with a morally good life, and that the way we cook and eat has become bound up in that mix.

But it is a wonder to behold how he gets from this unassailable proposition to his "solution": more sous vide. The poor guy's logic may even be more torturous than Julie Powell. Here's a tip for future commentators who have something really, really important to share with the world: do not wrap yourself in the mantle of defensor pauperum if your goal is to make twee tapioca foams for the vulgarly rich. Also, move to Chicago.

*

Patterson does, inadvertently, bring up an interesting question: Is it logically possible to challenge this orthdoxy of sustainability? One would undertake such a project not because it cramps your "creativity", or because the people at the farmers market are irritating (although they certainly are), but because of its insiduous equation of aesthetic beauty with moral good.

Patterson deserves credit for identifying the equation, though the purely aesthetic conception of sustainability indicates the chef's limited grasp of the question better than anything I could write. We can capture more of the real issue by rewriting the equation: is it a moral good to spend more money than strictly necessary to make yourself feel better about your lifestyle?

The answer depends on another question: how sustainable is what we are calling sustainable agriculture? If it's not really sustainable, than we have something to argue about (because the yuppies are just making themselves feel better instead of doing anything real). But if "organic," local, seasonal produce really is better for the planet and those who produce and consume it, the only possible resistance is that cheapness is better than goodness -- or rather that cheapness is the greatest good. Not an indefensible position, though it hardly puts you on the side of the angels.

But somehow I doubt that's the argument of the chef whose "creativity" is so cruelly crushed by his inability to invent anything that tastes better than a Zuni hamburger.

quickly

• Dan Shaughnessy is outraged that I left him off the list of world's biggest douchebags.
• NYers should keep an eye on snack for the latest, e.g., the michelin men.
• If you must know, the Times takes on the OTA v. OCA story. Organic is so five years ago.
• Reconstructing historical fish stocks from NYPL's Buttolph Collection of historical menus,
• which is now online.
• The traditional skull panna cotta for Día de los Muertos [thx muse].
• Le Montrachet: Il faut le boire à genoux.