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son of the eternal razor
2023-10-26 15:30I finally changed my razor again a few weeks ago... around 6 months after the last change.
2023-10-26
white people food
2023-10-26 15:34There's been a social media meme about "white people food", bland and unseasoned. Yesterday I saw a little video, first with some woman apparently cooking skinless chicken breast in white rice, cutting to a guy saying "Do you ever feel the urge to say 'I'm white but non-practicing?'" as he cut to a big spice rack.
This all irritates me more than it probably should. But let's think about some flavor options available to mid-level peasants -- not buying imports, but not limited to just eating an insufficient amount of barley -- in ancient or medieval Europe, depending on time and place:
salt: actual salt, fish sauce (garum), salted fish or meats
fat: olive oil, butter, lard, chicken or goose fats, suet
sweetness: raisins, dried apple, maybe other dried fruit. Honey? (might have been expensive)
alliums: onions, garlic, shallots, chives
herbs/spices: oregano, fennel, sage, bay leaf, rosemary, anise, cumin, juniper, lavender, marjoram, mint, sorrel, etc. (granted, this category is much richer toward the Mediterranean, but many herbs could be and were cultivated further north, and juniper is Scandinavian)
pungent: mustard, horseradish
acid/alcohol: vinegar, verjuice, wine, ale
Even if chicken-woman were avoiding the first three categories for alleged health reasons, there's still lots of options for pepping it up. And, to be fair, no evidence in a brief low-resolution video excerpt that she wasn't. Garlic, herbs, or marinade wouldn't have been visible.
Not to mention elites importing black pepper and other eastern spices, or the post-Columbian uses of paprika if not other chili peppers.
Granted, industrialization/urbanization, the Great Depression, and World War shortages or rationing, and the lowest common denominator of school cafeterias and TV dinners seem to have sapped the vim out of a lot of American or English home cooking. But that's a partial break in a rich tradition.
This all irritates me more than it probably should. But let's think about some flavor options available to mid-level peasants -- not buying imports, but not limited to just eating an insufficient amount of barley -- in ancient or medieval Europe, depending on time and place:
salt: actual salt, fish sauce (garum), salted fish or meats
fat: olive oil, butter, lard, chicken or goose fats, suet
sweetness: raisins, dried apple, maybe other dried fruit. Honey? (might have been expensive)
alliums: onions, garlic, shallots, chives
herbs/spices: oregano, fennel, sage, bay leaf, rosemary, anise, cumin, juniper, lavender, marjoram, mint, sorrel, etc. (granted, this category is much richer toward the Mediterranean, but many herbs could be and were cultivated further north, and juniper is Scandinavian)
pungent: mustard, horseradish
acid/alcohol: vinegar, verjuice, wine, ale
Even if chicken-woman were avoiding the first three categories for alleged health reasons, there's still lots of options for pepping it up. And, to be fair, no evidence in a brief low-resolution video excerpt that she wasn't. Garlic, herbs, or marinade wouldn't have been visible.
Not to mention elites importing black pepper and other eastern spices, or the post-Columbian uses of paprika if not other chili peppers.
Granted, industrialization/urbanization, the Great Depression, and World War shortages or rationing, and the lowest common denominator of school cafeterias and TV dinners seem to have sapped the vim out of a lot of American or English home cooking. But that's a partial break in a rich tradition.
condiment lifetime
2023-10-26 16:03As a child, I thought of condiments as lasting forever. Not just in the sense of not going bad, but in the sense of one container lasting a long time.
I have since realized this is mostly because we didn't use them very often.
mayonnaise: occasional tuna salad
mustard: occasional knockwurst, occasional Welsh rarebit
ketchup: occasional knockwurst and baked beans
How occasional? Probably much less than every two weeks, unlike the regular Thursday alternation of steak and lamb chops. (Either my parents were particularly dedicated to lamb or it was somehow much cheaper at our supermarket than it is now.)
I later learned my father used ketchup as a component of his taco filling, which suggests we actually went through that faster than I realized; not like I was doing the shopping.
Whereas now, actually using ketchup or mustard to spice up continuous batches of beans, they run out much faster...
I have since realized this is mostly because we didn't use them very often.
mayonnaise: occasional tuna salad
mustard: occasional knockwurst, occasional Welsh rarebit
ketchup: occasional knockwurst and baked beans
How occasional? Probably much less than every two weeks, unlike the regular Thursday alternation of steak and lamb chops. (Either my parents were particularly dedicated to lamb or it was somehow much cheaper at our supermarket than it is now.)
I later learned my father used ketchup as a component of his taco filling, which suggests we actually went through that faster than I realized; not like I was doing the shopping.
Whereas now, actually using ketchup or mustard to spice up continuous batches of beans, they run out much faster...
another burger
2023-10-26 18:20This one from Boss. 5 oz patty, I was told. Cheeseburger with veggies and house sauce. It was decent. A lot like the $5 burgers in Harvard Square in 2019, except this one was $11.