On the Table - the curious home of Gary Allen, Food Writer & Dillettante

The end of a year is a time for reflection, which can be a bittersweet experience. We, however, will spare you the sturm, drang, and yanking-out of beard-hairs that are likely to go on around here. Instead, this issue is a humongous (which is to say, slightly larger than usual) gift-wrapped package, just begging to be ripped open.

Regular subscribers to our updates newsletter receive these updates from our blog, Just Served, directly -- but there is much more at the blog that isn’t sent automatically. We don't want to wear out our welcome with a lot of unsolicited blather. This month we spared you much of our usual folderol (not entirely, of course; see below) -- and instead featured an excerpt from Sasha Gong's and Scott D. Seligman's new book, The Cultural Revolution Cookbook: Simple, Healthy Recipes from China’s Countryside.

If, in a moment of reflection and/or guilt, you feel the need for self-flagellation, you can always rely on Just Served to lend the requisite literary lash. It currently flaunts a non-food essay (one of Dr Sanscravat's typical curmudgeonly rants), an apologia On Children. If you don't want to wait for these newsletters to hear about such postings, you can follow us on Facebook, or Twitter.

Aside from the blog, this month we've published another piece online (at a more respectable venue). Roll Magazine is now available in electronic form only, and its first non-print issue contains our article, "Preserving Apples."

The Roger Smith Cookbook Conference is coming up in NYC, February 9-11, and we'll be moderating the panel on cookbook editing (with some fantastic panelists, BTW). You can find details about -- and register for -- the event at its website.

The index for our latest book, Herbs: A Global History, has been proofed, the graphics and their captions are done, and all of the Author's Queries have been addressed -- so all we have to do is wait for the book to come out on April 15th. There's going to be a kind of publication party (with dinner from recipes in the book!) on April 30th in NYC -- and we'll post more details as they develop.

Meanwhile, we're plugging away on a sausage book for Reaktion's Edible Series. The freezer at Chez Sanscravat is packed with andouille, chorizo, and other assorted encased meats (needless to say, we don't plan to have our cholesterol checked until well after the book is completed).

"A Quiet Little Table in the Corner" is an annotated ("annotated" being used, naturally, in the broadest possible sense) directory of our writings -- mostly on other people's sites.

Leitesculinaria will be posting our article about the New Year's Hoppin' John tradition, on or about December 27th, but we don't have a link for it yet. The entire list of our currently-posted Leitesculinaria articles is available here, along with several other articles on food history & science.

As this is being written, the year is winding down. So this month's quotations (from On the Table's culinary quote pages) look back at some of the anonymous -- and oft contradictory -- wisdom that has come down to us from auld lang syne:

"The belly rules the mind." Spanish Proverb

"When the Muslim is not hungry he says, we are forbidden to eat monkey. When he is hungry he eats a baboon." Yoruba proverb

"Manage with bread and butter until God sends the honey." Moroccan proverb

"Man who stand on hill with mouth wide open, waits a long time for roast duck to fall in." Chinese proverb

"Eat butter first, and eat it last, and live till a hundred years be past." 
Old Dutch proverb

"What butter and whiskey will not cure, there is no cure for." Irish proverb

"It is well to remember that there are five reasons for drinking: the arrival of a friend, one's present or future thirst, the excellence of the wine, or any other reason." Latin Proverb

"The best cure for drunkenness is whilst sober, observe a drunken person." Chinese proverb

PS: If you encounter broken links, changed URLs -- or know of wonderful sites we've missed -- please drop us a line. It helps to keep this resource as useful as possible for all of us. To those of you who have suggested sites -- thanks, and keep them coming!

PPS: If you wish to change the e-mail address at which you receive these newsletters, or otherwise modify the way you receive our postings, go here.

PPPS: If you've received this newsletter by mistake, and/or don't wish to receive future issues, you have our sincere apology and can have your e-mail address deleted from the list immediately. We're happy (and continuously amazed) that so few people have decided to leave the list -- but, should you choose to be one of them, let us know and we'll see that your in-box is never afflicted by these updates again. You can unsubscribe here.



All Things Sweet and Sugary
(an introduction to the baked goods and confections of Morocco)

Ancient Greek Trading Vessels Carried More Than Wine
(using DNA to learn about ancient trade; archaeology meets CSI)

Apocalx
(a search engine for recipes)

Artisanal Wheat on the Rise
(Smithsonian Magazine article about people raising long-forgotten strains of wheat)

Beer Archaeologist, The
(brewing some well-aged beer via experimental archaeology; an article in Smithsonian Magazine)

Books
(a bibliography of books about restaurant history, from Jan Whitaker)

Cooking May Have Driven Human Evolution
(an article in Archaeology, based on work that appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences)

Craving Earth - A Diet Mystery
(article on possible reasons for pica, geophagy, in The Sydney Morning Herald)

Eating Appalachia: In Search of Real American Cuisine in Hidden Hollers
(the first in a series of pieces on American regional cuisines, from Kathleen Willcox at Eat Me Daily)

Feedstuffs Food Links
("connecting farm to fork," articles, factsheets and podcasts on all agricultural topics)

Foie-gras Production
(article in The Economist that asks "How much is too much?" And "Why [are] some duck livers... delicious, and others nasty?")

Food and Recipes of Wartime Europe
(excerpts from Margaret Patten's We'll Eat Again and Post-war Kitchen)

Food We Eat Might Control Our Genes
(article in Scientific American about the presence of traces of the foods we eat in our RNA)

Guide to Culinary Arts Colleges
(two chefs have created this searchable database of places to obtain degrees or certificates in professional cooking)

It's Out After 170 Years, the Secret of Worcestershire Sauce... Found in a Skip
(sometimes food history is done by digging through the trash, literally)

Jeno Paulucci, Pioneer of Frozen-food Business, Dies at 93
(“What could be more American than a business built on a good Italian recipe for chop suey?”)

Journal of Gastronomy, The
(the American Institute of Wine & Food's former magazine, now partially available -- along with some other important gastronomic periodicals -- online)

Lucky Peach
(McSweeney's quarterly of food writing)

Pizza is Not a Vegetable
(Benjamin Phelan's article, in Slate, about how and why we call some plant parts "vegetables," but not others)

Porn on the Cob
(Ari LeVaux's Atlantic Monthly article about huitlacoche, corn smut)

Reading American Menus: A Virtual Exhibit
(historic menus serve as primary sources to show that "...the restaurant developed in a unique tension with American institutions and that the physical and social forms are clearly linked to larger phenomena...)

Reading, Apps, and the Myth of Cookbook Obsolescence
(Elissa Altman's take on why cookbooks will never disappear)

Sausage Peddlers, Vagabonds, and Bandits
(Clifford Wright on the charcuterie of the Mediterranean region)

Sourashtra Recipes
(dishes and spice mixtures from the Palkars of Southern India)

Through the Isinglass
(Intelligent Life's Christopher Hirst revisits Isabella Beeton's classic cookbook)

Uncle Phaedrus
("Consulting Detective and Finder of Lost Recipes, with the Hungry Browser Irregulars")



5 Tips to Finding a Literary Agent

Erosion in the Paid Media Pyramid, The

Is There Too Much Food Writing?



Food Through Time

Kevin Kossowan: From the Cellar, Wild, Garden, Local Farm

Out to Lunch

Tangerine and Cinnamon

Z Tasty Life



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Your privacy is important to us. We will not give, sell or share your e-mail address with anyone, for any purpose -- ever. Nonetheless, we will expose you to the following irredeemably brazen plugs:

Our books, The Resource Guide for Food Writers, The Herbalist in the Kitchen, The Business of Food: Encyclopedia of the Food And Drink Industries, and Human Cuisine can be ordered through the Libro-Emporium.

Here endeth the sales pitch(es)...

...for the moment, anyway.