Fair Weather Vegan

Julie and Julia

A little more than halfway through the movie, we stopped it so that I could get some cheese (many scenes of French cooking will cause that sort of thing).  My father remarked that the film was long.  Actually, I told him, it's only two hours.  "It seems longer," he said, "I guess that's not a good sign." 

It's not really fair to put any mortal up against the greatest actress of her generation.  Or, for that matter, to put any actor against the self-assured and understated Stanley Tucci.  But the other main figures could have at least tried to put forth an effort that didn't go from bad (Amy Adams) to worse (Chris Messina).  It's frustrating because there are situations in which Adams can act, so some of the blame must go to the script.  The Julia Child segments are a delight, which only serves to highlight the unrelenting tedium of the 'story' of a blogger setting out to cook the entire Mastering the Art of French Cooking in a year.  Having read parts of the book that was the result of her project, I can say that the movie strips any sense of dramatic tension, most centrally the near-nervous breakdown that prompts the project.  The dialogue is wooden; the delivery is wooden; and Adams and Messina have to compete with the utter joie de vivre that Streep brings to any role.  Worse, it's completely unclear what the contemporary scenes of the movie are trying to say, and when they do seem to say something the message is somewhat atrocious.   The most important thing, ladies, is a good husband, good being defined as one who puts up with your bitchy behavior.  "Do you really think I'm a bitch?" Julie asks her best friend.  "Yes, but we all are" is the response, a revelation that led me to exclaim aloud "Ah, the feminism of Nora Ephron."  In the moment where it was poised to turn Child from an icon to a human being with flaws, it reassures us that the 'real' child is, in fact, the figment of Julie's imagination. Although some of these are problems with the book itself, at least the book creates characters we can care about in the first place.  

Julie and Julia is worth watching for the Child segments, but do get up and do some cooking during the rest. 

The Post Punk Kitchen's Edamame Pesto

Isa Chandra Moskowitz, one half of the famed vegan cooking team, is at work on a low-fat cookbook.  There's no need to explain how I might feel about that endeavor as a whole ("good lord, the stuff is already vegan, what the hell do you want?" pretty much covers it).  But i was totally intrigued by the thought of edamame pesto, so I dove right into the recipe with more alacrity than I usually show (i.e., any).  It's set out as a two-step meal that also includes a mushroom-based sauce.  I chose to make the pesto by itself, and also made other changes to the recipe since I'm not enamored of cilantro, and also halved some ingredients to create a 'single-serving' option.  I do encourage you to try the original, since it's impossible to go wrong with creminis.  I made my version twice, and was quite happy with it both times.

• 8 oz. shelled frozen edamame, thawed
• 2 cloves garlic
• 5-6 fresh basil leaves
• 1/2 cup vegetable broth
• 1 or 2 tsps olive oil 

Roughly chop the garlic and throw it with the basil into the food processor.  Pulse a few times. Add the other ingredients and blend until smooth-ish.  I use that word because mine always turned out grainier than traditional pesto.  This may be because I have a sad little three-cup food processor and didn't give it enough time, but it might have something to do with the ingredients themselves, so don't be surprised if the pesto has a bit of a crunchy texture.  It adds interest to the dish, which (obviously) lacks the fat of pesto but brings its own lighter appeal.  Makes enough for two large bowls of pasta (I used fettuccine).  Non-vegans, do not put parmesan cheese on this no matter how tempted you are, because it doesn't blend its flavor well.  Moskowitz also recommends it in any place pesto may be used, such as sandwiches. 

Shauna 1, Rocco 0

This guy should have stuck with being an actual chef.  Remember those days, when he cooked and people liked it?   Shauna reports from BlogHer Food: 

Still, it was pretty darned funny to watch Rocco DiSpirito in a tight nylon t-shirt, a mic attached on his arm, walking through the crowd like a sweaty motivational speaker, hawking frozen pasta meals to a room full of food bloggers. "Who in this room has the time to make every meal from scratch?" he asked at the beginning of lunch.

Um, Rocco? You're taking to people who take photographs of their food and came to this conference to learn how to take better photographs of it. This probably isn't your audience.

When most everyone raised her or his hand to that question, he looked at the sea of hands aghast. "Come on! No one here has jobs or kids?" At this, 3/4 of the crowd turned their backs on him and started talking to each other instead. Within minutes, the din of people ignoring him was nearly deafening.

Who Made Eater (SF) God All Of A Sudden?

Wow, they go national and suddenly the egos run wild.  Someone decided it was an acceptable idea to offer $25 to any food blogger who would shut down.  I don't think of this as a food blog in the classical sense, but anyone should have the right to blog about anything they like, without snotbags arguing it lowers the level of journalism by talking about "mundane" food.  One of the major points of FWV has always been that all food is important food if it makes you feel happy.  Plus, the blogsphere is huge.  There's room for serious journalism and people writing about every burrito they've ever eaten and people who have stupid opinions, and nothing reflects poorly on you except your own attitude, which apparently Eater has a hell of a lot of.

What Food-Related Tweeters Float Your Boat?

The 'food' column on my version of Tweet Deck is much shorter than my other categories.  I follow some local faves like BiRite Market and Shuna Fish Lydon, some well-known food bloggers like Ganda, and of course awesome activists like Fat Nutritionist.  What should I add to my list? 

Why Is There Half A Bowl of Milk Left, Cheerios?

Chad Orzel of Uncertain Principles explores the physics of a question that has long bugged us all.  Namely, why, when you eat Raisin Bran, is there always less milk remaining at the end than when you eat Cheerios?  With this post Chad also becomes the only blogger (I think) to be cited both here and on WSB. 

I have also been paying little attention to my emails from Foodbuzz, so unfortunately I will not be attending the festival.  But I was pretty surprised to see some of the phrasing in excerpts from the letter they sent out about individual sponsorship (which apparently raised a lot of comment; I'm glad other bloggers found the subject comprehensible because I surely didn't).  I recognize that America has become unable to correctly choose prepositions, but there must be someone in the offices who can read the clause "and not the community on a whole" and say to herself 'no' and reach for the backspace key.  

Rotund Redesign

I've been remiss in not mentioning that The Rotund, a flagship fat acceptance/HAES blog, has done a beautiful redesign.  The content didn't need any alteration.  It remains thought-provoking and inspiring.  Tweeps can also follow @therotund. 

Cooks Are Women, Chefs Are Men

Pizza Diavola, a blog after my own heart, has produced this excellent post in which the blogger interrogates the conclusions of a recent panel on gender in professional cooking.  I would actually suggest she contact Ed Levine directly if she has concerns about his summation of the events, because I've found him to be extremely sympathetic.  If he responded positively to my critique of his way of writing about Chicago-style pizza, he would surely be attentive to a critique of more serious issues. 

'This Is Why You Are A Fellow Human Being'

I am saddened but even more disgusted that Jennifer, who created the Vegan Lunchbox blog that is often featured on this site, runs another site called "This is Why You're Thin."  I'm not making that up.  It's allegedly 'photos of things that motivate people to stay healthy.'  Current picture is a big photo of some kind of greens, which generally motivates this thin person to want to go get a Twinkie.  It may be too much to ask that people, especially women, give up the thin = automatically healthy nonsense. I'm currently reading The Obesity Myth by Paul Campos and the societal pressures to believe, against the actual data from the mortality studies, that this is the case are overwhelming.  But it isn't too much to ask that we treat fat people as human beings, and that includes not devoting entire websites to not being them. "How dare your body size selfishly be different than mine!  Because omg think of the children! And the kale!"  That's like running a site called 'This is Why You're Straight' or 'This is Why You're White.'  Showing pictures of 'reasons' to be either of those things makes just as much sense and is just as effective. 

"There's A Piece Of Paper Inside..."

The delightful Jennifer 8. Lee's 2008 TED Talk in which she discusses the globalization of Chinese cuisine.