Shavout

The holiday of Shavout begins this evening. The <span style="font-style: italic;">LA Times</span> ran a very interesting article about foods for the holiday: "<a href="http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-shavuot-20110602,0,2918024.story">Shavout: A Feast for Body and Soul</a>." One of my interests is the history of foods for Jewish holidays and celebrations -- and also cooking and eating them. Shavout, a grain-and-fruit-harvest festival, has an especially rich tradition of foods and complex history of what and why people chose them.<br /><br />In Biblical times, bread was the main food for Shavout. After the Temple fell, Rabbinic scholars shifted the significance of the holiday to a celebration of the giving of the Torah: "Searching through the Bible like employees at a 'CSI' crime lab, they found clues that proved to them that the ancient harvest festival had actually coincided with a crucial 'spiritual harvest' as well: What the Israelites 'reaped' at Shavuot was the giving of the Torah to Moses on Mt. Sinai."<br /><br />Still later, the Shavout food tradition morphed again, and dairy foods appeared as the centerpiece of the holiday table. As a secular Jew, I enjoy the complicated explanations for why this is the tradition (as well as liking to eat them). For example, it's said that the Jews waiting for Moses didn't know about dietary laws until the Torah was delivered. To celebrate, they had to make a kosher meal -- but had no time for kosher slaughter that had just been explained to them. What to do? Eat blintzes.<br /><br />I also like the more historic explanations, such as those in the <span style="font-style: italic;">L.A. Times</span> article and those I wrote about last year here: <a href="http://regional-food.blogspot.com/2010/05/blintzes-for-shavouth.html">Blintzes for Shavout</a>. This post is also on <a href="http://www.blogger.com/http://hero-or-antihero.blogspot.com///">my other blog</a> for today.

Shavout

The holiday of Shavout begins this evening. The LA Times ran a very interesting article about foods for the holiday: " Shavout: A Feas...

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Super Cucas and Its Opposite

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5797970914/" title="cucas6385 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="cucas6385" height="375" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2236/5797970914_26374a90e0.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />We really enjoyed the burritos, quesadillas, enchiladas, and green and red salsas at Super Cuca's Taqueria, quite near our temporary home in Santa Barbara. It's a completely informal place -- order at the counter, eat in a kind of garden area or take it home, which we've done a couple times. Cucas' kitchen makes a much more interesting photo subject than the food.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5797415931/" title="cucas6383 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="cucas6383" height="375" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5274/5797415931_d6e8c9c9b2.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5797971056/" title="cucas6382 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="cucas6382" height="376" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3145/5797971056_1642ccd227.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />Cucas' also has a grocery section with an outstanding selection of fresh and dried chiles:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5797489485/" title="cucas6219 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="cucas6219" height="375" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5269/5797489485_2332a6a5fd.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />Earlier this week, we had a very different meal at the elegant French-California restaurant called Bouchon. Local food is their focus. The chef shops at the same farmer's market where I've spent almost every Tuesday afternoon. Probably he was one of the guys I saw with a wheelbarrow or other huge conveyance, buying in large quantities.<br /><br />I've eyed the artistically arranged red and yellow beets at various farmers' stalls each week: at Bouchon, I ordered the beet salad with local greens and a sort of croquette made of wonderfully flavored cheese:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5797971112/" title="bouchon6369 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="bouchon6369" height="374" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5029/5797971112_978c379916.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYBGU9iTKcfGQubiF6pUNX2bi71bXOrRf3vzuOAA2z7XxpL8V58vnocfC1ZvHskL9PWSyMXanMJwkLrUKGP5byHjmhVAC4Lw00GzEIddzZm7MTli3Ev7Yzwowz7N7StPi3-_soCFpR_Pff/s1600/bouchon_evening_specials_menu.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5614490368243980674" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYBGU9iTKcfGQubiF6pUNX2bi71bXOrRf3vzuOAA2z7XxpL8V58vnocfC1ZvHskL9PWSyMXanMJwkLrUKGP5byHjmhVAC4Lw00GzEIddzZm7MTli3Ev7Yzwowz7N7StPi3-_soCFpR_Pff/s400/bouchon_evening_specials_menu.jpg" style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 306px; height: 400px;" /></a>I love the contrast between delicious but informal tortilla-based food to eat with coke or beer, and special boutique-y food with local wine pairings. Other dishes in our Bouchon meal included rillettes of duck (Len's appetizer), local sea bass for Len and a duck main dish for me, and a meyer-lemon bread pudding and a blood-orange-and-strawberry tarte for dessert.

Super Cucas and Its Opposite

We really enjoyed the burritos, quesadillas, enchiladas, and green and red salsas at Super Cuca's Taqueria, quite near our temporary hom...

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Government Nutrition Advice

Does anyone but me find it funny that the new government graphic of advice on what to eat looks like the one they used during World War II? Note in case you need it: the new one has a website listed on it. The Ancient one lists butter as a food group.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-noyPVnxC9sTH4tmyRDrewUcwgjJ4i7LhmJSfJFEyNbAWXre3WPSpoazkVPf4hx1EwRx4TkoG3uOw2flhbbD5oWmlxFIrBhaTF8L434VvfWKOctiP9F3Gi7XArP71f1jk78eQwzqwvlWT/s1600/food.plate.40s.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5613715398310139010" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-noyPVnxC9sTH4tmyRDrewUcwgjJ4i7LhmJSfJFEyNbAWXre3WPSpoazkVPf4hx1EwRx4TkoG3uOw2flhbbD5oWmlxFIrBhaTF8L434VvfWKOctiP9F3Gi7XArP71f1jk78eQwzqwvlWT/s400/food.plate.40s.jpg" style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 310px; height: 400px;" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr_zHZMQKpZubwO6YEJ9SBNRshVh-K0q8BpjUW5kPraPWPjx3MPNi8nskjLG0eRSDzPsEgkisQP1R4jRI22Trhfq5yNXzmXTbmmS_0dC_klu6W7g4b-D4OE1CMDMSFpmdfhAA5ST6jgqlZ/s1600/pyramid-plate.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5613715397060464738" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr_zHZMQKpZubwO6YEJ9SBNRshVh-K0q8BpjUW5kPraPWPjx3MPNi8nskjLG0eRSDzPsEgkisQP1R4jRI22Trhfq5yNXzmXTbmmS_0dC_klu6W7g4b-D4OE1CMDMSFpmdfhAA5ST6jgqlZ/s400/pyramid-plate.jpg" style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 364px;" /></a>

Government Nutrition Advice

Does anyone but me find it funny that the new government graphic of advice on what to eat looks like the one they used during World War II? ...

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My lunch -- and wasn't it delicious!

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5782992697/" title="quiche6365 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="quiche6365" height="480" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3045/5782992697_51e3556613_z.jpg" width="640" /></a>

My lunch -- and wasn't it delicious!

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Two Views of Food

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5774413452/" title="getty1550 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="getty1550" height="543" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3659/5774413452_856f26ea9b_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br /><br />In this simple scene, painted around 1660, painter Pieter de Hooch depicts "A Woman Preparing Bread and Butter for a Boy." Many Dutch painters of the era illustrated the interior of homes of middle class people, showing their daily lives in an idealized way. I love the details of the loaf of bread, the butter, and the glimpses of the scene outside the home.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5774413584/" title="getty6290 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="getty6290" height="375" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3184/5774413584_1d439b44be.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />In contrast: this detail from Aert de Gelder's large portrayal of "The Banquet of Ahasuerus" uses a dining scene to illustrate a decadent and possibly corrupt man -- though of course the viewer knows how the scene is redeemed in the remainder of the book of Esther from which the image is derived. This painting dates from around 20 years after the first.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5774413706/" title="getty6294 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="getty6294" height="375" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2391/5774413706_848abe4852.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />Nikolaus Knupfer's "Solon before Croesus" (detail above) shows an even more decadent-seeming scene. I'm not sure I understand what the woman's role is in this Greek myth about King Solon, who told Croesus that poor people may be happier than kings. The painting dates from a few years prior to the first one.<br /><br />Based on these three paintings, which I saw today at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, and on many other still-lives, Biblical and mythological paintings, and commonplace interiors from the Dutch Golden Age, I have an idea that the simple lives of ordinary virtuous Dutch people in this era were favorably contrasted with the more luxurious lives of the rich rulers of the past. I believe that this was the era of the Dutch Republic, where egalitarianism was almost achieved for a while.<br /><br />The Getty museum is situated on a beautiful hilltop with vast views out to sea and towards the mountains. Its many harmonious buildings, outdoor fountains and sculpture, and well-kept gardens are very impressive.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5773875911/" title="getty1515 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="getty1515" height="331" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3544/5773875911_41503025e7.jpg" width="500" /></a>

Two Views of Food

In this simple scene, painted around 1660, painter Pieter de Hooch depicts "A Woman Preparing Bread and Butter for a Boy." Many Du...

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The Holy Grail?

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5769887267/" title="in-n-out6284 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="in-n-out6284" height="428" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3600/5769887267_ed5326e3c2_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br /><br />After years of procrastination, we finally ate dinner tonight at In-N-Out Burger. We never got around to it during our stay in San Diego in 2009. We are leaving here in just over a week: lucky that we made it this time.<br /><br />Our expectations were very modest: we had heard that though it's very highly hyped, most level-headed hamburger eaters find the food here just a bit better than MacDonald's. Our expectations were met. AHHHHH.... an ordinary hamburger!<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5769887189/" title="in-n-out6280 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="in-n-out6280" height="333" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3265/5769887189_abffc1d57a.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />Most of our fellow customers were probably not influenced by Julia Child's admiration for In-N-Out Burger, unlike the foodies lining up at the Super Rica Taqueria. My guess is that most of our fellow customers haven't actually heard of Julia Child at all, since they seem to be mainly high school students, some maybe too young to have even seen "Julie and Julia" (which didn't mention either In-N-Out Burger or Super Rica anyway). I overheard a conversation about falling off a skateboard. Nothing about Julia Child.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/12003515@N05/5769887331/" title="in-n-out6287 by mesander2000, on Flickr"><img alt="in-n-out6287" height="375" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5306/5769887331_3e3576544a.jpg" width="500" /></a><br /><br />So this is it. The Holy Grail, not. Another peak California experience, perhaps.

The Holy Grail?

After years of procrastination, we finally ate dinner tonight at In-N-Out Burger. We never got around to it during our stay in San Diego in ...

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"The Ethical Assassin"

<span style="font-style: italic;">The Ethical Assassin</span> by David Liss is a suspense novel in which a naive character, 17-year-old Lemul Altick suddenly finds himself threatened by bizarre criminals and corrupt policemen in the heat and misery of 1980s Florida. Lem -- whose name is coincidentally the same as Swift's Lemuel Gulliver -- grows up and learns a great deal in his strange voyage of saving himself from a variety of dangers. He learns to deal with strange circumstances, with dishonest employers in his job selling encyclopedias door-to-door, with bullying from his age peers and others, and with ambiguity about which people he can believe or trust. It's not quite as excellent as some novels in this style (like by Graham Greene) but it's good.<br /><br />The "ethical assassin" of the title is a stealthy, weird-looking, and mysterious character named Melford who offers long discourses on veganism and saving animals from human cruelty. Melford insists on the ethical imperative of his views; his persuasiveness pulls in Lem and at least one other character. Despite all the discussion of the wrongs of eating meat, food in the sense that I usually write about it hardly plays a role in this book.<br /><br />Lem, attempting to skip meat thanks to Melford's discourses, dislikes the dairy-free bowl of oatmeal that's his only choice at an IHOP; he eats fruit when his hunger tempts him otherwise, and he also resists temptation from a girl who tries to lure him to eat a hamburger -- but this book is truly not about food in the style of many works of detective fiction. Melford's obsession with the ethics of eating meat plays a large role in the unfolding suspense -- making the discussions relevant without (in my opinion) turning this into a philosophic novel. It would in fact be perverse to read this as a tract about "meat is murder" though some of the amazon.com reviewers did read it this way. It's about a bizarre character whose quirk is animal rights.<br /><br />Lem Altick, like the central characters in Liss's other novels, is a Jew. For Lem, being Jewish has no stated religious or ethical content, it's just one of many taunts from the bullies of his school days and his experiences in the narrative. The extent to which Jewishness has no meaning for Lem is a bit extreme. In Liss's other books, which are set in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the key Jewish characters (the ones who have to get themselves out of dangerous and strange situations) are not practicing their religion; they nevertheless are very conscious of its meaning and customs and how it affects the lives of their Jewish relatives. For Lem, it's nothing but another reason to pick on him, like being overweight (which he had been a few years before).<br /><br />Since the publication of <span style="font-style: italic;">The Ethical Assassin</span>, Liss has returned to publishing historical fiction, and also seems to be collaborating on some graphic novels. I've read the rest of his novels to date, and liked them. I would judge this the weakest though it's a good read. The historical content of the others gives them a greater depth than this one; the variety of really oddball characters in this one doesn't make up for this lack of depth. I'm looking forward to Liss's new historical novel, scheduled to appear in August.

"The Ethical Assassin"

The Ethical Assassin by David Liss is a suspense novel in which a naive character, 17-year-old Lemul Altick suddenly finds himself threaten...

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