PicoBlog

Anything can be a salad! I mean what defines a salad, really? I’d make the argument that any combination of ingredients tossed together with some kind of dressing could be called a salad. By that logic, the possibilities are endless: Dressed leafy lettuces, of course, but also fresh fruit with a squeeze of lime juice, roasted veggies with a tahini drizzle, shredded chicken with mayo, cold pasta with pesto… By expanding the definition, “salads” become a lot more fun, and Salad Freak by Jess Damuck will help you think outside the box.

If you follow my work, you have probably seen me writing often about something called tucupi. It’s the boiled juice extracted from grated, bitter yuca (not yucca) in the making of casabe (yuca bread), which can be further reduced to make tucupi negro, also called tucupi preto, casaramá, andualako and dozens of o… ncG1vNJzZmimlazEsL7LnZyrZqOqr7TAwJyiZ5ufonyxe8KopqShnpx6uLXToWScmaOorrOxxKk%3D

Signed copies of my cookbook Made in Taiwan: Recipes and Stories from the Island Nationare available on Now Serving LA, Omnivore Books,Book Larder, and Kitchen Arts. If you haven’t already, consider being a paid subscriber to my newsletter. For now, I’m committing to a minimum of four posts a month (two free, two paid), with the goal of eventually ramping it up to eight posts a month by the end of the year.

In the process of writing my rambling “on convenience,” I realized how much I miss the single-song writeup format (see my nearly 1000 posts in The Music Ninja archives). It’s also the perfect opportunity to exemplify the manual process of discovering music referenced in there. I hope you enjoy these songs and find some cool new outlets/ways of finding music along the way! the song: Nour - “Wana”

Copain is, almost quite literally, a hidden gem. She’s that girl that’s been in every single one of your classes from 4th grade to senior year of high school but some how you’re just now meeting her for the first time at graduation and are hitting it off as best friends (not conveniently, you now have to go separate ways and have to do a long-distance friendship). So you think to yourself, woe to all the years past where we could’ve been bosom buddies, but God’s timing is perfect and at least you’ve got her now!

Happy Father’s Day to all of the other dad dudes out there. In my not-so-humble opinion, you’re setting a fine example for your children by staying informed about your community. Tempers flared late Tuesday evening after the Coppell City Council approved the plans for a fuel station on Kroger’s parking lot. Nerves were likely frayed due to the length of the proceedings. Because the public hearing was preceded by three proclamations and a separate hearing regarding a batteries facility, and because the council asked a LOT of questions during both hearings, the 5-2 vote on the Kroger proposal didn’t happen until 11:30.

Welcome to the weekend! Here’s what you’ll find in today’s newsletter. Cover Story: At the Cleveland restaurant Cordelia, helmed by a James Beard-nominated chef, the convivial kitchen staff serves up a fresh take on Midwestern fare. The Order: Gott’s Roadside in St. Helena, California, is the perfect pit stop for burgers and tacos between Napa Valley wine tastings. Weekend Reading: Chicago’s 20 best cocktails, a dry drinking den in Los Angeles, and a profile of prolific food writer

Total eclipse of the heart? More like total eclipse of the SUN! Anyway, great cosmic event. A+. Would be awed by it again. But now it’s time for the REAL cosmic event! Finally! After years of waiting patiently, you can now use your cold, hard cash to purchase the grand finale of Kaptara in collected form! KAPTARA: UNIVERSAL TRUTHS is in comic shoppes this week! It is glorious and vibrant and chock full of good old fashioned fun!

Is the world real? As American culture continues to fragment and polarize, there seems to be increasing numbers of people who question the reality of reality. Just today, a disturbing episode of On Point aired in which researchers Alex Newhouse and Emily Connelly detailed the way that various extremist online communities cultivate vitriolic hate and nihilism, leading many to the conviction that nothing matters and that nothing is real. There is even a word for social media posts that display this disordered nihilism: schizoposting