Monday Mar 15 6PM Book Party

Written on March 14th, 2010, by admin

Jenny White teaches anthropology at BU, often writing about Turkey. She also writes a series of detective novels set in the declining days of the Ottoman Empire. The books are published throughout the world and the newest book in the series is The Winter Thief.

The book received a rave review from the Washington Post's Maureen Corrigan. Jenny will be reading from the new book and greeting her fans on Monday night, March 15, starting at 6PM, at Toscanini's. 899 Main Street, Centrsl Square, Cambridge, Ma.

By Maureen Corrigan
Monday, March 8, 2010; C03

THE WINTER THIEF

By Jenny White

Norton. 400 pp. $24.95

Jenny White's new historical suspense novel, "The Winter Thief," is set mostly in Istanbul in 1888, but throughout my reading of it I kept thinking of Ken Loach's award-winning 1995 film, "Land and Freedom." Loach's look at the Spanish Civil War focuses on an idealistic young Brit who joins the International Brigades to fight the fascists. I remember seeing the film with a friend who was uncharacteristically silent afterward. Eventually, he shook off his mood to say one thing in response to the story: "I would have been killed." My companion wasn't being self-aggrandizing; in fact, he was probably right. Loach's movie brought home the fact that our lives are pawns to our convictions as they intersect with the whims of the historical moment. That, too, is the message of White's ambitious novel, which is more interested in exploring the unforeseen consequences of political and personal loyalties than it is in fully cranking up the machinery of the standard thriller.

The novel opens on a scene of passionate naivete that, of course, comes to no good end. Vera Arti is a new bride who has defied her wealthy Armenian family and secretly married a communist organizer named Gabriel. On a snowy Christmas Day in Istanbul, Vera makes her way to the office of an Armenian publisher. In her hands is a copy of "The Communist Manifesto," which she implores the publisher to print so that "the Armenian people will find the strength to resist oppression . . . by joining the International Movement, by standing shoulder to shoulder with other oppressed peoples around the world."

Vera has only an elementary understanding of the rhetoric she's spouting. She gravitated toward communism out of compassion for the suffering masses and because of her love for Gabriel. The newlyweds are merely stopping in Istanbul before they journey to a utopian commune called New Concord, situated in an abandoned monastery in the mountains, where some of their comrades have already settled. Unbeknown to Vera, Gabriel has arranged for a contraband cargo of guns to be shipped to the commune. And, oh yes, he also has robbed the Imperial Ottoman Bank of a sultan's ransom in gold and jewels in order to keep the commune afloat. When Vera is nabbed by the secret police after her foolish excursion to the publisher, Gabriel has to decide whether the needs of the many outweigh the needs of his hapless young wife.

Enter Kamil Pasha, the hero of this story, as well as of White's two earlier suspense novels set in 19th-century Turkey. Kamil is a special prosecutor in the secular courts. A moody loner attracted to modern culture, he is drawn into the search for Vera, which puts him at odds with a fiend named Vahid, the head of a rogue branch of the secret police. For vile reasons of his own, Vahid has convinced the sultan that the New Concord commune is allied with a secessionist movement and must be wiped out — along with the neighboring villages. Realizing that a massacre of innocents is in the making, Kamil charges off with a small contingent of soldiers to do battle with Vahid and his forces.

That's just a skimming summary of the busy plot of "The Winter Thief." White, a professor of anthropology who specializes in Turkey, adroitly tosses in period detail as well as romance, political intrigue and brutal battle scenes. But "The Winter Thief" really distinguishes itself by the intelligence of its smaller moments, when characters take stock of their limitations against the larger demands of history.

During the siege at the monastery, for instance, a philosopher-turned-commune-dweller ruefully reflects on how ill-prepared to fight he is. "I'm a philosopher," he tells an admiring young woman. "We collect the cream clotted at the rim of every civilization. We don't need to see it milked and churned." By the end of the novel, Kamil's own modernist self-doubts about his actions in the aftermath of battle become close to crippling: "He had chosen life over honesty, one kind of justice over another, but he knew not everyone would agree that he had chosen well."

Out of the purest of motives — a desire for social equality, a yearning for personal happiness, a wish to share a book with a larger audience — disaster can ensue. That vivid opening image of the ingenuous Vera clasping her incendiary book stays with a reader long after the shooting stops and an uneasy peace has been restored.

Corrigan, the book critic for the NPR program "Fresh Air," teaches a course on detective fiction at Georgetown University.

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Meat, coffee and Fourth Class Postage

Written on March 13th, 2010, by admin

Meatpaper is the coolest magazine in the world. They make Tyler Brule’s expensive Monocle look like the Saturday Evening Post. And part of why they are so cool is they have parties that none of us can attend, usually in the Bay Area but sometimes in Brooklyn. We will never be cool enough to attend these events. In fact we are not even cool enough to receive our subscriptions. Subscriptions plural is correct. I always give away issues of Meatpaper so I have several subscriptions. I got one copy of the new issue but another subcriber didn’t even get her single copy. They do have the best parties.

Here is the latest. And therer will be bacon.

Join Meatpaper and Blue Bottle at the SFMOMA Rooftop Garden to taste two of our favorite things: meat and coffee. Yes, there will be bacon.

Meatpaper and Blue Bottle Coffee are coming together at SFMOMA’s Rooftop Garden café to kick off the museum’s third Thursday springtime event series.

WHAT
An evening of coffee-inspired charcuterie, meat-inspired desserts, and Blue Bottle coffee!

Charcuterie by Morgan Maki of Bi-Rite, Chris Kronner of Bar Tartine, and Staffan Terje of Perbacco and Barbacco

Coffee and desserts by Blue Bottle

    WHERE
    Rooftop Garden & Cafe at SFMOMA
    March 18, 6-8pm

    WHEN
    Thursday, March 18
    6-8pm

    COST
    Event is free with half-price museum entry. Tasting plates $5

    © 2010 MEATPAPER

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Knives, couches, chocolate and burning sugar

Written on March 13th, 2010, by admin

The new issue of Edible Boston is quite handsome. Michael Piazza is the art director. There is a good story and good layout about Adam Simha, who invented Burnt Caramel, knives, furniture and lovingly dissolved chocolate ice cream mixtures. The head shot looks like it belongs to Adam's yet to be released collection of greatest hits, featuring music from Chelsea on Fire and Dead Man's Booty. Other stories feature Chef Will Gilson from The Cellar and naive lambs.

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Our Fearless and Far-flung correspondents

Written on March 13th, 2010, by admin

Marc and Sally continue to roam around the mountains.

Much of our experience in Nepal makes such a strong sensory impression
that five senses seem inadequate. Here are some that defy the
narrative style of a travelog: the intertwined smells of wood smoke,
masala tea spices, and nectar laden flowers; the local dress - most
women dress in a variety of Indian styles, sarees are most popular,
and kurtas - those pajama-like pants-suits, maroon being the most
popular color, while men are uniformly western in button down shirts
and slacks; flip-flops are ubiquitous, but there are plenty of shoes
and sneakers; older men sport those Nehru caps - sort of like the
boyscouts or old fashioned diner workers wore, usually woven in pastel
diamond patterns — younger men wear Yankees caps or go bare-headed
and sport knock-off t-shirts with unintelligible logos; cricket,
volleyball and of course soccer are played by youngsters everywhere;
the giant smiles on these tiny people are infectious - one feels
guilty for not greeting each and every person passed; we are
addressed as mama and maiju (uncle and auntie) by the more respectful
youngsters; some drivers become horn addicts - honking every 100
yards, regardless of the traffic; everyone who can, has a little
convenience store in the front room of the house - might as well try
and sell something while sitting around all day; people walking on the
street make some kind of devotional sign at each shrine passed - which
can be every block; romantic rowers on the lake all conform - women at
the oars, men lazing at the bow; electric power is all the more
precious when you only get a few hours a day; with a little squeezing
it's possible to squish sixteen people, including two giant Americans,
and a chicken or two, into the tiniest jeep made; sterilizing drinking
water with our ultraviolet wand (SteriPEN) seems like a miracle;
two-tone grey and black House Crows rule the urban skies; villagers do
indeed eat the pigeons and build dovecotes in the fields to collect
their guano; swallows zoom in and out of the roadside shops and nest
in the rafters and on the upper shelves; everyone who reads reads the
newspaper; an old man caresses and re-examines his new brass pot
incessantly and shows it off proudly to everyone on the bus; even in
the city, many need to carry water home from the neighborhood tap;
the bus baggage hold is opened at the end of the line and out pops a
family of goats; on the festival day called Holi, kids roam around
plastered head to foot in red powder while young guys at the bus stand
break eggs over each other's heads — we escape with only forehead
smears; Nepali faces vary greatly - some look very Chinese, others are
round-faced Tibetans, most are very Caucasian looking, most are dark,
but not very, much like Latinos; henna-dyed hair is popular, even for
men; most homes are tiny, unheated, often blackened from cooking on
wood fires; Nepali pop music blends Hindi and Chinese styles and is
infectious; Bollywood posters abound and Indian dramas are on every
TV channel; potato chips are popular - one local brand is Shaka Laka
Boom; the bone-jarring buses careen mercilessly round blind mountain
curves, horn blaring, driver on the cellphone while turning the
distorted music up to eleven; a bindi (the Hindu forehead's third
eye) can be a speck, a smear, a red and yellow trident, even a big
blob of crimson rice krispies; bunker-like buildings with tiny slits
for windows emit the rhythmic clacking of dozens of hand-operated
looms; wood-carvers and metal-workers chisel and pound workpieces held
gingerly between their bare feet; on commercial strips the same eight
shops repeat over and over - bangles, booze, snacks, dry goods,
pharmacy, paper goods, cold store, beauty shop, bangles, booze…;
rhododendrons the size of oaks, bananas the size of twinkies;
delicious masala tea available absolutely everywhere in a flash; kids,
kids, kids (40% of nepalis are under 14); I inadvertently step on a
piece of a carrot laying in the street - behind me a boy picks it up
and eats it; tumplines-forehead-mounted carrying straps handle any
load: 50 lbs of firewood, a conical basket of rocks, a dozen caged
chickens, fifty bamboo poles; ten aligned bicycle-carts drive down the
road, carrying a hundred foot long plastic water pipe draped from one
to the next; building a house? no problem piling sand, cement and
rocks right across the sidewalk and blocking a third of the road for
months; the people we meet are fit, if a bit puny, there are few
beggars, most are blind or amputees, no one sleeps in the street; bus
stations are whirlwinds: buses racing thru the lot, cabbies coaxing us
off the bus and into a comfortable ride, samosa stands and tea stalls
cheek-to-jowl scent the air and people rush everywhere; flattened
strips of motor bike tire serve as vertical battens over the gaps
between boards on the occasional wood-sided house and corrugated roofs
are often secured by piling big rocks on them; young men hold hands
walking down the street; country women unabashedly strip down to bathe
at public spigots; and of course, everyone says namaste.

Namaste y'all,
MarcnSally

"Mark Shea" <markwshea@gmail.com>

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morning internet work

Written on March 5th, 2010, by admin

1. An iPhone app for hungry people, from Ace.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/04/foodspotting/

2. Does Starbucks have to refuse service to people with guns? Good photo of armed latte drinkers.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-guns5-2010mar05,0,750921.story

3. Cupcake gentrification, bodegas and fried chicken. And maps!

http://www.ediblegeography.com/

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Milk in a Can

Written on March 4th, 2010, by admin

Sam Mehr is far away in Rochester, NY but sent us a good article about one of our fsvorite ingredients.. From the NYTimes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/03/dining/03milk.html?pagewanted=all

March 3, 2010

Milk in a Can Goes Glam

By JULIA MOSKIN

SWEETENED condensed milk is everywhere. There’s probably a can or two lurking in your cabinets. It is the key to Key lime pie; it brings the sweet to Vietnamese coffee; it went to Rio for Carnaval last month in the shape of brigadeiros, bite-size balls of milk fudge that are a Brazilian national treat.

But Victoria Belanger, a photographer also known as the Jello Mold Mistress of Brooklyn, may have a unique relationship with the stuff.

“Sweetened condensed milk solved a lot of problems for me,” said Ms. Belanger, who brings her professional understanding of light and color to an ongoing jellied-desserts experiment. “Now I can make opaque layers that set off the clear, bright-colored ones.”

Every few weeks, Ms. Belanger fills a few of her 30 molds — in shapes like fish, roses and starfish — with a mixture of condensed milk and gelatin. She’s drawn to imported and self-created flavors, like mango or crème caramel or milk chocolate-macadamia nut. She unmolds the shapes, photographs them while they still have their satiny sheen, then feeds them to pals and neighbors. “The condensed milk makes it more like a pudding, more satisfying for people,” she said. “I tried Cool Whip and vanilla ice cream, but only condensed milk got it really smooth.”

Sweetened condensed milk and its unsweetened cousin, evaporated milk, have never been in favor with food snobs. “Originally, these were marketed as nutritional solutions, not luxury ingredients,” said Anne Mendelson, a food historian and the author of “Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages.” Fresh milk and cream have always been preferred by American consumers, she said, with the shelf-stable products seen as inferior, if useful, substitutes.

“It was probably frowned on because it comes in a can,” said Alex Stupak, the pastry chef at WD-50 on the Lower East Side, who has made frozen “Oreo” centers, doughnut fillings and even a tart-sweet mayonnaise from sweetened condensed milk. “It’s a righteous emulsifier,” he said. At Momofuku Milk Bar, the chef Christina Tosi uses it to smooth soft-serve ice creams like peaches-and-cream and cherries jubilee.

And as more American home cooks with roots in Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean chime into the national culinary conversation, condensed milk is getting a lot of love. “Just try telling anyone from Latin America that canned milk isn’t real milk,” Ms. Mendelson said. “You’ll have a fight on your hands.”

In the Philippines, it is drizzled onto halo-halo, the popular dessert of shaved ice, coconut and a riot of toppings; in Jamaica, it’s mixed with stout, sherry and nutmeg to make a robust cream punch. Hong Kong-style “French toast,” served at cafes there, is toasted white bread glazed with condensed milk and peanut butter; it is a key ingredient in Thai iced tea and in Vietnamese coffee; and Brazilian cooks whip it with avocado to make gorgeous pale-green desserts like pudim de abacate.

In regions like these, where dairy-making might be difficult, expensive or untraditional, the stability and reliable sweetness of condensed milk has earned it a lot of fans. “It is hard to explain the relationship people have with it in Latin America,” said Leticia Moreinos Schwartz, a cooking teacher in Connecticut who grew up in Rio de Janeiro. “Leite moça came when life was hard and there were not many treats,” she said, using the generic Brazilian term that means “milk of the lady,” a reference to the Swiss milkmaid on cans of Nestlé condensed milk, introduced to Brazil in 1921.

It is one of the three milks in Mexican tres leches cake, and can be caramelized right in the can to make dulce de leche. (Put the can in a pot and boil for three hours; keep the can covered with boiling water or it will overheat and may explode.)

Sweetened condensed milk came on the United States market in 1856, the brainchild of Gail Borden, a chronic culinary inventor. (He had already patented a prototype of a complete nutrition bar, which he called a “meat biscuit.”) Mr. Borden began experimenting with sterilized milk after a series of “swill milk” scandals that revealed the true contents of much of the milk then for sale in American cities: chalk powder, molasses and vermin.

His process — a combination of vacuum pressure, heat and added sugar — produced a dairy product that is nearly indestructible, with a shelf life of years. Mr. Borden made his fortune supplying condensed milk to the Union Army in the Civil War. It was airlifted into Berlin in the 1940s, and more recently has opened up Asia as a major market for American milk.

“We grow up with it,” said Kathy Wong, an owner of Laut restaurant, one of few places in New York that serves real Malaysian pulled tea, or teh tarik. It is a thick brew of strong tea — preferably Boh brand, grown in the cool Cameron Highlands north of Kuala Lumpur — and condensed milk. (Fresh-squeezed ginger juice can be added to make teh halia, reminiscent of Indian chai.) The mixture is poured vigorously back and forth from one pot to another: this is the “pulling” process, which makes the drink smooth and gives it a frothy top. “The higher the pour, the thicker the top,” said her partner Camie Lai, who said that hawkers compete for customers by pulling the tea behind their backs, or from ever-greater heights. Among those who see cooking as an ongoing science experiment or craft project, condensed milk can do the work of milk, sugar and eggs combined — and can often stand in for all three.

Jessica P Lin, who has a blog, epicuriouseateries.blogspot.com, where she posts recipes and restaurant reviews, long tinkered with recipes for ice cream that wouldn’t require an ice cream maker. “At the time, I was a culinary student, but all I had at home was a $10 hand mixer,” said Ms. Lin, who grew up in Dallas and now lives in New York. She has often visited Taiwan, where her parents were born, and where condensed milk is a popular topping for dessert, or bread.

Ms. Lin said that she finally hit on the idea of whipping condensed milk, which she always keeps on hand, into heavy cream. “I was basically trying to be lazy and avoid making an egg custard,” she said. The result takes just a few minutes to get into the freezer.

Condensed milk has a very different chemical profile than fresh, and behaves accordingly. It will not curdle in the presence of acid, like regular milk would (that’s why it’s used for Key lime pie). The sugar crystals in condensed milk will not clump together and harden (this is called seizing), making it useful for candies like fudge.

“All candy-making is about preventing crystallization,” said Michael Chu, an engineer based in Austin, Tex., who writes about his kitchen experiments online at Cooking for Engineers. Mr. Chu’s chocolate fudge recipe, which he calls “absurdly easy,” has the pleasantly cakey, almost sandy texture desirable in fudge, which can be tricky to achieve using milk and butter. He uses condensed milk to reduce the ingredients in the fudge to a mere three (salt is optional), and to eliminate the dreaded step of cooking the sugar syrup to the soft-ball stage. “The manufacturing process has already done that work for you,” he said.

Fudge made from condensed milk is the base for brigadeiros, bite-size sweets served in paper frills and covered with sprinkles. “Brigadeiros are like the cupcakes of Brazil,” Ms. Moreinos Schwartz said. “They are at every birthday party.” (They are named for a once-popular politician, Brigadier Eduardo Gomes, who ran for president in 1945 under the slogan “Vote no brigadeiro, que é bonito e é solteiro” — “Vote for the brigadier, who’s good-looking and single.”)

Once, Ms. Moreinos Schwartz said, it would have been odd to serve brigadeiros at a grown-up dinner party — “it would have been a French chocolate mousse instead” — but now Brazilian cooks like her are embracing their own traditions. In her new book, “The Brazilian Kitchen,” she has transformed the classic, tooth-aching recipe with unsweetened coconut, pistachio paste and real chocolate sprinkles. “Now when I go home, the brigadeiros taste too sweet,” she said ruefully. “I’m like, guys, come on! You’re killing the fudge!”

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therapeutic ice cream

Written on March 4th, 2010, by admin

Marc Abrahams runs the once-a-year Ig Nobel Awards at Harvard, but like bread bakers and the US Air Force he also works while we're asleep, so we can sleep. Here is an article he has found about ice cream as part of a therapy for cancer patients. Mark also edits the Annals of Improbable Resesrch at
www.improbable.com

http://www.the-scientist.com/2010/3/1/24/1/#ixzz0h8FhEuog The Scientist
Volume 24 | Issue 3 | Page 24

By Katherine Bagley

In the fall of 2009, a group of New Zealand scientists were putting the finishing touches on a new therapeutic to help cancer patients recover from chemotherapy, in preparation for a clinical trial. All they had left to do was choose a flavor.

“It was no easy task,” says Arie Geursen, general manager of LactoPharma, the entity developing the therapeutic, presented in the form of an ice cream. “Everyone has their favorites. We were already leaning toward strawberry since one of the bioactive agents was tinting the ice cream pink… But the decision really came down to who won the taste tests. Strawberry came out on top.”

Development of the ice cream, named ReCharge, began 8 years ago with the formation of LactoPharma, a collaborative research venture between the University of Auckland, the New Zealand government, and the country’s largest dairy company, Fonterra Ltd.
antimicrobial, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory properties, and in the past decade, scientists have begun to identify the molecular components driving these reactions. LactoPharma was created with the goal of trying to incorporate milk’s protective mechanisms into food, health supplements, and pharmaceuticals.

One protein in particular, lactoferrin, has been shown to inhibit tumor growth, promote intestinal cell growth, and regulate immune response in the intestine (Biochem Cell Biol, 89:95–102, 2002). The scientists reasoned it could therefore help patients receiving chemotherapy, which can damage normal cells that multiply quickly, such as infection-fighting white blood cells, known as neutrophils, and intestinal cells. A lack of neutrophils exposes cancer patients to a high risk of infection, while the destruction of intestinal cells can lead to digestive problems, such as diarrhea and poor nutrient uptake. Geoff Krissansen, a molecular biologist at the University of Auckland, and colleagues began testing whether bovine lactoferrin and other dairy components could reduce these side effects of chemotherapy.

Indeed, when fed to mice 2 weeks prior to chemotherapy, bovine lactoferrin helped increase immunoresponsive cytokines in the intestine, decreasing cell damage caused by chemo, and restored both red blood cell and neutrophil numbers (Immunol Cell Biol, 86:277–88, 2008). The researchers also found that another bioactive component present naturally in milk—a type of “lipid fraction,” according to Krissansen—demonstrated similar results in mice. The scientists expect to publish these results in 2010.

“Since lactoferrin has been shown to help restore immune response, it makes sense to incorporate it into a therapy for chemo side effects, which can cause immunosuppression,” says Marian Kruzel, a biologist at the University of Texas Medical School in Houston, who was not involved with ReCharge. “But the dosing levels are very important; too much of it and its immune-regulating effects may be negated.”

To figure out how to deliver these milk ingredients to patients, Krissansen and LactoPharma looked to Kate Palmano at the Fonterra Research Center. “We needed to formulate a product that was acceptable and palatable to patients, but that was also suitable for the bioactives,” says Palmano. They had to avoid anything that would require high temperatures during production, she explains, since the heat could change the protein structure and the bioactives’ functions.

Palmano considered incorporating the bioactives into a liquid drink or yogurt, but in the end, ice cream won out. “Creating a frozen product meant we didn’t have to worry about the bioactives’ shelf life,” she says. “Plus, people going through chemotherapy typically lose their appetite. Why not give them a treat like ice cream?”

The scientists worked with New Zealand’s top ice cream manufacturers to create six tons of strawberry-flavored ReCharge. They then made a placebo ice cream with the same taste, color, and calorie count. ReCharge started its Phase II clinical trial in October 2009, in which 200 prechemotherapy cancer patients will be required to eat 100 grams of either ReCharge or the placebo ice cream each day.

“It has been a wonderful ride creating this product,” says Geursen. “We don’t know if ReCharge will work—it is always a challenge going from mice to humans—but we are keeping our fingers crossed.”

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friends and neighbors

Written on March 4th, 2010, by admin

The Improper Bostonian has taken time off from covering Boston's best bartenders and best hairdressers. On page 14 of the he new issue there is a sweet story about Thalia Large's The Rapture, which is her most recent breakfast creation. Thalia was our first chef for Breakfast@TheBigTable and now cooks in East Boston at Scup's. Scup's has the city's best view of downtown Boston. The neighborhood is fine, but the location was once the East Boston Navy Yard When the sun is not shining you can feel like you're in an episode of the old Naked City television drama, specifically the first minutes when someone finds a body floating in the drydock.

On page 28 Tony Maws from Craigie on Main is eating at Coppa in the South End. On menus the trend is to replace cupcakes with doughnuts. . What will supplant pork? Some predict rabbit.

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Purim food fight at MIT

Written on March 4th, 2010, by admin

Boston Weather: 36.0°F | Overcast

Volume 130 >> Issue 8 : Friday, February 26, 2010

PDF of This Issue

The Tech is MIT's newspaper and if you don't read it you will miss stories like this hysterical argument about latkes versus hamentashen.

http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N8/latkehamentashendebate.html

Faculty fling fake facts in food fight

Professors talk latkes and
hamentashen

By Yuanyu Chen

STAFF REPORTER

February 26, 2010

Latkes or Hamentashen? That was the question this past Wednesday as students, faculty, and staff packed into 26-100 in anticipation of MIT Hillel’s annual Latkes vs. Hamentashen debate. Six professors fought it out, arguing for the ultimate Jewish food product: the latke (a fried potato pancake eaten during Hanukkah) or the hamentash (a three-sided filled cookie eaten during Purim).

Professor Keith A. Nelson of the Chemistry Department, the moderator, opened the night by showing how latkes and hamentashen influence MIT, both in research and buildings. Keith claimed that both latkes and hamentashen inspired architect Frank O. Gehry, who designed the Stata Center. “Gehry used the shapes of the latke and the hamentash in the design of the Stata Center,” he said.

Representing the latke were Amy Smith ’84 of D-Lab, Professor Barbara Imperiali of the Chemistry Department, and Dr. Erika B. Wagner ’02 of the X-Prize Lab. On the other side of the room, representing the hamentash were Department Head Eric E. Grimson of EECS, Assistant Professor Marta C. González of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Department Head Michael Sipser of Mathematics. Each professor was allowed seven minutes to present why his or her treat was superior to the other. After each presentation, the opposing team was allowed a 90-second rebuttal.

In order to decide which team would have the choice to go first, the audience had a chanting battle. The right section of the audience yelled “hamentash” while the left section screamed “latke.” The middle section of the audience was asked to decide which side was louder — the latke won. Team Latke chose to go second.

Grimson presented first, giving the audience a history lesson about the pastries. He presented photos of British and colonial hats from the 18th century, noting that the colonial tricorn hats were remarkably similar to hamentashen, and the British hats were like latkes. He said that hamentashen resemble golden triangles, and can be used to construct a perfect pentagram, which many religions believe have the power to protect against evil. Grimson criticized latkes for being circular, comparing them to the Golden Circle, a popular tourist route in Iceland. He pointed out that because Iceland is a bankrupt and cold country, latkes are not powerful.

He also examined the economic impact of hamentash and latke consumption and determined that hamentash are better for global economies while latkes destroy national economies. He argued that a latke is similar to mashed McDonald’s french fries, which are made of only one type of potato. The last time an economy depended on one type of potato, the irish potato famine happened, crippling Ireland’s economy. The hamentash, on the other hand, uses a variety of ingredients produced by various countries all over the world.

In response to Grimson, Smith revived the image of the latke by presenting the triple bottom line for measuring success: prosperity, planet, and potatoes. She demonstrated how the triple bottom line explains why the latke is superior for a sustainable world. She added that 2008 was the U.N. Year of the Potato, whereas not once has a hamentash filling had its own year.

For Team Latke, Wagner convinced the audience that, because potatoes can be brought to space, latkes make great zero-gravity meals. On the other hand, because “safety in space requires no sharp edges,” hamentashen are useless — even dangerous — in space.

Sipser wrapped things up for Team Hamentash with the HamenTheorem, which proves by contradiction that the hamentash is better than the latke. First, the proof assumes latkes are best. Then by obviousness, he claimed that hamentashen are better than nothing, and by first assumption, claimed that nothing is better than latkes. Therefore, Sipser argued that the HamenTheorem proved that hamentashen are better than latkes.

Imperiali used the rules of organic chemistry to criticize hamentashen. She said that the triangle structure of the hamentash is “unreliable, unstable, and duplicitous” because is like a three-membered ring. She then concluded her presentation with a question to the audience: “Everyone may tell you that a triangle is perfect, but what happens when that triangle isn’t a triangle anymore?”

Team Hamentash made the first rebuttal, quickly countering Team Latke’s arguments with ones such as “the Challenger disaster was caused by an O-ring and not a hamentash ring.” Instead of a traditional rebuttal, Team Latke presented a photo of the Latke-Hamentash fold, a protein which, when rotated, had 3 triangular sections surrounded by 3 circular sections, symbolizing latkes and hamentashen coexisting in harmony.

The debate, as always, ended in a tie, allowing for another debate next year.

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The Awl website chases Starucks around the block.

Written on March 3rd, 2010, by admin

http://www.theawl.com/2010/03/the-coffee-wars-will-not-end-until-america-is-a-shaking-heap-of-overstimulation

March 2, 2010

The Awl website goes after Starbucks for introducing a bigger iced coffee cup. If youve been to Texas you’ve seen drink cups of every kind that are so big a county could irrigate its farms with contents, whether those contents were frozen Coca Cola, RC Cola or iced tea. Some of the cups are so big they could double as water towers for towns in the Panhandle..

This new size is another opportunity for Starbucks to inflict more fractured Italian on America. The new cup is called the “trenta” which is close to thirty, but if the cup is 32 ounces maybe it should be called the trenta due but with Starbucks you never know. Piadini might be the plural for the Italian word “piadina”, but Starbucks uses it to describe one breskfast sandwich. In Italian two piadina would become due piadine. God knows what Vivanno mean? Was that the Italian translation of Vivan Vance’s name on the Lucy Show.

The Coffee Wars Will Not End Until America Is A Shaking Heap Of Overstimulation
by Maura Johnston posted @9:30 AM

if only more baristas were this cheery at 7 amIn hopes of recapturing the "bigger is always better" spirit of the previous decade, Starbucks has reportedly been test-marketing a new cup size that allows customers to guzzle 32 ounces of its iced beverages in one fell swoop. Called the "Trenta," it could provide the caffeine-needy with more than enough caffeine to power through their increasingly stressful days, or at least an hour or two of them.

The Trenta is named after a town in southern Italy that sorta rhymes with "Venti". It's being test-marketed in the Phoenix area right now, which unfortunately precludes me from running out to get one. (Too bad — I was hoping to later turn the cup into a hat.) From this photo, the cup looks to be taller and more stout than the Venti while retaining the ever-crucial trait of being able to fit in cars' cup holders:

Some have noted that Starbucks is merely trying to catch up to Dunkin' Donuts, which has a 32-ounce "large" size for all its iced coffee beverages, including its super-milky lattes and cloyingly sweet Coolattas. Does this mean that we'll be bombarded with paparazzi photos of starlets clutching Frappucinos that outgirth their femurs?. No*, say anonymous commenters who claim the mantle of "insiders" on Jim Romenesko's Starbucks Gossip. Apparently in a nod to these more serious times, Starbucks will practice some comparative restraint and allow only your basic iced coffees and iced teas to be poured into Trenta cups — no ginormous iced lattes or super-sized Frappucinos will cross the baristas' threshold. The over/under on how long after national roll-out this "no milky, whipped-creamy drinks" edict will last has to be less than two months, right? Especially since the competition is currently flaunting waffle-sausage-egg-and-cheese monstrosities for those people whose inability to decide what to have for breakfast results in them wanting it all.

* That's "no" in Italian. House style and all.

Posted via email from Toscanini’s Ice Cream