I Made My Shed the Top Rated Restaurant On TripAdvisor: Once upon a time, long before I began selling my face by the acre for features on VICE dot com, I worked other jobs. There was one in particular that really had an impact on me: writing fake reviews on TripAdvisor. Restaurant owners would pay me £10 and I'd write a positive review of their place, despite never eating there. Over time, I became obsessed with monitoring the ratings of these businesses. Their fortunes would genuinely turn, and I was the catalyst. A Restaurant Ruined My Life: Seven years ago, I was an analyst for Telefilm Canada, earning a paycheque by sitting in a grey cube and shuffling box office stats. At the end of each day, I would rush home to my wife, two daughters and truest passion: making dinner. The sights and smells of my kitchen were balms to my soul. Vladimir Mukhin offers Japan a culinary reminder that Russia is just next door: Chef Vladimir Mukhin is spearheading a culinary revolution in … [Read more...]
Richard Ekkebus and the Amber philosophy to eliminate plastic from the restaurant
Chefs today can be activists promoting causes which are important for society. Richard Ekkebus, chef of restaurant Amber at the Landmark Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong is conscious of the importance of giving back to society and has made it his philosophy to try and improve things. Ekkebus is on a mission to try and remove plastic waste from the restaurant. And it is something that he and his team monitor on a weekly basis. “In Hong Kong, we live in a city with over consumption and we have a huge problem when it comes to landfills and pollution. There are things that we can do to fight this. We have been thinking about ways to eliminate plastic within our operations. It is not just a question of limiting food waste but also of limiting packaging because we are only now realising that plastic is coming back into the food chain after 100 years of industrial and household use of plastic,” he told Food and Wine Gazette in an interview. Plastic is everywhere from the packaging to … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #126
Is being a chef bad for your mental health? In October last year Andrew Clarke, head chef of the much-admired Brunswick House restaurant in Vauxhall, London, posted a picture of himself to Instagram. It’s in black and white. He is sitting at a table against a wall of distressed plaster, his straggly hair unsuccessfully tucked away beneath a ragged beanie hat, tattooed arms on show. In his hand is a teacup and before him, a bottle of spirits, the implication being that the contents of one are filling the other. It could have been the moody cover to one of the albums Clarke thought he would release when he was pursuing his first love, music. A culinary cruise from Dublin to Lisbon: super markets and caramel bottoms: To the opening chords of Hotel California, Calvin the Indian accommodation director walks onto the brightly lit stage. Then comes the ship’s Filipino doctor, to Bad Case of Loving You. The Ukrainian chief engineer joins them, somewhat disconcertingly, to the theme tune … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #125
Why mushrooms may be the best food to fight aging: New research reveals that mushrooms are “without a doubt” the highest known single source of the antioxidants ergothioneine and glutathione, which are both associated with anti-aging properties. A team of researchers from Pennsylvania State University found that mushrooms are surprisingly full of both compounds, and that some of the 13 species they tested contained vastly higher levels than others. Common white button mushrooms, for instance, had low levels of the two antioxidants compared to some other mushrooms but still higher levels than your average non-mushroom food. The winner “by far” was the wild porcini mushroom, which is convenient since it’s also delicious. And even though some foods lose their health benefits when you cook them, the antioxidants in the mushrooms appear heat-stable and thus unaffected. The research was recently published in the journal Food Chemistry. Jeremiah Tower Is Done With These Gimmicky Food … [Read more...]
Gert de Mangeleer Unplugged, a collection of recipes to share in English released
Gert de Mangeleer, chef of three Michelin star restaurant Hertog Jan in Zedelgem, Bruges has just released his collection of recipes to share in a book called Unplugged in English. Originally published in Flemish, the book is now also available in English. “This is the first book in which I collected many of my favourite recipes. I never was really into sharing my recipes until now because my style of cooking evolves too much for that. Nor did I want to give people the impression that they could easily recreate the dishes we serve at Hertog Jan at home. Because they can’t. I cannot even do the things I do in my restaurant at home, because I neither have the kitchen equipment nor the team for it,” he says in the introduction to the book. Instead the book is accessible and presents a series of the tastiest dishes the Belgian chef has prepared for his family and friends in recent years. He says he gets inspiration for his dishes everywhere he goes and that is very visible in the … [Read more...]
Food on the Edge and reinventing the food congress
Could Food on The Edge 2017 be the final nail in the coffin of the ‘Food Congress’ as we know it? If so, it’s about time. Because for 20 years the format – or should we say the frame – has always been the same. An auto-promotional, showing off, a dully TV-oriented gig on a stage starring the usual mix of techniques and dishes. A predictable playlist of chefs vogueing, making it up (to measure) for an audience of sponsors and wannabes. The Berlin Wall has fallen down, long gone are the days of Lo Mejor de la Gastronomia in the Basque Country. But something has happened since then. When the Mad Food Camp took off in 2010 a page was turned. No more mimicking with knives and forks, no more joggling with pots and pans, there you go: speak your heart out and make sense of yourself. Even make a fool of yourself. At its best, when it kept the usual big, boring names and old French farts at bay, MAD opened new doors, setting new standards, reconciling deep thoughts and emotions. And that’s … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #124
The Thrill of Losing Money by Investing in a Manhattan Restaurant: If you live in New York City long enough and appear to be successfully employed in an industry that Bernie Sanders dislikes, you will be asked at some point to do three things: sponsor a table at a vanity fund-raiser, become a “producer” of a Broadway play, and invest in a restaurant. I had no trouble declining the honor of hosting a benefit or helping “Hedda Gabler” back to the stage. Nuns open restaurant offering free food in London – named ‘Nundos’: An order of nuns has opened a restaurant in East London offering free food, named “Nundos”. Sisters from the Daughters of Divine Charity opened the temporary – or “pop-up” – restaurant in Shoreditch on Tuesday offering “food for the soul”, such as chicken soup and lentil broth, free of charge. John Besh restaurants fostered culture of sexual harassment, 25 women say: Madie Robison said she was done with the uninvited touching from a male colleague, the comments about … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #123
The Politics Of Pizza: How Italy's Flag And Food Are Deliciously Intertwined: A nation's flag embodies a defining aspect of its identity. It could be related to geography (the rising sun in Japan), nature (the maple leaf of Canada or the cedar of Lebanon), religion (the Christian cross or the Islamic crescent and star), political ideology (the hammer and sickle) or mythology (the Welsh dragon). In a new book on flags, A Flag Worth Dying For: The Power and Politics of National Symbols, Tim Marshall explores how a "piece of colored cloth" can arouse profound emotions of loyalty, love and pride in the breasts of its citizens. Celebrate Autumn’s Harvest with Food Tank’s Fall Reading List: For fall, Food Tank has compiled a list of 17 books we hope will educate, inform, and inspire. As the weather cools and we turn to more savory foods, learn about the history of butter, duck season in France, and the life of Patience Gray, the visionary behind the modern slow food culture. For … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #122
NY restaurants - under threat? Des Gunewardena, the chairman of D&D Restaurants (the old Conran group), was in even more ebullient form than usual when I bumped into him recently over lunch in the newly opened second branch of Blacklock in the City of London. His mood, he explained, was primarily due to the fact that he had recently returned from New York. 'They may have Trump', he observed, 'but the city is so confident and positive that they set an example to us all.' With that, he moved on to enjoy some well-grilled meat with his long-standing lawyer. José Andrés and World Central Kitchen Have Served 130,000 People in Puerto Rico: José Andrés and team have surpassed the 100,000 meal mark. Over a week since arriving in Puerto Rico to help those affected by Hurricane Maria, Andrés and his nonprofit World Central Kitchen have served a total of 130,000 meals out of mobile kitchens, restaurants, food trucks, and the Coliseo de Puerto Rico, the island’s largest arena — smashing a … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #121
José Andrés, a naturalized U.S. citizen, has become the face of American disaster relief: Unlike the president, Homeland Security or the Federal Emergency Management Agency, José Andrés has no responsibility to respond to natural disasters, and yet the Washington celebrity chef has become a reliable presence in disaster zones, deploying his Chef Network to help feed thousands of displaced people. Andrés was among the first responders in Haiti and Houston, and now he and his crew from World Central Kitchen are on the ground in Puerto Rico, improvising ways to feed countless residents who are stranded without electricity, drinking water and food in the wake of Hurricane Maria. With little ability to speak with the outside world, Andrés has used his Twitter feed to keep followers updated on his progress in the U.S. territory. A Battle to Save the World’s Favorite Treat: Chocolate: The trees of the International Cacao Collection grow here in an astonishing diversity of forms, … [Read more...]