Delicious

The Eastern and Oriental Cookbook by Will Ricker

Pan-Asian cuisine at its best.

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The curious made extraordinary

All Visual Arts presents The Age of the Marvellous

Inspired by the Wunderkammer, or Cabinet of Curiosities, popular in the late Renaissance through the Baroque period (ca. 1550–ca. 1700). An era characterized by a revival of learning, the sum of all of man’s knowledge could be represented in rooms filled with natural wonders, artificial exotica and relics or art works concerned with the supernatural.

The Wunderkammer‘s particular ability to evoke the marvellous, to incite the emotions of awe, wonder, surprise and astonishment leading to curiosity and then learning was based on its ability to draw parallels and unify seemingly unrelated fields of human knowledge like Science and Art. The brilliant evolutionary biologist E.O. Wilson considered the unification of knowledge – or what he labeled ‘Consilience’ in his eponymous book published in 1998 - nothing short of imperative for the survival of the human species.



Adam Fuss’s photograms
Alastair Mackie's Metamorphoses




Polly Morgan's At the Beginning, inspired by a Victorian proposal for a flying machine.




Kate MccGwire's sculptural works made from crow and jackdaw feathers.



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Crisp autumn mornings

Naturally lead to thoughts of spring. For once I intend to get a head start, at least in the garden.



Daffodil Ice Follies
Daffodil Pheasant's Eye
Snowdrop S. Arnott
Musk hyacinth Muscari muscarimi






Camellia japonica Lavinia Maggi
Camellia hybrid Cornish Snow
Camellia japonica Charlotte de Rothschild
Camellia hiemalis Bonanza

And, a little wisdom from Dame Marjorie Maude Chardin -



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From the sublime to the serious, via the ridiculous

The sublime -



Luis Barragan's Los Clubes (Mexico City, Mexico)


The ridiculous -



John Waters's Pink Flamingos (1972)



The serious -

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month via Mrs. Blandings.

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In no need of chintz to distract the eye

A Diego Giacometti table sits comfortably with Georgian pieces.



In a guest room, a pair of chairs from the Edward James sale in their original Severini fabric.


The house which was used for What's wrong in this picture? appeared in the June issue of The World of Interiors. In fact it is Woolbeding House, a restored pile dating from the 1720s in West Sussex, home to the late cultural benefactor, Simon Sainsbury.

I was so taken with the individual pieces (and there are some incredible pieces ranging from Chippendale to Giacometti) I failed to take in the whole. The comments left by Mamacita and Hello Gorgeous gave me pause for thought. It never occurred to me that the room itself would not be well received. After all, it does have that typically English country house look which is usually so popular.

In spite of its fine architecture, it is not a pretty house or rather it has not been prettily done. Though, it does appear comfortable and inviting; which, from a cultural perspective especially, has always taken precedence. There is, however, an uncommon sense of connoisseurship in the understated English Georgian furniture and British pictures that is atypical of the English country house look.


Simon Sainsbury built the collection to furnish and complement Woolbeding House, which was leased from the National Trust. It was this and his personal taste that formed the nature of the collection.


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You mean all this time we could have been friends?

The Providores & Tapa Room, London

Peter Gordon and his Marlybone restaurant, The Providores & Tapa Room, represent the best of fusion cuisine. Until then, for me at least, it was nothing more than an unpalatable and ridiculous idea.

One of my favourite dishes was his mashed sweet potatoes with miso and wasabi, served with escargots. Sadly no longer on the menu, but not impossible to make.


2 Sweet potato - peeled and roasted then pureed

Blend:

Yellow miso paste, about a teaspoon and a bit
Tamari, a couple of good dashes
Wasabi paste, a dollop
Mirin, a teaspoon
Sake, single shot

Warm the rinsed escargots in the blended ingredients and add to the still warm pureed sweet potato. Simple.




Peter Gordon: A World in My Kitchen

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Van Morrison, Astral Weeks Live At The Hollywood Bowl: The Concert Film

First yellow, then pink, and finally black

The historically important Das Triadische Ballett by Oskar Schlemmer (1888-1943) premiered in 1922. During Schlemmer's tenure at the Bauhaus, 1921-1929, the ballet became a symbol of the new school's ethos.










If today's arts love the machine, technology and organization, if they aspire to precision and reject anything vague and dreamy, this implies an instinctive repudiation of chaos and a longing to find the form appropriate to our times. - Oskar Schlemmer



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World view

World map from the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum by Abraham Ortelius.




Typus Orbis Terrarum, twelve 19th century hand painted large ceramic glazed tiles after Abraham Ortelius. Each tile measures 25cm X 25cm.


Abraham Ortelius (1527 – 1598), the Flemish cartographer and geographer, is generally recognised as the creator of the first modern atlas.


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Preaching to the choir

In the matter of furnishing, I find a certain absence of ugliness far worse than ugliness. - Sidonie Gabrielle Colette

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With summer on its way

It's not too early to start planning for cold dishes. If I may suggest one of our favourites Vitello Tonnato, chilled veal with a tuna sauce. It is one of the Italian summer classics.

Delia Smith has a new recipe for it on line.


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Now playing: Simple Minds - Someone Somewhere In Summertime
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Dirty pansies

Heartsease


Viola Sorbet Antique Shades




Viola Bowles Black (t)
Viola Molly Sanderson (b)


Viola, call the gardener.

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White, yellow, and green

Pavlova from la.foodblogging

Ingredients:

6 egg whites
a pinch of cream of tartar
superfine sugar
dash of white wine vinegar

whipping cream
vanilla essence
the pulp of 4 passionfruit
sliced kiwi fruit
sliced star fruit

Visit la.foodblogging for method and a more exact recipe.


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Shell collecting, literally

Digitate Thorny Oyster - Spondylus ictericus (Reeve, 1856)



Atlantic Thorny Oyster - Spondylus americanus (Hermann, 1781)



Regal Thorny Oyster - Spondylus regius (Linnaeus, 1758)


Jacksonville Shells



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I'm thinking...

Molly Wizenberg's Classic Cheese Soufflé based on a version from The Way to Cook by Julia Child. Not nearly as daunting as one would think. Basically, nothing more that a flashy omelet.

Finely grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup whole milk
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons unbleached all purpose flour
Pinch of cayenne
Bay leaf (remove just after milk has heated through)
1/2 teaspoon salt
Pinch of ground nutmeg
4 large egg yolks
6 large egg whites
1 cup (packed) coarsely grated Gruyère cheese (about 4 ounces)

Visit Epicurious for method.

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Duality

What Do You Want From Me?, Claude Cahun (1928)





Claude Cahun (1894–1954) the French surrealist artist, photographer and writer. Born Lucy Renee Mathilde Schwob, she was the niece of writer Marcel Schwob and the great-niece of Orientalist David Léon Cahun. She was raised by her maternal grandmother, Mathilde Cahun.

Cahun began taking photographic self-portraits as early as 1912, when she was merely 18 years old, and continued doing so through the 1930s. Her work, which was both political and personal, questioned the accepted notions of sexuality, gender, beauty, and logic. She collaborated with her stepsister and lover Suzanne Malherbe, who had adopted the pseudonym Marcel Moore.

In 1937 she and Moore fled France and settled in the Bay of St Brelade on Jersey. Forever the radical activists, they carried out acts of resistance against the occupying German force. In 1944 Cahun was arrested and condemned to death, but the island was liberated before the sentence could be carried out. She died on Jersey 10 years later.


Further reading:

Disavowals: or Cancelled Confessions by Claude Cahun
Don't Kiss Me by Claude Cahun, Marcel Moore


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It's just flowers (the fresh is redundant)

A large shallow glass cylinder lined with moss and planted with fritillaria (at least a dozen or so) makes for a very smart arrangement.





Fritillaria meleagris




A more casual approach from Martha Stewart using Fritillarias and Epimediums (native orchids) in vintage chemistry measures.


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Jam don't shake like that

The work of Bompas & Parr, fine English jelly specialists.



Jelly Mould No.227 ( England c. 1870 )



Jelly Mould No.365 ( England c. 1880 )



Jelly Mould No. 240 ( England c. 1870 )




From Jelly and Moulded Foods course by Historic Food


A Victorian variation on ribband jelly known as Russian Jelly or Panachee Jelly. It has been made in a nineteenth century succès mould and the opacue effect achieved by whipping the jelly to a froth . Each layer had to set, before the next was poured in.


This jelly was made from an Alexandra Cross mould with an inner lining that allows a white cross to be cast all the way through, like the wording in a stick of rock. The cross represents the Danish flag. Edward, who became king of England when his mother Queen Victoria died in 1901, married Princess Alexandra of Denmark in 1853. The Alexandra Cross mould was registered that year. - Ivan Day, Historic Food

Listen to Chef Claire Bassano and food historian Ivan Day discuss the merits and the history of the much overlooked dessert.



Nigella Lawson's Rhubarb and Muscat Jelly

Tyler Florence's Muscat Jelly with Blackberries

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Cheap and easy

That is, until one adds Bellwether crème fraiche from Dean & Deluca and Sevruga caviar. At least it still is easy - and still cheap, if the many possible substitutes are used.



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Cheap and easy

That is, until one adds Bellwether crème fraiche from Dean & Deluca and Sevruga caviar. At least it still is easy - and still cheap, if the many possible substitutes are used.



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Now playing on iTunes: Simply Red - Money's Too Tight (To Mention)
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