December 22nd, 2006
Growing up I never really cared for celery. I mean, true, it had valuable non-dietary fiber and served as a useful peanut butter container, but flavor? Not really there, I thought. My opinion began changing last year, when we subscribed to Boston Organics in Somerville and I got a taste of organic celery. Everything I had heard about celery was finally revealed to be true: peppery, somewhat lemony, incredibly fresh tasting — like celariac’s more assetive cousin. I have been fully converted, though I have to say that non-organic celery still remains the same insipid stuff destined for mirepoix.
October 18th, 2006
The NY Times has an article detailing the aftermath of Jamie Oliver’s attempt to make British school food more healthy. N and I had seen a segment of his bizarre reality TV show
months and months ago. Essentially, he was given access to a Cardiff (maybe London? I can’t quite recall the people’s accents) middle school kitchen, and budget for the week, and had to train the staff to churn out reasonable food. Now, mind you, his goals seemed very modest: vegetables, fresh fruit, very little deep-fat fried food, and a strict “from scratch” policy that went against everything the British educational culinary establishment stood for. It was a sweet, sort of pointless program, since we both concluded that his goal was highly quixotic (the students were scared of the food, the staff incredibly overworked, his budget quite small) and would soon collapse. More
