The Academy Winner Cookbook 🥟
Start your day with gyoza bags and ethical shrimp, upgraded popcorn and accordion breads.
Welcome to Secret Breakfast / The best place to start your day with awarded actor's meals, frozen pelmeni, and a free South Asian recipe ebook
Hi there!
This is the second issue from the new platform running Secret Breakfast from secretbreakfast.com.
I hope you noticed that the site is completely open and searchable. I managed to import about 80% of the previous issues (even if the script I used didn't like some long reads that I now have to import manually).
Also, I'm afraid I have to go again with this note.
I don't wanna bother you too much with the tech bits, so let the party begin.
Piero
Photograph: Emma Laird, The Brutalist.
✺ Ina Garten, her latest book is Be Ready When the Luck Happens.
Who put Masala in my Mardi Gras? (FREE EBOOK LINK)
The Krewe of Bhan Gras, a South Asian dance group in New Orleans, has pioneered a unique Mardi Gras parade tradition by distributing professionally printed cookbooks featuring 18 family recipes ranging from chana masala to Sri Lankan love cake. This cookbook (18 recipes), distributed alongside 1,000 chai recipe magnets during four parades, represents a collective effort by approximately 100 members, many of whom are medical professionals who first met through a diasporic food community.
2025 COOKBOOK by Krewe da Bhan Gras
Shortplot → 🥭 🍛 🌶️ 🥥
The Refreshing Taste of Triumph
The Academy Awards ride was crazy this year. The winning movie was Anora, directed by Sean Baker, which follows a Russian-American sex worker who unexpectedly marries the son of a Russian oligarch. The whole film production probably costed less than a Birthday Dinner at the Eleven Madison Park.
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🥟 Is food involved in the movie? Well, to me a bag of frozen pelmeni (★video recipe + recipe) used as an ice pack is the right answer to the question.
But in Anora, food is subtle: it represents both necessity and occasional luxury. Her relationship with food reflects her precarious economic situation, making moments of culinary indulgence particularly meaningful.
Also who prepares food, who serves it, and who consumes it establishes social hierarchies. When Anora cooks for her new husband, it marks a temporary shift in their relationship, while lavish restaurant scenes with his family emphasize wealth disparities.
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That said, Anora is portrayed by the new Academy Awards Winner for Best Actress Mikey Madison, who posed for W Magazine as a doughnut bandit (and for that we love her).
🍪 Ms Madison is also pretty skilled in baking chocolate chips cookies (★video recipe with Drew Barrymore).
🍚Best Supporting Actress (for Emilia Pérez) Zoe Saldaña can teach The Best (and Only) Way to Cook Rice.
🥪Best Supporting Actor (for A Real Pain) Kieran Culkin is more of a drunk late night grilled cheese sandwich kind of guy.
🧐Best Actor Award Winner (for The Brutalist), Adrien Brody, Tossed a Chewing-Gum Ahead of his Speech and says he has a Need to Constantly Be Cooking Creatively. Anyway, here's How to Eat Like a Brutalist, According to Carsten Höller.
Picture: Anora.
🎭I totally missed Mardi Gras, but beignets are always a great idea (★recipe) 🧀Alia Bhatt cooking Mac & Cheese (video) 💕3 Celeb Proposals That Involve Food 🔍I loved this discussion: What is a food that makes you think, “How did humans discover this was edible?” (oh man, cashews are a fruit of Satan) 🥖When in Paris, This could be le meilleur sandwich du monde (Libé tested it) 🇫🇷lA Few Hours in Paris, a city of indulgence 🧂José Andrés Says Fresh Black Pepper Is the Best Substitute for Salt 📈Pitch dating, or how to sell your single friend with a PowerPoint presentation 🇯🇵10 Observations About Tokyo, the world’s most successful failing society 🌎Food production is now responsible for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions 🔪Meet the Feminist Resistance Fighter Who Created the Modern Kitchen
The AI Kitchen
MAD Digest
What might artificial intelligence bring to independent, creative restaurants? And an interview with an Academy alum doing the hard work of bringing authentic Mexican cuisine to Greece.
Why Is My Drink So Damn Weird?
David Wondrich/ Punch
The cocktail world has undergone a dramatic transformation from classic, predictable drinks to increasingly complex, experimental concoctions, driven by bartenders' desire to create unique, attention-grabbing beverages with multiple obscure ingredients. Despite the current trend of hyper-elaborate mixology—with techniques like hydrosols, fat-washes, and centrifuged ingredients—the author predicts this wave will eventually recede, with bartenders likely returning to simpler pleasures and classic techniques.
