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Fearlessness in the Kitchen 🔪

SB158

Hi there!

Imagine you’re in a beautiful garden, taking a break from the everyday life. What would you notice at first?*

Would you measure how tall the trees are, how many different flower species are around you and how many acres are around you?

Would you smell the air, touch the herbs or listen to the bird’s songs?

I often use this exercise to figure out the person I have before me and tell if I’m dealing with science or spirit, mind or feelings, Apollonian or Dionysian, salad with separate condiments or piping hot Shepherd’s Pie.

It’s a silly simplification - I know - but 9 times out of 10, this thing works. I know for sure I’d love to work with the first kind, and I’d have a great time with the second.

Piero

PS: if that reminded you Persian Letters by Charles de Montesquieu, you’re absolutely right.

Photo by ROMAN ODINTSOV

␥

THE BEST QUOTE

✦ Elizabeth Zott is the main character of the TV show Lessons in Chemistry, based on the novel of the same name by Bonnie Garmus (which, I’m told, is far better than the show).

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THE MISSING INGREDIENT

HUNGRY FOR A DOPPELGÄNGER

Tamales (★recipe) vs. Zongzi. Garbage Plates (★recipe) vs. Loco Mocos. Conchas vs. Melonpan (★recipe). The world’s a kitchen and, sometimes, different countries, with very different histories, reach the very same recipe.

This Atlas Obscura feature - Ever Spotted a Doppelgänger Food? - made me think I must have encountered a Doppelgänger Food many times, but can’t recall. And you?

Picture: Sakuraco

⎅

THE BOOK

An Appetite for Words

★★★★☆

This book’s tagline is “On Eating, Reading, Reading about Eating, and Eating While Reading” and it sums up 85% of what I like of my life (when I have the time to live it). The author is The New York Times book critic Dwight Garner and he wrote a memoir stuffed with literary excerpts about hunger, food, and the sense of enjoying the time on this Earth. I had the possibility to read that in advance (thank you G.!) and I consider it a no-brainer: get it, read it, and, sooner or later, you’ll come back to it. Well, it probably lacks some feminine soul, but you’re buying the life of a guy named Dwight, after all.

The Upstairs Delicatessen by Dwight Garner
→ Shortplot: 🖋️ 🍝 🍷 🍗

❍ OnlyPans
This is where Secret Breakfast picks juicy content from food creators

Ⓡ

RANDOM ACTS OF HUNGER

This is the space where I share some food (un)related stuff of my week

🏙️Hannah Goldfield’s Favorite Restaurants in New York City 🍊An Orange Cake From a Revolutionary Chef (★recipe) 🆇A silly Twitter-thread about food puns and IA art 🐡Thailand's Bizarre Cafe Where Customers Dined In Ankle-Deep Water Filled With Fish 🍨 Roasted-Buckwheat Custards, with soba-cha tea (★recipe) 🥚The Egg - A Short Story by Andy Weir (I loved Project Hail Mary), animated by Kurzgesagt 🍈Everything You Did Not Know About Watermelons 🍇In the West Bank, Palestinians Preserve Grapes and Tradition 📚The Best Food Books to Read This Fall 🇰🇷Budae Jjigae, a Korean War-era staple 💡Top 50 productivity hacks chosen by internet 💛For her first Bon Appétit Editor’s Letter Jamila Robinson wrote a paean to the Mac’n’Cheese (note for the Italians here: in the US that is considered a side dish)

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FOOD FOR LATER

Who Killed the Fudge King?
Tom Donaghy / Atavist

“The fudge (★recipe) sold at Copper Kettle was so creamy, so sweet, so beyond compare, that many candy shops on the Ocean City boardwalk didn’t even sell fudge, because there was no point”. Here’s a story with the following ingredients: a killing, homosexuality, the Sixties and 43 occurrences of the word “fudge”.

➤ Last week's most clicked link was about the 700-plus songs known to give people chills. Should I pivot to a lifestyle newsletter? And that's all for today.

• SEASON 4 - ISSUE 158 •
Secret Breakfast is a newsletter
by Piero Macchioni

Think of it as The Morning Brew for food people, or just the most unconventional email you'll get today. In two years we have shared more than 2,000 recipes, hundreds of books, and countless hours of news, gluttony, and joy. Download our free ebook about food in 2023.

★★★★★
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