Welcome to Secret Breakfast / An exclusive newsletter, the best place to start your day with popcorn cakes, red hot portraits, and girls dancing on your tongue

Hi there!

Aren’t you tired? I am so tired this Spring.

Maybe I’m eating the wrong things.

A few days ago T, the New York Times magazine, published a luxurious Issue All About Pasta featuring a Saltburn-style editorial about fancy people sharing an Italian Sunday Lunch.

Maybe I’m having too many carbs. Futurists thought that pasta was inimical to the modern-thinking person, leaving the eater heavy and shapeless, and inducing “lassitude, pessimism, nostalgic inactivity and neutralism”. Pasta was “no food for fighters”.

Maybe a salad or two will do. Or one of the recipes you’ll find in this crazy issue.

Piero

PS: in these weeks I’m experimenting with an ADV/Affiliate section to support this newsletter by subscribing to other newsletters. You can recognize it by the headline “A Message From…”. If you’re not interested, just skip it, no problem.

PPS: last week, I had mixed feedback about that, but thank you to those who contributed or wrote me their concerns. I’m using May to try different things, please bear with me a little more.

Family at Dinner Table Photo Print | 1940s - via Etsy

✦ Billie Eilish, Lunch.

WHEN TASTE IS A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH

At the Wolf's Table is a 2018 novel by Italian author Rosella Postorino about a woman who becomes a food taster for Adolf Hitler during World War II.

Postorino derived the story from that of real-life food taster Margot Wölk and now Italian director Silvio Soldini‘s shooting a movie that will be called The Tasters.

In a memorable passage, Postorino writes:

❝

My punishment had finally arrived. It wasn't poison, it wasn't death -- it was life.

What’s worse than this? Well, on the “evil side”, you can always cook for a dictator, as this incredible book by Witold Szablowski taught us.

Picture: Vision Distribution

A MESSAGE FROM…*

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Do you remember Ukraine, don’t you?

★★★★☆

Two years ago, the invasion of Ukraine by Russia was still big news. When I decided to write an ebook to fix the food trends of 2023 (this ebook), I contacted chef Yevhen Klopotenko to let him explain the “Borsch without a 't'“ rule and the importance of knowing better that Ukrainian cuisine was not Russian Cuisine. Now Yevhen has a new book out with two different artworks (US and UK). Nigella wrote about that and posted his Nalysnyky (★recipe).

The Authentic Ukrainian Kitchen: Recipes from a Native Chef by Yevhen Klopotenko
→ Shortplot: 🇺🇦 🥬 🍯 🌾

🌶️Sticky Gochujang Chicken Flatbreads (★recipe) 🥕Carrot-Harissa-Miso Pasta (★recipe) 🍒Cherry Cheesecake Danishes (★recipe) 🍌Dulce de Leche + Banana + Empanada (★recipe) 🖤Cheesecake, but in Black & White (★recipe) 🍕All The Flavors of Pizza in a One-Pot Meal You’ll Make Again and Again (★recipe) 🧅Risk a Divorce while cooking Jeweled Rice Stuffed Onions (★recipe) 🍋Greek Lemonpita (★recipe) 💪🏻15 Easy Ways to Add Extra Protein to Your Day 🌮The first Mexican taco stand to get a Michelin star 🙀10 Tips For Having The Most Intense Orgasm Of Your Life (no food involved) 🐻‘The Bear’ Season 3 Release Date is June 27

PS: our reader Jane would like to share this “save asparagus stems” soup with you (★recipe)

⁌POP QUIZ⁍

Let’s be honest: what does Jonathan Yeo’s King Charles III Portrait look like?

🍕 Roman Sheet Pan Pizza Rossa 🟥 A Red Velvet Cake before assembly 🍅 A Greasy Nigerian Beef Stew

Farm to Lunar Table: How Astronauts Are Eating Today 
Kitty Greenwald / Saveur

NASA is planning to provide astronauts with fresh food during long space missions. Astronauts currently rely on pre-packaged foods with a two- to three-year shelf life. Supplying fresh food is difficult because it spoils and can harbor bacteria. Then NASA is researching ways to grow fresh food in space using hydroponics.

A Year on Ozempic Taught Me We’re Thinking About Obesity All Wrong
Johann Hari / The New York Times

“Ever since I was a teenager, I have dreamed of shedding a lot of weight. So when I shrank from 203 pounds to 161 in a year, I was baffled by my feelings. I was taking Ozempic, and I was haunted by the sense that I was cheating and doing something immoral. I’m not the only one”.

➤ Last week's most clicked link was 56 Fast Dinner Ideas You Can Make in 20 Minutes or Less. And that's all for today.

• SEASON 4 - ISSUE 185 •
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 four years we have shared more than 2,000 recipes, hundreds of books, and countless hours of news, gluttony, and joy.

★★★★★
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