Jeremy Cherfas

Let joy be unconfined: farm share of food dollar up from 14.2 cents in 2018 to 14.3 cents in 2019. Farmers get an even lower share of eating out dollars, and eating out dollars plunged during the pandemic.

www.ers.usda.gov/data-prod…

When programmers take to baking: Amylase is a POKE instruction for the yeast computer.

A minor chuckle in a very good reflection on pandemic baking. interconnected.org/home/2021…

I’ve always wanted to try a sensory deprivation tank, though deprivation seems like entirely the wrong word. Floating in the Dead Sea is all well and good, but those salts sting. I would expect a proper tank to be much nicer.

“Decellularized spinach serves as an edible platform for laboratory-grown meat”

A less mouth-watering headline, you’re unlikely to read.

www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea…

I agree that people should learn to protect themselves against pseudoscience, especially medical quackery. But before you ask “How is this supposed to work?” it might be even more worthwhile to ask “Does this even work?”

Without evidence of an effect, a mechanism is worthless.

Must We Cook? /ppVery excited to be joining Rachel Laudan, Ken Albala, Chad Ludington and Margot Finn tomorrow for what promises to be a great discussion./ppWednesday 31 March at 1:00pm EST, 7:00pm CEST /ppJoin us on Zoom. Details in bio pesos

Turtles all the way down. pesos

Avoiding the very overcrowded park. pesos

A very colourful garden has been quietly growing at the back of the fridge. Luckily this is a spare, spare starter so I don’t even have to try and resurrect it, even though I could. pesos

Of course I am going to resurrect my podcast episode about Celebrating Passover and Easter. Maybe a bit late for tonight’s seder, but plenty of time for a little didactic baking next week.

www.eatthispodcast.com/passover/

I really enjoy using #loopback from @RogueAmoeba for more complex things, but I cannot seem to fathom the simplest thing. If I’m on a straightforward Zoom call using an outboard mic though a USB mixer, how can I get my mic into my headphones with zero latency?

As noted in the latest Eat This Newsletter, the new Plant Humanities Lab website is absolutely terrific, and would be even better with some sort of feed of new items. How about it, @DumbartonOaks ?

lab.plant-humanities.org

I’m not mad keen on subscription services myself, though I do pay for a few because they keep on delivering. Another twist to the story, though: when an app I am happy to pay offers a discount on a new version that my OS won’t be able to handle until I get a new machine.

Let’s go, microbes. pesos

I’m happy to cop to this. My motivation is certainly not jealousy. I’m not in the business of handing out rules for how other people should behave. It is more to do with the adulation others bestow not on the rules but on the person dispensing them. And it isn’t the rules, per se, it is the rest of the stuff.

First of the season. pesos

Teresa Cherfas reviews ‘The Return of the Russian Leviathan’by Sergei Medvedev:

“For anyone interested in contemporary Russia, this book is an invaluable guide and will leave you smiling through tears.”

Fine episode of Gravy from @southfoodways, all about horchata. A little disappointed that @rachellaudan didn’t bring English barley water into the story. Or if she did, that they cut it.

www.southernfoodways.org/gravy/hor…

Found these in the Chinese supermarket and am enjoying a bit of the numb tongue sensation that is Szechuan pepper. Strangely pleasant.

Nice to see violets in the springtime. pesos