Writing in cook book margins + fixing democracy + leading men

May 15, 2022

May I recommend

Writing in the margins of your cookbooks.

“But Amy, I don’t want to bespoil my pristine copy of Yotam Ottolenghi’s latest ode to the chickpea! Look at these artful shots of artichokes and this lush depiction of a bowl of yogurt. How can I sully it with my chickenscratch scribblings?”

To that I say, “DO IT.”

Your cookbook is a tool that is meant to be used. You are supposed to burn the edges of it after leaving it too close to the burner; the binding is meant to be smashed open from that time you weighted the pages down with a bag of flour and a pineapple to follow the soufflé-making instructions; its pages want to be smeared with butter and dribbled with soya sauce.

If you can’t throw your favourite cookbook into a pot and boil it for an hour or two to produce a nourishing stew from its accumulated years of dribbles and crumbs, are you even cooking?

In that vein, when you make a recipe from a cookbook jot down the date and the success of the recipe. Do you even need to ask why? Fine, because on a very practical level, it reminds you what you cooked, if people liked it and is a snapshot of your life in a particular moment in time. Shout out to my friend Meghan, who I *think* introduced me to this practice.

Am I pleased that I have dozens of bitter little cookbook entries from the year when I lost my sense of smell (don’t get me started on THAT) where I’ve written - “worked out well , Andrew says it was a little sweet. I couldn’t taste anything.” Of course I am. It’s a testament to my years of chopping, sifting, sautéing and yes, burning.

This is a feminist issue. Cooking is hard and time consuming work. Historically it’s mostly been done by women. When the very tools of our trade exhibit no wear or tear and have no historic record attached to them, we are erasing our labour. Throw down these tools of patriarchal hegemony and grasp your liberation by the nib of a Bic pen! Record your efforts! Document you work. Write beside Jamie Oliver’s grinning moon face: “May 15, sautéed the onions too long. Needs more salt.” Seize your liberation!

Do you write in your cookbooks? Tell me all about it below!

*Programming Note - Next week Canadians have a long weekend to celebrate Queen Victoria’s birthday. I will be honouring this colonial relic by doing the same. See you back here the following weekend! *

The fantasy of writing versus the reality

When I write something

This author captures the messed up state of mind you can get yourself into as you rev up to start writing.

When I finally write something, I will write it by hand, in a coffee shop. They say that the written word is dead, but not on my watch. When I write, I’ll write in a frenzy and then rip out a page that I don’t like and toss it across the coffee shop until a large pile forms. The baristas won’t mind, though—they understand that it’s all part of my writerly process, because that’s how important my writing is.

Some good news

A movement that’s quietly reshaping democracy for the better

When everything feels a bit hopeless and tough, this is an interesting approach. I am a little dubious, because, having lived in Belgium for three years, I’m not sure those guys have the best governance structure, BUT it’s worth a shot, isn’t it?

As governance systems are failing to address some of society’s most pressing issues and trust between citizens and government is faltering, these new institutions embody the potential of democratic renewal. They create the democratic spaces for everyday people to grapple with the complexity of policy issues, listen to one another and find common ground.

Hollywood’s leading man problem

How Hollywood’s Blockbuster Golden Boys Went Weird

A dishy look at the life and careers of Will Smith, Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp, Eddie Murphy and Robert Downey Junior.

These actors’ imperial phases are decidedly behind them—with the exception of Cruise, who may pull off a magic trick in reviving his Navy aviator for Top Gun: Maverick on May 27—and their projects just don’t afford them the outsized status that they once did. Meanwhile, reality has caught up with these men and exposed their not-so-nice sides. Bluntly, years and decades at the top may have led them to go a little bit cuckoo. Here’s a look back at how these five Hollywood golden boys became the eccentric men we know today.

Read this book

My lovely friend Kim’s lovely book came out this week and it’s fantastic. It’s the story of single-dad Dave, who’s on the autism spectrum, as he raises his 15-year-old daughter and navigates a world he views as wildly dangerous. It’s funny and poignant and will make you want to move to California.

Ways the World Could End is available everywhere - get it!

The first page:

April 2019
Dave
There are several ways the world could end. And it will end. It’s not something that depresses me, which Cleo thinks is weird. I can hear her voice in my head now: Dad, you’re such a weirdo. She says it lovingly—with a laugh instead of an eye roll. I’ve decided this means I’m doing okay as a father.
We’ve had a good run, as a species. Half a million years. We’ve built cities from nothing, created complex languages, visited outer space. We’ve invented and engineered and made the impossible possible. But, as I said, it will end.
Cleo says I’m a pessimist, but I do not agree with this assessment. I am a realist. The fact is that ninety-nine percent of all species that have ever lived have gone extinct, including every one of our hominid ancestors. Our turn will come—sooner rather than later, by my estimation.
The question, of course, is: How?