Read Online Best Food Writing 2015 by Holly Hughes - Free Book Online

but I think it’s important to keep his version of cooking in our sights. On a good day, there is wonder in transforming humdrum ingredients into a satisfying, good-tasting meal; if kids see the magic, it’s not just a manifestation of elite privilege.
    Would that strategy work for adults? Fulkerson says “parents can be as picky as kids,” and she thinks the same principle applies. So, if you’re an adult or a kid over about the age of 10 and you’re guilty of complaining, grab an apron and see whether you can’t do better.
    I asked Daniel Post Senning, co-author of the 18th edition of Emily Post’s Etiquette (and great-great-grandson of that etiquette icon),about complaining at the table, a practice so brazenly discourteous that mention of its prevalence left him “slack-jawed.” When he recovered his wits, he had several suggestions for changing the family dinner dynamic. First, he seconded Fulkerson’s strategy: “If you’re not participating in the process, you don’t always have standing to offer a critique,” he says. “Offer to participate in a meaningful way: planning and shopping, if not cooking.”
    And even then, be careful. “The compliment sandwich—praise, critique, praise—would be appropriate. There’s always something you can thank someone for when they’ve worked on your behalf.” Also, “have a solution.” Don’t care for creamed spinach? Volunteer to try roasting cauliflower.
    What you don’t do when someone—probably someone you love—has made a meal for you is gripe about the food at the table. Just don’t.
    The Little Brute Family stumbles through a grim and joyless life eating sticks and stones until, one day, Baby Brute finds a daisy, and the daisy gives him a good feeling. That evening, at supper, “when his bowl was filled with stew he said, ‘Thank you.’” From that moment, the good feeling catches on. “When Papa Brute went out for sticks and stones the next day, he found wild berries, salad greens, and honey, and he brought them home instead. At supper, everyone said ‘How delicious!’ because it was delicious.”
    Okay, The Little Brute Family is a fable, and decreeing that, from this day forth, no one shall complain about dinner won’t magically turn the home-cooking trend around. But, unlike most interventions, it doesn’t cost us anything. And if home cooking is something worth encouraging, and I think it is, we all need to take a tip from Baby Brute. When someone cooks a meal for you, whether or not you found your daisy, here’s an appropriate thing to say: Thank you.

Cooking’s Not for Everyone Cooking’s Not for Everyone
    B Y M OLLY W ATSON
    From Edible San Francisco

    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  Bay Area food writer and recipe developer Molly Watson (check out her delightful blog TheDinnerFiles.com ) offers another real-world perspective on America’s vanishing kitchen skills—reminding us what the high-minded foodie elite always seems to forget.
    We are bombarded with this truth: Family dinner is a magical and yet endangered institution. What was once commonplace—lo, quotidian!—for people who lived in the same house is, because of dual-income households and yoga classes and Lego workshops and screens of all sizes and Hot Pockets, going the way of whalebone corsetry.
    Sure, it exists, but more as a fetish object than something you pull out and put on everyday.
    We must fight for its survival, we are told. Not only is it an insanely effective way to stay connected as a family, but it’s even better at getting the kids into Harvard than mission trips to Guatemala and it can coax elves to dance with unicorns in our backyards.
    And here’s the latest promise coming directly from the better-food movement: It will de-industrialize our food system. That last bit only happens, though, if