“[T]hese hacks ultimately become a labor issue. It would not be so taxing to make a TikTok drink … if stores were well-staffed, if workers were paid a living wage, if corporations weren’t intent on busting unions, and if customers were patient and understanding when their desires just aren’t possible.”
“The original silphion was said to have appeared suddenly, after a great downpour. Miski observed that, when rains came to Cappadocia in April, Ferula drudeana would spring from the ground, growing up to six feet in just over a month.”
“I can see you out there, skipping the pasta water steps of pasta preparation — the reserving some of the starchy pasta water, and the tossing the cooked pasta and sauce with the pasta water to bring everything together. I can see you, being skeptical of the necessity of these steps. I see it! It makes me sick.”
“The pellets are filled with fish scales that match a type of ray-finned fish found in that same location. The authors determined that these were gastric pellets rather than coprolites due to their shape and the location in which they were found in association with the pterosaurs.”
“Another course — a citrus foam — was served in a plaster cast of the chef’s mouth. Absent utensils, we were told to lick it out of the chef’s mouth in a scene that I’m pretty sure was stolen from an eastern European horror film.”
“If the bánh mì of Saigon and Hanoi represents the peculiar alchemy of a colonized people choosing and changing a legacy forced on them at gunpoint, the bánh mì of the United States is a product of another long, cruel war, and a mass exodus from subsequent privation.”
“[T]he Iron Age sample also had a high abundance of two species of fungi: Penicillium roqueforti — commonly used in the fermentation of cheese — and Saccharomyces cerevisiae, used for fermenting bread and alcoholic beverages like beer, mead, and wine.”
“The Okmok II eruption lasted from 43 BCE to 41 BCE, but its effects on the other side of the world lasted more than a decade. Ancient writers describe crop failures and famine in northern Italy and northern Greece from April 43 BCE through 36 BCE.”
“He called in and placed an order for 10 pizzas to a friend’s house and charged $160 to his personal credit card. A Doordash call center then called into his restaurant and put in the order for those 10 pizzas. A Doordash driver showed up with a credit card and paid $240 for the pizzas.”
“Glantz and Mauro made several propositions over the coming days, including one in which they’d sign the union’s contract with the stipulation that it never be enforced, and another that offered $10,000 to buy the union’s cooperation. It was all rejected. Local 338 wanted union bakers inside the Bagel Boys shop, and nothing less.”
“[W]e find that ‘vegetable’ rarely applies to the entire plant (or to the same parts of the plant), while it also has a way of applying to things that aren’t actually vegetables. It is a category both broader and more specific that the thing it’s supposed to describe.”