Canada Reads, Day One: Mexican Gothic Horror

On the first day of the 2023 season of the book competition Canada Reads, a panel of Canadian celebrities voted out a bestselling horror novel by Canadian-Mexican writer Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

Photograph by Martin Dee
via Silviamoreno-garcia.com
Licensed for editorial purposes

Mexican Gothic was a runaway success when it appeared in 2020. It tells the story of a rich young woman, Noémi, who is trying to rescue her cousin Catalina, who fears for her life in the mysterious family into which she has married. Instead of an American seaside home or a British estate like Manderley in the classic Daphne Du Maurier novel Rebecca, Moreno-Garcia's novel is set in an uncanny countryside house in 1950s Mexico.

Favourably reviewed by critics in the Guardian, the New Yorker, National Public Radio, and the Washington Post, it has had a wide appeal across borders and has been translated into languages from Arabic to Thai.

Noemí is [...] an unlikely rescuer: She’s a glamorous debutante, and her chic gowns and perfect red lipstick are more suited for cocktail parties than amateur sleuthing. But she’s also tough, smart, and has an indomitable will, and she is not afraid — Synopsis from the author's website

Tasnim Geedi, the TikTok star who entertains over 100,000 followers who enjoy her thirty-second book reviews, paid tribute to the immersive quality of the novel as she championed the book on Canada Reads. She described Mexican Gothic as a fantasy setting where the problems of colonialism can be explored in a distanced way that may appeal to readers who are not ready yet to confront directly Canadian history.

Her fellow panelists and rivals, amongst them Jeopardy! champion Mattea Roach and actor Michael Greyeyes, paid tribute to the author's rich imagination and style.

The Great British Bake Off's Loss of Spice

In the fall of 2014, the television audience Britain was shocked to behold a frustrated amateur baker throw a melted Baked Alaska into a garbage bin, and leave the show he was on in the wake of that incident.

"Raspberry cheesecake" — raspberry cake being an
emblem of the Great British Bake Off
Image by Arria Belli; May 27, 2008
Wikimedia Commons.
Copyright License: (CC BY 2.0)

But in the tranquil realm of The Great British Bake Off, the latest stir is that the show will be moved from BBC 1 to Channel Four in 2017.

Its new host channel, Channel Four, stated, "Channel 4 will become the new home of The Great British Bake Off after signing a new three-year agreement with the producers of the hit show, Love Productions."It also promised that the show would remain "free-to-air."

Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, the comediennes who have spoken the prefaces to each episode and accompanied the bakers, have stated that they are leaving the Great British Bake Off when it is no longer with the BBC. Someone else will have to commiserate with the unfortunate competitors over many an 'underbaked' dumpling and derelict gingerbread house, like Jennifer Saunders or Jo Brand. (The Guardian notes that bets are already being taken.)

Money was at the root of the trouble, since the production company wanted the BBC to quadruple its present payments to keep hosting the show. BBC News reported that Love Productions had asked for £25m per year, whereas the BBC only agreed to £15m per year.

It is an exorbitantly well-enjoyed weekly event. On the first Wednesday of its 7th season — it has run each summer since mid-August 2010 — 10.4 million Britons, between a seventh and a sixth of the population of the United Kingdom, are estimated to have watched it.

***

"Channel 4 to become home of The Great British Bake Off" [Channel Four], September 12, 2016 (Retrieved September 13, 2016)
"Great British Bake Off: BBC loses rights to Channel 4" [BBC News], September 13, 2016 (Retrieved September 13, 2016)
"Great British Bake Off: 10.4 million people tune into most-watched launch episode in show's history," by Patrick Foster [Daily Telegraph] August 25, 2016 (Retrieved September 13, 2016)
"Mel and Sue leaving Bake Off: how social media reacted," by Guardian staff [Guardian] (Retrieved September 14, 2016) (c) Guardian News & Media Ltd
"Great British Bake Off moves to Channel 4 as BBC negotiations collapse over fee," by Hannah Ellis-Petersen, Tara Conlan and Jane Martinson [Guardian]  September 13, 2016 (Retrieved September 14, 2016) (c) Guardian News & Media Ltd

"United Kingdom" [Wikipedia] (Retrieved September 13, 2016)
"The Great British Bake Off" [Wikipedia] (Retrieved September 13, 2016)

France/U.S. State Dinner: The Grub

On February 11th, President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama received the French president François Hollande for a state dinner at the White House in Washington, D.C.. Purple irises in honour of the French national emblem were the decorations, alongside glasses with allium heads, and Mary J. Blige sung to entertain the French and American guests. In catering to François Hollande, his dislike* for artichokes (or is it asparagus?) and his predilection for mousse au chocolat are well-known. The menu:

*

First course

American Osetra Caviar

Fingerling Potato Velouté, Quail Eggs, Crisped Chive Potatoes

*

Second course

"The Winter Garden Salad"

Petite Mixed Radish, Baby Carrots, Merlot Lettuce

Red Wine Vinaigrette

*

Cook-at-Home Version:

MINIATURE vegetables in a 'garden,' instead of a terrarium, are also part of British chef Heston Blumenthal's past menus. In the recipe published at the Guardian's website, in 2011, his 'garden' has potting soil of fragmented black olives and grape nuts, a layer underneath of sauce gribiche, and tended lines of asparagus shoots, leafy baby carrots, as well as miniature growths of the longdrawn Chinese cabbage bok choi, etc.

(Radishes, leeks or fennel in miniature will work, too, writes Blumenthal.)

Recipe: "Heston Blumenthal's garden salad with sauce gribiche recipe" ([Theguardian.com], December 14, 2011)

*

What is Merlot lettuce? — Merlot lettuce is a leafy, maroon salad.

'Merlot' [Wild Garden Seed]
*

IN the dinner, the vegetables were nestled on a white sauce, green sprinkles presumably the herbs from the First Lady's garden. Since the summer had been fruitful, as the White House's executive chef Cristeta Comerford explained in a film before the State Dinner, fennels and mustard, onions and capsicum from the White House grounds were kept. Pickled throughout the autumn and winter, these reappeared in the night's repast.

*

THE White House's type of dressing — i.e. a red wine vinaigrette with honey — likewise fits in a salad of satsuma, fennel, chèvre and Belgian endive. Vinegar, pomegranate, extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper, and honey are mixed. (From the UK restaurant Fitzbillies's chef, Rosie Sykes.)

Satsuma, goat's cheese and chicory salad with pomegranate dressing (From: "Why pomegranate is good for you" [The Guardian], by Joanna Blythman and Rosie Sykes (November 2, 2013))
Untitled [The White House: Instagram], February 10, 2014

***

Main Course

Dry-aged Rib Eye Beef

Jasper Hill Farm Blue Cheese, Charred Shallots, Oyster

Mushrooms, Braised Chard

*

THE blue cheese was farmed in Vermont; the oyster mushrooms are a frequent fungus in Europe, North America and elsewhere, growing on decomposing tree trunks or stumps rather than in the soil, and are ribbed on the underside with a grey or white or brown, waved, oyster-shaped cap.

Rib eye beef is taken from the forward-leaning centre of the animal, wedged between the chuck toward the neck and the short loin at the sixth to twelfth ribs, and tucked above the plate at the belly, according to the American style of cuts.

"Bon appetit! White House to throw an all-American state dinner for French president" [Today: NBC], by Danika Fears (Feb. 11, 2014)
"Pleurotus ostreatus" [Wikipedia]
"Rib eye steak" [Wikipedia]
Beef diagram, "File: BeefCutRib.svg" [Wikimedia Commons], Uploaded by JoeSmack, July 25, 2006

***

Dessert

Hawaiian Chocolate-Malted Ganache

Vanilla Ice Cream and Tangerines

This time the petits fours were served on a marbled sugar platter, the triumph of the pastry chefs — a red American rose and a French purple iris — attached to it, and the traditional American treats were maple fudge, amongst others — even cotton candy.

Untitled [The White House: Instagram], February 10, 2014
Cook-at-Home version: "Chocolate Ganache Cake" [Taste of Home]
(Note: 'Originally published as Chocolate Ganache Cake in Light & Tasty February/March 2008, p53')

*****

Further sources:

"Behind the Scenes at the France State Dinner: See the Menu" [White House], by Megan Slack (February 11, 2014) [Read February 13, 2014]

"Behind the Scenes: Inside the Kitchen for the France State Dinner" [YouTube: The White House] (February 11, 2014) [Watched February 13, 2014]

"Presidential chefs swap recipes for world diplomacy" [Reuters], by Vicky Buffery (July 24, 2012)

"Le Club des chefs des chefs: le G20 des cuisiniers reçu par François Hollande" [Huffington Post: France], by Geoffroy Clavel (July 24, 2012)

Pinter-Testing the Paleo Watermelon Cake

Pinterest's 'Everything' screenshot, May 9, 2013

 A MONTH or two ago I finally launched a Pinterest account. For those who do not know what Pinterest is, it's a website where everyone who is registered can assemble picture boards full of photos which link to or simply show recipes, weight loss tips, exercise regimens, survivalist equipment, loving photos of rifles and other firearms, professional posed baby photos, gardening advice, aggressive humour, cartoons, crafts and millions of wedding planning tips. It has been around since March 2010. In 2012 it had some 11.7 million registered users.* Amongst others, the wives of the two candidates in the last U.S. presidential elections, magazines like Martha Stewart Living, and museums from the Prado in Madrid to the Museum of Cinema in Texas run Pinterest accounts.

* "Pinterest" [Wikipedia]

Looking at Pinterest from a serious critical perspective there is a lot that is neither entertaining nor very healthy ('thinspo' in which young girls are encouraged to become thin enough to develop a gap between their thighs, the obsession with weddings, racist 'jokes,' and supposed medical advice which is not reputably sourced, etc.).

It is a climate of haphazard fact-checking. A harmless example: Some 'pins' which often reappear on Pinterest due to popularity are inspiration quotes which are misattributed to arbitrary dead celebrities. For instance, 'Oscar Wilde' : "You don't love someone for their looks, or their clothes, or their fancy car, but because they sing a song only you can hear."

TO REMEDY this empirical Wild West in a small way, I have decided to try out, research and — if necessary — debunk an assortment of Pins. There are many tempting notions, e.g. 'Exercises to increase drainage of lymphatic fluid and get perky boobs,' but let's begin with Paleo recipes.

***

THE 'PIN'

The Paleo Watermelon Cake derives its name from the 'Paleo diet,' which attempts to reestablish the food spectrum common in what used to be called the Stone Age. This time period covers some 2.6 million to 10,000 years ago,* before the advent of broadscale agriculture.

* "Paleolithic" [Wikipedia]

THE OVERVIEW

THE RECIPE I found — through Pinterest — is from the website Paleo Cupboard. The cake's ingredients are a watermelon, coconut milk, vanilla extract, honey, seasonal fruit, and almonds. It asks you to carve the rind off a watermelon so that you have a cylinder, to coat it in coconut whipping cream, and to decorate it with almonds around the sides and with berries or kiwis or other fruit above. So there is no baking involved, and indeed sugar and flour are anathema to the Paleo diet.

Watchdogs on Capitol Hill

There was nothing funny about the 2010 General Services Administration conference in Las Vegas that featured a clown, a mind reader and an overall taxpayer price tag of $820,000.

— Rep. Mike Coffman and Rep. Jackie Speier, March 18, 2013

Opinions may differ on that statement; in fact, more than one 'segment' of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart has made comedic capital out of the GSA's spree. But it is undeniable that the United States has an enormous public debt* and that wasteful spending within the federal government only makes things worse.

* Over $9 trillion according to the 2011 CIA World Factbook, under the definition of public debt as 'the total of all government borrowings less repayments that are denominated in a country's home currency." [Wikipedia]

***

THIS MONDAY, Reps. Jackie Speier and Mike Coffman wrote an op-ed for Politico to announce a Congressional Watchdog Caucus, which hopes to ease matters for federal employees and others who want to report misuses of funds and other problems within government.

For anyone who wants to report, the route is complex. There is more than one office (or, watchdog) which undertakes investigations and passes on preexisting records to those who request them.

A Verse on Squash for Nowruz

Cucumis sativus
Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé: Flora von Deutschland,
Österreich und der Schweiz (1885)
Via Wikimedia Commons

IN HONOUR of Nowruz, the Zoroastrian feast day which celebrates the beginning of spring, here is an Iranian poem.

It echoes the Aesopian fable which is known in French as "Le chêne et le roseau," in English as "The Oak and the Reed."

But Nasir Khusraw, the 11th-century Iranian poet who was of course not Zoroastrian considering that Islam had replaced that faith, wrote it in qasida verse. It was collected in his Divan.

HAVE you heard? A squash vine grew beneath a towering tree.

In only twenty days it grew and spread and put forth fruit.

Of the tree it asked: 'How old are you? How many years?'

Replied the tree: 'Two hundred it would be, and surely more.'

The squash laughed and said: 'Look, in twenty days, I've done more than you; tell me, why are you so slow?'

The tree responded: 'O little squash, today is not the day of reckoning between the two of us.'

'Tomorrow, when winds of autumn howl down on you and me, then shall it be known for sure which one of us is the real man!'

(Divan, 256)

نشنیده‌ای که زیر چناری کدو بنی بر رست و بردوید برو بر به روز بیست؟

پرسید از آن چنار که تو چند ساله‌ای؟ --- گفتا دویست باشد و اکنون زیادتی است

خندید ازو کدو که من از تو به بیست روز --- بر تر شدم بگو تو که این کاهلی ز چیست

او را چنار گفت که امروز ای کدو --- با تو مرا هنوز نه هنگام داوری است

فردا که بر من و تو وزد باد مهرگان ---

N.B.: The diction of the translation drives me a bit nuts, but de gustibus.

"Squash" is a noisome word in this context because it often refers to species which were imported to the 'Old World' from the Americas during the western Renaissance period; in fact the very word is derived from Narragansett according to the ITP Nelson Canadian Dictionary on the table beside me. A German translation I came across has کدو = kadú = pumpkin, but 'gourd' might be accurate, too.

***

"Nasir Khusraw: A Portrait of the Persian Poet, Traveller and Philosopher" [Institute of Ismaili Studies], by Dr Alice C Hunsberger
"Nasir Khusraw" [Wikipedia]

[Edited for brevity and style, August 2023]

Misanalysis

IT is ten years yesterday since the US under the Bush administration invaded Iraq. To celebrate the anniversary, Wired published a column on its website by Nada Bakos, a CIA analyst at the outset of the Iraq War. Under pressure from Vice-President Dick Cheney and his associate "Scooter" Libby to make the case that Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was linked to al Qaeda, she writes that she and her colleagues even rehearsed with her superior how to reply to the questions of the administration.

Photo: A September 2002 antiwar demonstration in London.
By William M. Connolley, (CC BY-SA 3.0) Licence. Via Wikimedia Commons.