A Literary Feast

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Posts from the “Uncategorized” Category

Oysters In Your Mustache: The Rise and Inevitable Future Decline of the Cocktail and Oyster Bar

Posted on February 13th, 2012

The year is 1996. The setting – an enormous industrial loft-style lounge with high ceilings, exposed pipes and sleek modern couches and coffee tables. Narcotic beats by Bristol trip hop groups waft over the space from the sound system designed to get the most bass out of every beat. On one of the couches, a man and a woman in clean black turtlenecks and Chelsea boots lounge with martinis. Remember Pearl Jam? Says the man. What happened to them? I haven’t listened to them since their first album – Ten, was it? Is it too early to feel nostalgic for them? Says the woman and giggles self-consciously. Speaking of grunge – wasn’t this place a dingy dive bar just a couple of years ago?…

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Tropic of Cutlet

Posted on February 13th, 2012

To eat you must first open your mouth. You must have an alimentary canal, and a little knowledge of forks. It is not necessary to have a knife or mandoline. The essential thing is to want to eat. Then it is a meal. I am cooking. It is you, cutlet, that I am eating. I wish that I could eat better, or more languidly, but, then perhaps you never have actually consented to dine with me. Others have eaten you and only half finished, leaving you cold. They claimed to eat beautifully, but, were, let’s face it, kind of picky in the end. It is the somethingth of February—I no longer keep track of the menus. Would you say—the takeout of last week? There…

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Drinking Alone With Attempted Blogger

Posted on February 13th, 2012

What’s dark about Massachusetts? Well, other than the months between December and March, the first thing that comes to mind is pizza. But this issue’s theme — I love you, but I’ve chosen dark meat — implies a conscious decision, and no one really chooses Massachusetts pizza. Like snow shoveling and long underwear, it’s an unfortunate aspect of New England life that one must solemnly accept, but under no circumstances, embrace. What I really needed, I decided, was an honest-to-goodness adventure on the dark side. Why not start with beer? It’s practically the official drink of Massachusetts and you can’t get any darker than drinking alone. Step 1: Open fridge and discover leftovers of dubious age and one empty bottle of wine. Step 2:…

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Agaricus the Champ(ignon)

Posted on February 13th, 2012

In an issue about the dark side of epicurean endeavors you might guess an article about mushrooms would focus on the mysterious effects of the few and illustrious psychotropic fungi. Good guess-but I have no experience with psychotropics in any form, so this article must be about something else entirely. It will, in fact, explore the notion that the mushroom, specifically the mature agaricus bisporous or portobello, is the dark meat of the meatless world. Agaricus bisporous is the most common species of edible mushroom. Many popular “varieties” – white mushroom, button mushroom, crimini mushroom, Swiss-Roman-or-Italian brown mushroom, champignon mushroom and portobello mushroom – are actually the very same agaricus at different stages of maturity. Historically harvested in grassy fields after cool autumn rainfalls,…

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You Say ‘Salud’ I Say ‘Satan’: Satanic Feasting In Early Modern Europe

Posted on February 13th, 2012

Witches throughout history have always thrown the greatest parties. Part of what made them so great was that witches spared no expense, hiring only the best caterers Tattenwang had to offer. More important was their exclusivity. Of course, even in the height of the glamorous 17th century, there were always bitter detractors would spoil it for everyone by telling all. During one witches’ Sabbath, told a country rube called Anna Pappenheimer, witches from near and far arrived to the party riding on broomsticks and pitchforks. A bit cliché, maybe, but this was Bavaria. She further disclosed that after an amaranthine-robed Satan arrived in a puff of sulfur-smoke and farts, they supped on “disgusting” foods like horse meat and various reptiles and ravens. Disgusting? Isn’t…

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The Meal: Much More Than Eating

Posted on February 13th, 2012

A three-cheese fondue filled my belly a number of weeks ago and nearly two years before that. I had invited my friends to share this meal before I left for Europe and again when I returned home. Both times I used Swiss cheeses, imported into the states, boxed cooking wine, and dipping ingredients that were not traditional to this Alpine meal. Presumably, I could have made a “better” fondue at any time during my European stay, but these two meals were The Best I had ever had. I was sharing food and time and conversation with my favorite people in the world, and I didn’t care about the freshness of the cheese, the container of the cooking wine, nor the choice of food bits…

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Don’t Mess with Tradition, or How Not to Make a Manhattan

Posted on December 28th, 2011

Of all the cocktails that the sufficiently mustachioed gentleman with rolled sleeves behind the bar can construct for you, I’ve always considered the Manhattan to be vastly superior to the rest. This has reasons of an aesthetic nature as well as those pertaining purely to sensory pleasures. Beautiful in color, the drink smells sweeter than straight whiskey but still carries enough menace for the novice and the teetotaler to take one whiff and turn away.

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Ask Rennie Vol. 8: Holiday Hoo-Ha

Posted on December 4th, 2011

Dear Rennie,

I don’t know if it’s Occupy Wall St., that freak October snowstorm or what, but my holiday fervor has about as much bounce as the elastic in Blanche DuBois’ oldest girdle. In order to try to plump up our sagging seasonal bouffants, my roommates and I have decided to put on a traditional living crèche. We’re a little confused—how much of a faux pas is it to eat the participating animals afterwards? We’re hoping the answer is ‘not at all’, because it’s this lamb, or, a tube of E-Z Cheez. And the E-Z Cheez has never crapped in the living room.

Yours in nativity play fellowship,

Loving Animals Really in Dunwoodie

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