French photographer Jean-François Mallet has a lovely (somewhat) new book called “Take Away” which is an amazing chronicle of street food sellers and customers from all over the world. We were intrigued by his pictures of both familiar and new takes on street food. You can check out some more of Mallet’s food and travel photography on his portfolio site.
A mobile bread vendor in Beirut, Lebanon by Jean-François Mallet
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
It’s like the UN of food – well, not exactly, but close. This past week there was a meeting of the chefs of the head of state (Called the Club des Chefs des Chefs) of 20 countries, including France, India, Poland, Thailand, Germany, and the US, among others. The New York Times covered the 2013 event, which happens yearly (since 1977). The chefs cooked emblematic dishes from their nations and sought to bring “diplomacy through gastronomy.” We’ll drink to that.
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I was first introduced to Marcus Nilsson’s photography by a feature in Swallow Magazine about food culture in Mexico City. Intrigued, I then went on the peruse some of his portfolio, and I love all of the travel food images. Here is a very small sample of some of his captivating photography from around the globe. A former chef, Nilsson talks to Fstoppers about his photography philosophy.
Marcus Nilsson: Parma
Marcus Nilsson: Marrakesh
Marcus Nilsson: Detroit
Marcus Nilsson: Mexico City
Marcus Nilsson: Spain
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
Ramadan, the 9th month of the Islamic calendar, started on July 10th. During the month, Muslims fast from dawn until dusk, and break the fast with a meal known as Iftar each night. What is eaten at an Iftar meal varies widely from country to country and from home to home, ranging from a small family meal to a huge party with an elaborate spread of dishes. Asia Society has a list of classic Iftar dishes from each country, and Time.com has a photo gallery of global Iftars, both showing the diversity of Iftars around the world. So where to begin? The possibilities are nearly endless. Time Out Abu Dhabi has recipes from reknowned chefs, About.com has a list of Traditional Moroccan Iftar recipes, and Veg Recipes of Indian has a wealth of Vegetarian Iftar options.
Iftar in the UK by Reway2007
Filed under Holidays, World Eats
In honor of Mother’s Day: Gabriele Galimberti’s photo series “Delicatessen with Love” focuses on food that Grandmothers make all around the world. The photo series was born from a conversation with his own Italian grandmother, who was worried about what he would eat when photographing around the world.
Marisa Batini – Castiglion Fiorentino, Italy (The photographer’s Grandma)
“In that occasion I said to my grandma ‘You know, Grandma, there are many other grandmas around the world and most of them are really good cooks,” Galimberti wrote via email. “I’m going to meet them and ask them to cook for me so I can show you that you don’t have to be worried for me and the food that I will eat!’ This is the way my project was born!”
Ana Lucia Souza Pascoal – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
The Grandmas are from diverse locations ranging from Iceland to Fiji to Malawi. In each diptych, the featured Grandmother is pictured first with the ingredients to her signature dish, and then the completed dishes are shown. Some of the stories even come with recipes, including Ana Lucia Souza Pascoal’s Feijoada. You can see the whole 47-part photo series at Riverboom. You can also submit your own tribute to your Grandma’s cooking through the Twitter tag #grandmacooks.
Thilaga Vadhi – Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
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A fascinating set of photographs by Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio have been making the rounds this week. The pair traveled around the world in 2007, photographing families displaying one week’s worth of food – a striking set of images now published in their book, Hungry Planet: What the World Eats. You can easily scroll through hi-res copies of some of the images on imgur, but it would be worth your while to slog through Menzel and D’Aluisio’s work in a series two galleries published by TIME in 2007 (galleries one, and two here, as well as a third gallery with other images from the book), since they feature information on each family’s location, weekly expenditures, and favorite meals, as well as the full set of 27 images (not all of which are on imgur).
The Celik family of Istanbul. We’d like to stay with them!
As revealing as these photographs are, they raise as many questions about the relationship between class, nationality, ethnicity, and access to food; as well as the obvious representativeness of each family of their national origin (this is easily dealt with in the original book, but imgur leaves out all the identifying information so that each photo is just labeled with a country.) Interest and criticism aside, can we just say, can we have Menzel and D’Aluisio’s job? What lucky people to have so many families invite them into their homes – we’re sure they had many good meals come out of the project!
Filed under Books
Today is Eating the World’s 5th anniversary. We’ve come a long way in 5 years. We got married. Visited Asia, Europe and South America. Took (2) roadtrips through the Southern USA. Lived Abroad in Brazil and Portugal. One of us got a PhD, and one of us is almost done. Most of all, we have eaten a LOT of food. As of today, we’ve eaten food from 88 different countries – not even half of the total. Between all the different culinary experiences it’s been hard to nail down some favorites, but we had to give it a shot. Here they are, the winners of ETW’s 5th Anniversary Awards:
Best Meal: NEXT Sicily, including the drinks, Chicago, Illinois.
Best Service: Coffee Cop, Bangkok, Thailand.
Best Dessert: Giolitti, Rome Italy.
Best Snack: Açaí bowl, Salvador, Brazil.
Best food-related appliance (tie): Bialetti and Molcajete.
Best ambiance Confeitaria Colombo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Best place worth the drive: Sweatman’s, Holly Hill, South Carolina.
Best Discovery: Yogurt and Honey, Greece.
Best Market: Ortigia Market, Siracusa, Italy (post coming soon).
Best Food City: Singapore.
Most fun overall experience: Getting snacks on a Brazilian beach.
Filed under Note
On our first full day in Lisbon, after acquiring our monthly metro passes we decided to head downtown and reacquaint ourselves with Lisbon. Surprisingly, we pretty much remembered our way around, and sampled a few Pasteis de Nata as we headed toward the Tagus River. Unfortunately, it started to drizzle unexpectedly ( and counter to weather reports) so we ducked into Betrand Livreiros, a bookstore in the Chiado neighborhood, to avoid the rain. Naturally, as we waited out the weather, we starting browsing for books. There was a pretty healthy culinary section with a bunch of global cookbooks – but one in particular caught our eye: Cozinhas do Mundo em Portugal (World Cuisines in Portugal). However, this was not a cookbook, but a guidebook! Along with descriptive information about various cuisines, typical ingredients and meal structure, the book listed restaurants in Portugal that specialized in each cuisine. While the book covered all of Portugal, there are many restaurants in Lisbon. Cuisines from Asia, Europe and Africa are represented, from obvious choices like Japan and Italy to the more esoteric Guinea Bissau and Luxembourg. There are even a few Irish pubs and American restaurants listed. We just couldn’t pass up this cool book, and it is now part of our growing travel book library in Lisbon. It is already littered with sticky tabs and we are well on our way to checking a few more countries off of the list.
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So the Olympics are officially over – and we are sad (though we are looking forward to Rio)! However, while the international athletes may have gone home, the international food scene in London is only growing. With over 8 million people, London has an amazingly diverse population and food scene. Indian food, arguably the most popular cuisine in the UK, is found nearly everywhere in the city, and there are amazing Indian restaurants for every budget. While London has long been home to South Asian food on Brick Lane and has a Vibrant Chinatown, it is home to many other far-flung cuisines. London Ethnic Eating is a blog dedicated to exploring ethnic food in the city, turning up eateries ranging from Vietnamese to Algerian. Time Out London’s List of top 50 restaurants includes many international options.
Brick Lane at Night
Filed under Links, World Eats
Olympic Cookies from Papery and Cakery
The Olympics are on – one of our favorite times! In honor of the event we are going to be covering the national dishes of Gold Medal winning countries, along with other Olympic-related foodie tidbits. Let the games begin. If you’re feeling extra festive, why not whip up a batch of Olympic cookies.
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The British website We Heart is arbiter of all things design-related, and we have always been impressed by their coverage of international restaurant design. Though most of the restaurants we frequent are of the hole-in-the-wall variety, we always appreciate some elegant design, and judging by the coverage on We Heart, there are some pretty innovative ideas out there. The photo above is from an ultra-modern, stark-white Cioccolato a chocolate shop/bakery in Mexico City. Another futuristic design is presented by the monochromatic Arthouse Cafe in Hangzhou, China. For a more industrial look, check out this Philly-style diner, Pat’s, in Melboourne, Australia. The photo below is of Nando’s Ashford in Kent, UK, a sister restaurant in the Nando’s chain M visited in Washington D.C. More photos of the Ashford Nando’s are available at Design Milk. For even more cool restaurant designs, check out the Lifestyle section of We Heart. For those who want to delve deeper, Dwell Magazine has an interesting post about the history of restaurant design.
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
Easter may be over, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t make holiday-themed food (and we aren’t going to be retiring our Peeps-shaped muffin pan). In that spirit, we have a roundup of some international carb-heavy Easter recipes for your enjoyment.
A blog worth visiting for global food inspiration is Epicurious’ Around the world in 80 dishes, which feature the history of the dish as well as a video and a recipe. They feature recipes from Egypt, Jamaica, The Philippines, Hungary – everywhere! The latest recipes is Doro Watt – an Ethiopian favorite.
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A beautiful post on the Flickr Blog has an assortment of pictures of spices from around the world. It’s worth a view. I am particularly impressed by these spice displays – they look too perfect to be real.
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
[Via Vidafine] I was intrigued by this interesting marketing for the Sydney International Food Festival, where food representative of a country’s cuisine was arranged like the flag of the country itself. Check out the Vietnamese flag done in starfuit and lychees, and the French flag made out of cheeses and grapes. How clever. You can find flags from Greece, India, and more, here at PSFK.
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
An Eid feast in Malaysia by Phalinn Ooi
Today is Eid Al-Fitr, the end of Ramadan, which means the daily fasting is over. So naturally, it is a day of copious feasting. Naturally, recipes and traditions vary widely from area to area, so here’s a range of recipes and stories from around the world to honor Eid. The Smithsonian delves into Eid food traditions from Lebanon to Indonesia. NPR has a story and a collection of recipes, including fruit chaat. Finally, here’s a recipe from Faith at Thought 4 Food for date bar cookies.
You’ve probably seen these heart logos on a box of ice cream before, weather in the US or abroad. The iconic shape, introduced only a decade ago, is Unilever’s Heartbrand. I never really realized the reach of the Heartbrand until I was in Spain, and saw ‘heartbranded’ ice cream stalls all up and down the boulevards and beaches. The heartbrand wasn’t actually unveiled until 1999, and Unilever uses it across most of its worldwide offerings, with local names particular to the country. Apparently, Good Humor, one of the many Unilever ice cream brands, is unfolding its logo from the Heartbrand, more info about this is on the design blog Brand New. Though the behemouth that is Unilever scares me a bit, its interesting to think that a little heart logo can mean ‘ice cream’ across the world.
Filed under World Eats
Art Basel is one of the premier contemporary art events in the world, so we were excited to see a show featuring food there. Street food to be exact. Mike Meiré’s Project called “Global street food” features photo, video and most importantly, an amazing range of vendor carts and kitchens. There are pieces from all over: from a lollipop vendor in Argentina to a fruit stand in Namibia. Below is a floating market from Vietnam.
Filed under Design and Photography, Links
There’s no theme this week. Just some interesting links and tidbits:
It’s not called Fat Tuesday for no reason. Shrove Tuesday, the last day before Lent begins, is a traditional day of feasting. Naturally, in the US the focus is on Creole and Cajun Mardi Gras foods due to the big way that New Orleans celebrates the holiday. For an awesome intro, Epicurious has a new guide on Cajun and Creole food, because as we learned, there is a difference. If you’re feeling especially festive (or hungry) Chow has a recipe for King Cake (Galette des Rois – seen below) and Gumbo Pages has a history and recipe of the ubiquitous Muffaletta.
However, in addition to the Nawlins Mardi Gras we know and love, there are some other pretty great food traditions, such as Paczki Day in Chicago. Paczkis (pronounced poonch-key) are filled doughnuts and are traditionally consumed in areas with high Polish populations. On the other side of the pond, the tradition in England is to have Shrove Tuesday Pancakes (is it a coincidence that IHOP has free pancakes today?). In Sweden, the day is called Fettisdagen, and a traditional pastry of semolina wheat called Semla is consumed. Basically every country or community that celebrates Easter has their own Mardi Gras food traditions, and they all sound pretty delicious to us!
Filed under Holidays, World Eats
Eating The World 