PicoBlog

When I’m camping in the US, my go-to staple food is rolled oats, because they’re available in most stores, and I can cook them if I have a stove or just re-hydrate them overnight in kefir, buttermilk, or water. But here in Mexico, I wanted to try something more local. I learned about pinole back when I read Born to Run; it’s the preferred trail ration of the Rarámuri (aka Tarahumara), probably the world’s best long-distance runners.

Don’t know what to do with all the random bits of leftover pasta in various shapes lingering in your cupboard? Romans use those bits, commonly called pasta mista, to make this hearty chickpea stew, though of course you could use any small pasta. Flavored with garlic, rosemary, anchovies, and tomatoes, It’s pretty much exactly what you want to eat on a cold winter evening.  Pasta e ceci is one of those humble, home-style dishes that rarely turns up on restaurant menus, but everyone’s mother or grandmother makes it at home—and each family has their own version.

(SCHENECTADY, N.Y., October 30, 2023) - With a band sporting black suits on a dimly lit stage and songs filled with images of darkness and death sung in a voice seemingly channeling another dimension, Bob Dylan’s concert at Proctor’s Theatre on Monday night could well have been a Halloween special. Except for the fact that pretty much every Bob Dylan concert and new song since at least 1997 has had a Halloween-ish aspect to it, or a battle with mortality, after the Nobel Prize-winning rock poet almost met his maker (or, as he likes to say, “almost went to see Elvis”), having succumbed to a rare heart infection that had obituary writers scurrying.

Welcome to the Brown History Newsletter. If you’re enjoying this labour of love, please do consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your contribution would help pay the writers and illustrators and support this weekly publication. If you like to submit a writing piece, please send me a pitch by email at brownhistory1947@gmail.com. Check out our Shop and our Podcast. You can also follow us on Instagram and Twitter. The scenery outside bore no resemblance to her reality.

In either late in 2000 or early 2001, dark days during my tenure at Warner/Reprise. David Kahne walked into my office at the Ski Lodge (Warner Bros. Records) to ask me if I would take over the A&R duties for Wilco. The Reprise and Warner Bros. A&R staffs had recently split into two distinctive bodies. Joe McEwen, who had signed Uncle Tupelo, the band whose break-up had spawned Son Volt and Wilco, kept A&R oversight of Son Volt given he was officially on the Warner Bros.

Hi everyone, Yesterday The Unpublishable shared an essay from a guest writer, Kimia Dargahi, titled “You’d Be Even More Beautiful With A Smaller Nose.” It has been brought to my attention that the guest essay contained many instances of plagiarism, with lines and phrases lifted from this article written by Dina Nayeri for VICE in 2014. I apologize to Dina Nayeri and to all of you — the readers who come to The Unpublishable for original reporting on ignored or under-examined topics in the beauty space — for not realizing this prior to publishing Kimia Dargahi’s piece.

As Prince Edward, the Duke of Edinburgh, turns 60 today, I want to share a story about his sporting enthusiasm—and his character and personality—that has never been told before. It involves my husband, Stephen G. Smith, who wrote a feature for The New Yorker magazine in 1991 about the venerable and complicated racquet sport known as court tennis in the United States and real tennis in Britain.  Stephen’s account of the match they played was meant to be the surprise ending of the article, but it was cut in the editing.

What is a sandwich? It’s a question that people have been arguing about for the internet equivalent of generations, without getting any closer to an answer. Great philosophers have been roped into the debate. Does a sandwich have a Platonic form? If so, then a hot dog is surely a debasement of that form, and should not be called a sandwich. On the other hand, if the telos of a sandwich is to deliver meat easily by hand to mouth by means of bread, then surely a hot dog fulfills that telos—and so, from Aristotle’s perspective, it is indeed a sandwich.

The first stop in our newly released -zine, Il Mare, is the beautiful island of Capri. A rocky island surrounded by azure blue seas, it is located just a short ferry or hydrofoil ride from Naples, Italy in the Tyrrhenian Sea. Summer playground to Roman emperors, European nobility, and Hollywood stars, it’s a magical place that holds a special place in my heart. Like many other tourist hotspots in Europe, its daytime population swells to an unmanageable size but if you can visit like a local or stay overnight, it can be a perfect vacation spot.