Food

Affairs of the Art World
By MAURA EGAN

When Margot Henderson and Melanie Arnold were scouting for a place to hold a dinner for the artist Anselm Kiefer after his opening at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac in Paris last fall, they found the perfect spot: a metal factory. For the two women, who run Arnold & Henderson catering in East London, it wasn’t just the factory’s location, which is near the gallery in the city’s Marais district; it was the rawness of the industrial space — a complement to their no-frills cuisine as well as the artist’s rugged aesthetic. The 240 guests, including the French prime minister, sat down at long banquet tables while the cooks worked out of a makeshift kitchen. Dishes were served family-style from large bowls and platters; the entrée, veal shin on the bone, arrived with a knife sticking out of it. The “chichi Parisians” had to carve it themselves. “They went mad for it,” Arnold recalls. And so did the artist. Since then, Arnold & Henderson has gone on to produce other dinners for Kiefer in London, the most recent in a Soho parking garage. More

Melange

The Way We Live Now
Mixed Messenger
By PEGGY ORENSTEIN

A few weeks ago, while stuck at the Chicago airport with my 4-year-old daughter, I struck up a conversation with a woman sitting in the gate area. After a time, she looked at my girl — who resembles my Japanese-American husband — commented on her height and asked, “Do you know if her birth parents were tall?”

Most Americans watching Barack Obama’s campaign, even those who don’t support him, appreciate the historic significance of an African-American president. But for parents like me, Obama, as the first biracial candidate, symbolizes something else too: the future of race in this country, the paradigm and paradox of its simultaneous intransigence and disappearance.

It’s true that, over the past months, Obama has increasingly positioned himself as a black man. That’s understandable: insisting on being seen as biracial might alienate African-American leaders and voters who have questioned his authenticity. White America, too, has a vested interest in seeing him as black it’s certainly a more exciting, more romantic and more concrete prospect than the “first biracial president.” Yet, even as he proves his black cred, it may be the senator’s dual identity, and his struggles to come to terms with it, that explain his crossover appeal and that have helped him to both embrace and transcend race, winning over voters in Birmingham, Iowa, as well as Birmingham, Ala. More

Review of the Chicago 10

If I have any quibble with Chicago 10,it is a minor one. Although some of us are old enough (ahem) to remember the high-profile media coverage of the trial and grok the circumstances surrounding it, perhaps a little hindsight analysis or discussion of historical context would have been helpful for younger viewers. But as I have already said, perhaps Morgen wanted to steer clear of the usual clichés, like parading a series of talking heads with gray ponytails, sentimentalizing and waxing poetically about the halcyon days of yore. Besides, if you “remember” the 60s, you probably weren’t there anyway, right?

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/saturday-night-at-movies-allow-me-to.html

With two bottles in the fridge...

I'm off later this morning for a mixed Easter celebration. Have to make some bean pate to take with. The weather outside is not frightful, but it sure as hell ain't spring. It's been snowing the whole weekend, and yesterday, when the sun would break through the clouds, it would melt, and then the clouds would reform and snow would fall again. I want my global warming back.

If you celebrate this holiday in any form, may it be a happy one; if not, may it be a fine day and warmer than it's going to be here.

It may not be the end of the world...

But, it's close: We're outta garlic!

Ittsa

Good thing I live next to the Asian ghetto. Garlic, lemon, buns, & a quacker for later.

Easter

At friends in Uptown

4,000 Now And Counting!

4 Soldiers Killed in Baghdad, Pushing A.P. Count to 4,000 Killed in Iraq

The U.S. military said four American soldiers were killed by a bomb in Baghdad, raising The Associated Press's count of the U.S. death toll in the war to at least 4,000.

Read More:
http://www.nytimes.com/?emc=na

Vote McCain! Another 10,000 years occupation and a few million more dead!