Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, July 18, 2011

Published by Monday, July 18, 2011 Permalink 0

by Simon de Swaan

I don’t altogether agree that a plain green salad ever becomes a bore — not, that is, if it’s made with fresh, well-drained crisp greenstuff and a properly seasoned dressing of good-quality olive oil and a sound wine vinegar. But I do agree that all this talk about ‘tossed salads’ is a bore; it seems to me that a salad and its dressing are things we should take more or less for granted at a meal, like bread and salt; and not carry on about them.–Elizabeth David, in The Spectator, 1961

Elizabeth David, food writer (1913-1992) who with wit, wisdom, and various cookery ingredients the British were obviously suspicious of, she introduced the English to fresh, flavorful fare and a sensual approach to the art of eating.

Many of her books are available in the Penguin classics series.

 

 

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, July 13, 2011

Published by Wednesday, July 13, 2011 Permalink 0

Grilling, broiling, barbecuing – whatever you want to call it – is an art, not just a matter of building a pyre and throwing on a piece of meat as a sacrifice to the gods of the stomach.–James Beard

James Beard, in Beard on Food, (1974). Beard was an American chef and food writer who authored 20 books and was instrumental in bringing French cooking to America in the 1950s. World Culinary Institute offers a brief biography. His legacy lives on with The James Beard Foundation.

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, July 12, 2011

Published by Tuesday, July 12, 2011 Permalink 0

A number of rare or newly experienced foods have been claimed to be aphrodisiacs. At one time this quality was even ascribed to the tomato. Reflect on that when you are next preparing the family salad.–Jane Grigson

Jane Grigson, English food writer championed by Elizabeth David as a result of her first book Charcuterie and French Pork Cookery published in 1967 to high acclaim.

 

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, July 8, 2011

Published by Friday, July 8, 2011 Permalink 0

by Simón de Swaan

Poverty rather than wealth gives the good things of life their true significance. Home-made bread rubbed with garlic and sprinkled with olive oil, shared – with a flask of wine – between working people, can be more convivial than any feast.–Patience Gray, Honey from a Weed: Fasting and Feasting in Tuscany, Catalonia, the Cyclades and Apulia

Patience Gray was an English food writer who introduced Mediterranean tastes to Britain. She died in March of 2005. More can be read about her in The Guardian’s obituary.

Simon de Swaan, daily food quote, Simon Says. The Rambling Epicure. Editor, Jonell Galloway.

 

 

 

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, July 7, 2011

Published by Thursday, July 7, 2011 Permalink 0

In the summer there is also holiday cooking. That may well mean food cooked in an unfamiliar kitchen equipped, more than likely, in an impersonal and inadequate fashion by the owners of a house, holiday villa, or caravan hired out for the summer.–Elizabeth David (Summer Cooking, London, 1965)

Elizabeth David, British food writer (1913-1992), who helped change the way Britain saw food.

 

 

 

 

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Wendell Berry: Daily Food Quote, June 29, 2011

Published by Wednesday, June 29, 2011 Permalink 0

“Odd as I am sure it will appear to some, I can think of no better form of personal involvement in the cure of the environment than that of gardening. A person who is growing a garden, if he is growing it organically, is improving a piece of the world. He is producing something to eat, which makes him somewhat independent of the grocery business, but he is also enlarging, for himself, the meaning of food and the pleasure of eating. (pg. 88, “Think Little”)”—Wendell Berry (The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry)

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Wendell Berry: Daily Food Quote, June 27, 2011

Published by Monday, June 27, 2011 Permalink 0

by Jonell Galloway

Better than any argument is to rise at dawn and pick dew-wet red berries in a cup.Wendell Berry

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, June 24, 2011

Published by Friday, June 24, 2011 Permalink 0

by Simón de Swaan

Food is a subject of conversation more spiritually refreshing even than the weather, for the number of possible remarks about the weather is limited, whereas of food you can talk on and on and on. Moreover, no heat of controversy is induced by mention of the atmospheric conditions (seeing that we are all agreed as to what is a good day and what is a bad one) and where there can be no controversy there can be no intimacy in agreement. But tastes in food differ so sharply…that a pronounced agreement in them is of all bonds a union the most intimate. Thus, if a man hates tapioca pudding he is a good fellow and my friend.–A. A. Milne, “Lunch” (1934)

Alan Alexander Milne was an English author, best known for his book about a teddy bear named Winnie the Pooh.

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, June 16, 2011

Published by Thursday, June 16, 2011 Permalink 0

by Simón de Swaan

[A Comice pear is] sweetly and subtly perfumed…so soft it is best eaten with a spoon, a tenderness more appealing to gourmets than to those who have to pick, ship, handle and store it in constant fear of ruinous spoilage.–Waverley Root, Food

Waverly Root, author of Food: An Authoritative and Visual History and Dictionary of the Foods of the World, was an American journalist and writer, best known for the book The Food of France published originally in 1958, and is still in print today. He died in 1982. Click here to read his obituary.

 

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Simon Says: Daily Food Quote, June 14, 2011

Published by Tuesday, June 14, 2011 Permalink 0

by Simón de Swaan

How much cheese is a handful? How much more or less is a cupful? What is the capacity of a glass, a tumbler, or a soup ladle? What is the difference between a suspicion and a pinch? How much more is a good pinch? How much wine is a little, how many olives a few? When a book says a tin of chopped almonds or pomegranate juice what are you supposed to understand by that?–Elizabeth David (1913-1992), English food writer

 

Elizabeth David made significant contributiosn to the food world. Her book Spices, Salt & Aromatics in the English Kitchen is a classic.

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