The Bluestocking, vol 213
dismantling the patriarchy OR cooking with turmeric
Happy Friday!
Today’s Spark is about testosterone, “the hormone that dominates and divides us.” This was an interesting (and challenging) one for me, because the question of sex differences is so contested, and so prone to appropriation in various culture war skirmishes.
Carole Hooven’s book, Testosterone, is both short and accessible, if you would like to know the difference between congenital adrenal hyperplasia and complete androgen insensitivity (which can result in XX or XY individuals who have the appearance of the opposite sex) and also learn more about the mating habits of red deer.
Helen
Alison Roman Just Can’t Help Herself (New Yorker)
At the end of 2018, Roman débuted what became known as #TheStew (né Spiced Chickpea Stew with Coconut and Turmeric). To make it, you soften garlic, ginger, and onions in olive oil. You add chickpeas, frying them with red-pepper flakes and turmeric, then simmer them in coconut milk. After wilting in greens, you serve the dish with mint leaves, a dollop of yogurt, and toasted flatbread. The recipe was healthful. It was warming. It was, to some readers, obviously an Indian chana masala or chole or, alternatively, a Jamaican chickpea curry. “This is neither a soup nor a stew, it’s called chana masala, and Indians have been eating it for centuries. Seriously, 🙄,” an Instagram user named Priya Ahuja Donatelli wrote, in the comments of a post in which Roman had announced a giveaway with an equity-focussed spice company, inviting readers to respond with their “favorite ideas for dismantling the patriarchy OR cooking with turmeric.”
Lauren Collins profiles Alison Roman, an Instagram cookery writer turned NYT cookery writer turned cancelled cookery writer (the NYT fired her last year for making disparaging comments about the fact that Chrissy Teigen and Marie Kondo have their own branded cookware).
The meat of this piece is a discussion of whiteness/privilege in food writing, and whether Roman needs to be more aware of the cultural roots of her dishes, and more vocal generally on social-justice issues. I’m slightly sympathetic to Roman’s own view, which is that she’s not very interesting on social-justice issues and therefore is better off sticking to the cookery.
I also think it’s very hard to talk about cultural appropriation in relation to food. For example. What are these?
Five points if you said “pierogi”, the Eastern European form of dumpling.
OK, so what are these?
These are gyoza, the Japanese form of dumpling (derived from the Chinese jiaozi, as the name reveals).
And what are these?
These are empanadas, in this case from Argentina.
Of course there are regional differences in these dishes—you won’t find dairy in the traditional Asian versions—but lots of cultures have either independently come up with the idea of encasing meat in pastry, or traded that idea through sailors turning up somewhere and reminiscing about the Cornish pasties of their youth.
As with lots of these debates, I feel like the actual, real grievance in the Roman story—it’s easier to make it as a cookery writer if you’re white and attractive (female) or white and brooding (male)—has been subsumed underneath a much more nebulous argument about the origins of cuisines and who gets to cook which dishes.
Alison Roman’s real crime, on the evidence of this profile, was her tone—she was glib and sarcastic, when the age demands earnestness and self-deprecation (or even self-abasement) from successful white women. “I’m not trying to pivot to being, like, ‘All right, buckle up, this is my new food blog, and I’m going to teach you about racism,’ ” Roman tells the interviewer. “It’s about continuing to be myself, a more sensitive version of myself.” And then she prevaricates about whether she can cook with lentils without looking racist.
Succession, if Succession was a romantic comedy about Tom and Greg:
Meeting Nick Clegg in the Metaverse (Financial Times)
Nick Clegg may be available in Berlin. He has a slot in Paris. He’ll make time for lunch in Brussels. Then Omicron hits, and the vice-president of global affairs at Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is not coming to Europe after all. Instead Clegg offers to meet . . . in the metaverse, the immersive digital world hyped as the successor to the internet. In the metaverse, no one can give you Covid. So I put on a bulky virtual reality headset, sign away my data and log into a simulated meeting room.
There I find that the one-time deputy prime minister of the United Kingdom is now a wrinkle-free avatar with the word “Nick” hovering above it. “Can we get the sneering and mockery out of the way?” says the avatar. Sadly not, because he doesn’t have any trousers on. Neither do I. We don’t even have legs. To quote Microsoft computer scientist Jaron Lanier, Meta’s vision of the metaverse has so far not resolved “basic issues of geometry”.
Henry Mance interviews Nick Clegg as an avatar. There is, unbelievably, a video.
Quick Links
Christopher Hitchens died ten years ago this week. Here is what his brother Peter wrote at the time (Mail).
“I cannot find Neil Shastri-Hurst, a barrister, for the Conservatives, but I am used to it: in four by-elections I have not met a single live Conservative candidate. They are shy, semi-mythical beings ever in peril of being chased into cupboards by Newsnight reporters.” Tanya Gold visits North Shropshire, scene of the Owen Patterson-inspired by-election. (Unherd)
What it’s like when your play is terrible flop. (Guardian)
Prince Albert: palace moderniser, absolute rotter. (Unherd)
See you next time!
But may I misunderstood the « or » … is cooking with turmeric an option ?
Depressed to learn that turmeric plays an essential role in dismantling the patriarchy … I hate turmeric.