Rachel Laudan

Ensaimadas are the utterly delicious coiled flaky pastries made of wheat flour and lard, and found in Menorca (which I have visited) and Mallorca (which I have not). How did these two little islands in the Mediterranean come to have these pastries and when, what are the connections with the series of invaders (including Muslims [...]

Sorry, folks.  I hit the publish on this before I meant to.  In any case an interesting story in Slate.  I’d actually put the beginnings of the Japanese move to wheat at the beginning of the twentieth century.  That established the idea that wheat was good and strengthening, laying the foundations for the  big increase [...]

So now from urbanization to industrialization, the second of the two culprits that Paul Krugman fingers for the awfulness of English food. 1.  Perhaps Krugman means that the British industrial revolution was responsible for industrialized food.  I don’t think he can because the dates are all wrong. At least in its classic period, usually, if [...]