Sunday, November 1, 2009
I'd love to have a room for a night at the White House, but I am not a Podesta
I hesitate to suggest that Obama's eloquent speeches about the importance of higher education is disingenuous . . . I relate strongly to the stories he tells about his mother being a struggling graduate student from Kansas. (Those are two things I share with her, plus I attended schools where Obama either taught or attended himself). The same institutions that informed the way Obama thinks also played a formidable role in my own intellectual formation. But then I learn that Anthony and Heather Podesta - lobbyists for Sallie Mae - spent the night at the White House. Mr. Podesta claimed that his lobbying efforts failed (see page 2 of this article). However, his wife, Heather, made three additional visits to the Old Executive Office in the White House Complex. Moreover, Anthony Podesta's brother, John, was head of Obama's transition team. I realize these facts are just part of politics. I'm not naive. Nevertheless, it's unsettling information, especially when I think of the way in which I was inspired by Obama's refrain: "We need real change." From this lowly perspective (plus being crushed by student loan debt), I'm not really seeing any of this so-called "real change," and I know that there are millions of others who agree with me. It leaves me wondering why I bothered canvassing for Mr. Obama. It also leaves me wondering if there is any value in obtaining degrees from the most prestigious universities in this country.
Let Me Guess
A 15-year-old female student leaves a dance at her Richmond, California high school. She apparently drinks some alcohol. Then gets beaten and gang-raped by a bunch of hoods while other students stand-by and do nothing for two hours.Wanna take a guess who ends up being sued for a huge amount of money?Yep. Dollars to donuts that it's going to be the school district that ends-up coughing up the cash
ON THE CHOCOLATE TRAIL by P.B. Lecron
WINNING CHOCOLATE
Chocolate-lover David Lebovitz's name keeps popping up in conversations lately, partly because of the recent release of his new book, The Sweet Life in Paris, and partly because the cookbook writer and Californian pastry chef's followers are in a buzz wanting to know who his favorite Parisian chocolatier is. It turns out that his is just about everybody else's: the young and dynamic chocolate-maker Patrick Roger who already has five beautiful and trendy boutiques in and around Paris.
Roger has an irresistible and tastefully contemporary website with funky fringes on which--and here's the good news for folks back home in the States--he has an online boutique that fills international orders. I realize that we Americans love to sling superlatives around like six-shooters saying what is the very best of this or that, but I have to say that www.patrickroger.com has some of the best Web site design in the universe. (If it's worth the hyperbolism, then why not go all the way?) Don't miss his life-size chocolate sculptural creations.
David Lebovitz, who transplanted himself to Paris in 2002 after working as pastry chef for nearly 13 years at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, has a Web site that is pal mal, not bad, too.
Mentionning Chez Panisse reminds me of a San Franciscan friend who sorts people by whether or not they recognize the Marcel Pagnol reference without consulting Google. Her motto is, "Tell me what you read, I'll tell you who you are." It's a spin-off of the 18th century French gourmet and gourmand, Brillat-Savarin's aphorism: "Dis-moi ce que tu manges, je te dirai ce que tu es." Tell me what you eat, I'll tell you who you are.
Whatever you eat, chocolate is always a best seller during hard economic times and what can really count in the comfort zone is a good cup of hot chocolate at the first signs of an autumn cold snap. In a Friday-night card game with a kicky French friend (who has Nutella eyes) we used secret recipes as stakes and I won his grandmother's thick and creamy hot cocoa recipe. Here it is:
Grand-Mère's Old-Fashioned Hot Chocolate
Stir cocoa powder well with one cup of the milk in a very large sauce pan. Heat and add rest of milk. Bring to a near boil, after five minutes add sugar and stir for 20 minutes (yes!) keeping the mixture simmering. Carefully control temperature so that the milk does not boil over, removing pan from heat if necessary.
When the mixture is reduced to about half, add orange zest and stir another five minutes. It's ready when the chocolate is thick and leaves a creamy coating on a spoon. Serves six.
www.patrickroger.com
www.davidlebovitz.com
www.chezpanisse.com
Text & photo ©2009 P.B. Lecron
All rights reserved
Chocolate-lover David Lebovitz's name keeps popping up in conversations lately, partly because of the recent release of his new book, The Sweet Life in Paris, and partly because the cookbook writer and Californian pastry chef's followers are in a buzz wanting to know who his favorite Parisian chocolatier is. It turns out that his is just about everybody else's: the young and dynamic chocolate-maker Patrick Roger who already has five beautiful and trendy boutiques in and around Paris.
Roger has an irresistible and tastefully contemporary website with funky fringes on which--and here's the good news for folks back home in the States--he has an online boutique that fills international orders. I realize that we Americans love to sling superlatives around like six-shooters saying what is the very best of this or that, but I have to say that www.patrickroger.com has some of the best Web site design in the universe. (If it's worth the hyperbolism, then why not go all the way?) Don't miss his life-size chocolate sculptural creations.
David Lebovitz, who transplanted himself to Paris in 2002 after working as pastry chef for nearly 13 years at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, has a Web site that is pal mal, not bad, too.
Mentionning Chez Panisse reminds me of a San Franciscan friend who sorts people by whether or not they recognize the Marcel Pagnol reference without consulting Google. Her motto is, "Tell me what you read, I'll tell you who you are." It's a spin-off of the 18th century French gourmet and gourmand, Brillat-Savarin's aphorism: "Dis-moi ce que tu manges, je te dirai ce que tu es." Tell me what you eat, I'll tell you who you are.
Whatever you eat, chocolate is always a best seller during hard economic times and what can really count in the comfort zone is a good cup of hot chocolate at the first signs of an autumn cold snap. In a Friday-night card game with a kicky French friend (who has Nutella eyes) we used secret recipes as stakes and I won his grandmother's thick and creamy hot cocoa recipe. Here it is:
Grand-Mère's Old-Fashioned Hot Chocolate - 2 liters (1/2 gallon) of whole milk
- 50 grams (3/4 cup) of bitter cocoa powder
- 115 grams (1/2 cup) of sugar
- zest of one half orange (optional)
When the mixture is reduced to about half, add orange zest and stir another five minutes. It's ready when the chocolate is thick and leaves a creamy coating on a spoon. Serves six.
If you enjoyed this and would like to read more of my work, click on
http://That-Defining-Moment.blogspot.com www.patrickroger.com
www.davidlebovitz.com
www.chezpanisse.com
Text & photo ©2009 P.B. Lecron
All rights reserved
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