Food news antipasto

Bravo TV’s Top Chef is shaking things up a little, heading to London to celebrate its 20th season. The program will feature a cast of international all-stars focusing on winners and finalists from previous seasons.  All of this season’s contestants have appeared on one of the many different Top Chef iterations that have aired around the globe. 

In the northern parts of the world, harvest season is starting in earnest. Finding ways to use all of the garden’s bounty can quickly become overwhelming, which is where preserving steps in to offer assistance. Saveur is here to help, offering 8 of their favorite pickle recipes to use as inspiration. From there, head to the EYB Library, where you will discover more than 3,100 online pickle or pickle-adjacent recipes.

If you are like me, the process of pairing wine with food can be a daunting challenge. There is so much advice available online that it can be overwhelming, some of it contradictory and a lot of it dubious at best. However, matching wine with food doesn’t have to be scary, says drinks writer Eric Asimov. He demystifies the concept, in the process debunking some of the myths that have have grown up around wine pairings.

Sometimes I glance at my overflowing bookshelves and wonder if I will ever get around to cooking from each and every cookbook that I own. I realize that some of these books might go unread for months or possibly years as my reading list grows ever longer. But that’s okay, because having more books than you can ever read is actually a good thing.

Over at Modern Farmer, you will find a lovely article/interview with Michael Twitty about his recently released book KosherSoul. The book explores the cultural crossroads of Jewish and African diaspora cuisine and issues of memory, identity, and food. The question that most intrigues him is not just who makes the food, but how the food makes the people.

You may have seen the viral video of the bear cub in Turkey that appeared to be intoxicated after consuming ‘mad honey’. This may have led you to wonder what the heck ‘mad honey’ is, or maybe even where you could find it. Gastro Obscura to the rescue! They have an article explaining everything you ever wanted to know about this hallucinogenic sweetener. (Don’t worry about the cub: it was rescued, is being treated by a veterinarian, and will be released back to the wild soon.)