we were clean like kerosene
this and that 6/20/25
I’m cranky because I unexpectedly have to fast all day before I go to the doctor this afternoon. I’m almost 100% useless when I’m hungry, so I’ll wait until this weekend to write about my Father’s Day trip to the Seventh Day Adventists bookshop/health food store in Glendale. The Back to the Garden recipe I cooked this week is from a restaurant that opened in 1936, so a couple of ingredients were a bit obscure.
In the meantime, I’ll catch up on my this and that, which I didn’t get to do last week after my drive back down to LA. I cooked less than I thought I would in Berkeley because my mom didn’t have much of a post-surgery appetite. But I made a couple of things I hope we all enjoyed.
I whipped up a double batch (ambitious) of the North African Couscous Paella from the 1994 post-Katzen Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home. I wrote about this dish, and the ‘90s obsession with couscous and paella, back in January. It’s really good, one of the few recipes from this project that I’d put in my regular weeknight rotation.
I also made Hetty Lui McKinnon’s brand new Chickpea, Spinach and Feta Pie from NYT Cooking. McKinnon is operating an active Substack, churning out recipes for the Times, and has a new cookbook coming out! How does she do it? This recipe is stellar: a skillet spanakopita with chickpeas for protein and a hit of lemon zest. I added almost three times the greens called for (a 16oz bag of frozen rather than 5oz of baby spinach), and it still wasn’t too much.
Other nights we ate out or picked up. Tlayudas and rellenos from Comal, pizza from Dimond Slice (a credible Cheeseboard dupe), and my ultimate childhood comfort food, a bean and cheese burrito from Gordo.
A couple of stray questions for the culture:
Will LA ever get an actual Mission-style burrito place? Or is the cultural divide too great?
Has Cheeseboard spawned enough imitators that “East Bay” can be considered a legitimate regional pizza style? I say yes. Substacker Abby from Crabapples + Honey wrote about it last summer. Definitely worth a read.
Back in LA, on Sunday I made the mysterious mid-century Seventh Day Adventist recipe I can’t shut up about. More on that to come. Let’s just say, for now, it didn’t last as long as I thought it would. That could be good or bad. Maybe it was so tasty John and I ate the whole thing in one night. Or maybe it was so disgusting I had to scrape it directly into our compost bin out back so it wouldn’t infect the other food in the refrigerator. Stay tuned to find out.
I will admit that Monday and Tuesday dinners required some improvisation. Frozen veggie burgers and a better than expected tuna/extra-sharp cheddar/Ezekiel melt for me, taquitos and more taquitos for John.
Wednesday night I made two recipes from Raghavan Iyer’s seminal 660 Curries, Sweet-Tart Split Green Lentils with Mustard (pg 383) and Broccoli with Ginger and Coconut (pg 466), along with some brown rice with turmeric, mustard seeds and saffron. Maybe one day I’ll write more about 660 Curries. The book never ceases to amaze me. Everything I cook from it is like nothing I’ve ever tasted before. If you have one Indian cookbook in your collection, this should be it. I’m lucky to live a few blocks from a great Indian grocery store, but even if you live nowhere near one, the ingredients needed to make good Indian food are more readily available in American supermarkets than the specialty ingredients of many other cuisines.
My WFH lunches this week were clean-out-the-fridge stuffed peppers using a bunch of over-the-hill poblanos I didn’t get a chance to cook up in Berkeley. I stuffed them with mushrooms and some red quinoa and flageolet beans I picked up at Berkeley Bowl. Random, but they got me through the week.
What else is going on?
The night before I left for Berkeley, my friend Aggie invited me to a Bleak Week screening of a new 4K restoration of Todd Solondz’s Happiness at the Egyptian. (To my newer subscribers: Aggie and I used to talk every week on mic about Gwyneth Paltrow, an eight-year-long folie à deux). Happiness was one of my favorite movies in high school (yes, I’m an extremely disturbed person) and it absolutely holds up. It’s equally hilarious and horrifying, and Solondz and his cast navigate the tonal changes perfectly. The bonus: Lara Flynn Boyle and Camryn Manheim were there in person, talking about their experiences working on the film. Amazingly, that night was the first time Boyle had seen the movie.
My only cinematic theatrical experience this week was a peaceful afternoon among the Materialists at the Americana. Does the movie work? Not entirely. Is Pedro Pascal too bland and undynamic to be a real movie star? Perhaps. But I enjoyed it. At least writer/director Celine Song was going for something beyond the typical rom-com pablum. And you’ll never catch me saying anything bad about my low-energy unbothered not-quite-acting queen Dakota.
Did you know there was an earlier adaptation of The Children’s Hour before the Audrey Hepburn/Shirley MacLaine version? I had no idea until I was listening to Michael Koresky on Nicholas Rapold’s podcast talking about his new book, Sick and Dirty. Miriam Hopkins and Merle Oberon are the gal pals, but in this version (called These Three) they’re not quite as lesbian-y (Hays Code, hello). The rumor the bitchy little girl (Oscar-nominated Bonita Granville) starts is not about Hopkins and Oberon hooking up, it’s about Hopkins hooking up with Oberon’s fiancé, the extraneous Joel McCrea. I watched it on HBO Max at my mom’s house, and it’s super fun. Hopkins (the spunk! the Southerness!) might be my pick for most underrated ‘30s movie star. I even tried to tell my 8-year-old nephew the story of Oberon hiding the fact she was half Indian in order to make it in racist, Golden Age Hollywood. He just wanted to play Minecraft.
Wednesday night, John and I needed something to watch, and I (without doing my due diligence) suggested the new Apple TV+ “thriller” Echo Valley. It stars Julianne Moore and was written by the guy who wrote Mare of Easttown, how bad could it be? Something happened somewhere in the filmmaking process, because I cannot believe that Moore, Sydney Sweeney, Domhnall Gleeson, Fiona Shaw, and Kyle (one scene) MacLachlan would voluntarily sign up for this. Gleeson (as a sociopathic drug-dealer/murderer/aspiring stableboy) comes off the best here, and Shaw (playing a lesbian NAMED LEZ) provides a few camp moments.
One of two straight-male-hosted music podcasts I listen to, Indiecast, was discussing the evolving meaning of the somewhat derogatory term “dad-rock”, coined in a 2007 Pitchfork Wilco review. It originally meant a contemporary song or band too indebted to or enthralled by 60s-70s classic rock. But, now it’s come to mean any music enjoyed by men who are “dad-aged.” Two (I guess formerly?) cool indie acts have apparently graduated into dad-rock territory, Philly weirdo Alex G and Asheville country-grunge act Wednesday. Are they mellowing out because they’re on major labels? Is it an attempt to court the NPR audience? The natural aging process?
The Laurel Canyon barnyard vibe on Wednesday’s Elderberry Wine lacks the bite of some of their earlier songs, but Alex G’s Afterlife (a little Neil Young, a little R.E.M. a little dare I say James) is one of the best things he’s done. Happy belated Dad Rock Day.
Lots to comment on here, but I'm going to stick with Materialists! Overall I liked it; I think there should be more movies about money. BUT, I agree that Pedro Pascal was miscast. I like him a lot, but let's be honest, he just was too old and not quite good looking enough for that role.