Slim Gaillard's Yep Roc Heresy, the first Jazz Song in Arabic

Food is always an amazing inspiration. Just learned about the great Slim Gaillard today and loved Yep Roc Heresy.

From Wikipedia:
Arabic is sprinkled about Gaillard's songs. The song "Yep-Roc-Heresy" 3:07 - 1945 is a good example. This song is made up almost entirely of Arabic food names. The title of the song is taken from the first two words of the song, which are "yabraq" or in Arabic "يبرق" (pronounced "يبرأ" "yabra'" in the Levant, and mostly in northern parts of today's Syria), which is another name for the Turkish Dolma or stuffed grape leaves. The second word is "[harisseh]," which is a sweet desert made from semolina flour - recipe.

Other Arabic words used in the song are: Burghal (burghal), Mahshi (stuffed), kibbeh siniyyeh (kibbe in a tray), anna biddi (I want), Masari bahh (No money), banadoura (tomato), ruzz (rice), eidi maksura (I am broke), Arak (Arabic: عرق [ʕaraq]) (a liquorice liquor), lahame mishwie (grilled meat), basal (onion).

This may be the first jazz song in Arabic. Some say he was reading from a menu of an Arabic restaurant, but this does not explain for his use of phrases such as, "no money" or "I am broke."

In the 1940s, the song was "banned in the radio for being suggestive", for its suspicious lyric references to drugs and crime.

The actual origin from these phrases comes from his time living in Detroit. He was out of money by the time he made it to Detroit and was turned down a job at Ford. An Armenian woman named Rose Malhalab (last name indicates connection to Aleppo, Syria) took Slim in, where he lived in the basement of her and her husband's beauty shop on Woodward Avenue. She cooked much Arabic food for him, explaining Slim's entire song.

Team Awesome Space Pizza

TEAM AWESOME SPACE PIZZA from Farolito Films on Vimeo.

The guys from Roberta's are at it again with this phenomenal video for Yoxi the social change/challenge site. The Challenge: To Reinvent Fast Food. The Answer: Team Awesome Space Pizza. Roberta's short film is about solving world hunger, putting a farm on every rooftop in NYC, and making pizza in outer space. Cheggit!!

WNYC x Just Food

Hosted at WNYC's Jerome L Greene space, check out this three-part series on Local Food and sustainability. Buy tickets here!

NY Art Book Fair

Of course all my favorite things in life are bulky and heavy. Books being on the top of my list. This weekend is a great opportunity to add to my ever expanding collection at the fifth annual NY Art Book Fair. Sponsored by Printed Matter, the fair is FREE! hosts over 200 international presses, booksellers, antiquarian dealers, artists and publishers from twenty countries, offering the best in contemporary art book publishing. Check it out at PS1 starting Friday and take a stroll around the corner to grab some buffet Indian eats at Five Star. Not bad for a day's work!

Ramadan 2010

Next Thursday is Eid ul-Fitr, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan. One of the five pillars of Islam, Muslims around the world follow the example of the Prophet Muhammad and fast from dawn to dusk. Ramadan is a prayerful month and the idea that people all over the world are fasting and reflecting on their spiritual journeys is very powerful to me. Check out the Boston Globe's series of beautiful images of Muslims across the globe coming together for Ramadan--in prayer, in celebration, and in meals. (Can someone please make chocolate mosques in NYC?) Happy Eid ul-Fitr to all my folks! Thanks Rukhs!!

Soul Food

The NYTimes published a great interactive feature about combat meals served to soldiers from over 50 countries in Afghanistan. A totally fascinating viewpoint on the comforts of food, home, and military culture on the ground. Soldiers from different countries trade meals; the French ration of cassoulet, deer pâté and nougat, used to be worth three American rations. I especially love all the different matchboxes included in each combat ration. Check out 14 dining packets from varying countries here!

Healthy Bodegas

What would NYC be without our cornerstores, delis, and bodegas! GrowNYC, the organization behind the city's greenmarkets, has started a welcome new initiative with the DoH and Red Jacket Orchards to deliver farm-fresh, locally grown produce to Bed Stuy bodegas! Ive loved the influx of green carts across the city and in my neighborhood and this new program is another great step in the right direction. Healthy Bodegas has the potential to transform the "food desert" of neighborhoods like ours by offering healthy food options AND convenience. Now I can grab beers, snacks, seasonal vegetables AND vanilla dutches at my corner spot. Thanks Kat!!

Healthy Bodegas Initiative from CENYC on Vimeo.

HNH BBQ @ Trophy Bar

We're back at trophy bar for our monthly residency tonite and not only are we celebrating the one-and-only Dennis Ngo's birthday but we're also debuting our first fall special -- Four-Meat Texas Chili!! Sweet Tea Cocktails for $5 and Brisket in the Backyard. Sebastian, Don and EPak on the wheels spinning new wave!!

Florent: Queen of the Meat Market at NYFFF

This week marks the opening of the 4th annual New York Food Film Festival. On Thursday, for one night only, join Florent Morellet to taste a selection of original menu items from Restaurant Florent and watch the World Premiere of David Sigal's "FLORENT: Queen of the Meat Market", a heartwarming film about the man behind the legendary restaurant. In June of 2008 cherished New York restaurant Florent closed its doors forever, marking the end of an era. Florent Morellet, the openly HIV-positive restaurateur turned his namesake diner in the Meatpacking District into a hotbed of activism and a community that welcomed one and all. These are the extraordinary stories and times of Florent, the staff, patrons, and celebrities who made up an extensive family. With appearances by Julianne Moore, Isaac Mizrahi, and Christo and Jean-Claude. This feature-length documentary chronicles the ups and downs of the French bistro's 23 glorious years. All proceeds for this special night go to the Food Bank of New York City! Get Tickets Here!

Mr. Softee In China

Im not a huge fan of Mr. Softee but it is one of those things that seems quintessentially New York. The NYTimes reports that they're expanding their powdery cold empire into China, land of the lactose intolerant. Read the whole article here.

For more than half a century, Mr. Softee has been as synonymous with New York summers as open fire hydrants, its blue and white trucks and instantly recognizable jingle luring children throughout the city, from Washington Heights to Coney Island.

New York being a tough town, Mr. Softee has also endured its share of bumps and bruises. It has fought about noise with the city, which no longer allows Mr. Softee trucks to play their jingle while parked.

The company hired private detectives to spy on Mr. Softee impersonators, and Mr. Softee drivers have gotten into verbal and even hand-to-hand battle with rival ice cream vendors.

Along the way, this quintessential New York institution has pursued an unlikely road to globalization...

"It happened almost by accident. An American working as an English teacher was walking around the streets of the city where he taught and noticed a deluge of American fast food franchises, but found nothing resembling the kind of soft-serve ice cream that his college roommate’s family had turned into a multimillion-dollar enterprise.

And that’s how Mr. Softee went to China.

Now this staple of New York City life is being served 7,000 miles away, on the streets of Suzhou, an ancient city of more than six million people about 50 miles west of Shanghai. Mr. Softee or Mr. Soft Heart, the English translation of “ruan xin xian sheng” — there is no Mandarin word for Softee — has been a hit, with sales doubling every year since the first truck started rolling three years ago...

"Customers like Meng Xiangbo, 19, a college student, have proved Mr. Conway right. He is a regular customer of the Mr. Softee truck that peddles its treats in Suzhou’s university district.

One recent balmy afternoon, Mr. Meng ordered a kiwi sundae.

“They have six flavors,” he said of the sundaes. “I eat a different one every day. On Sunday, I rest.”

Francis Lam Hearts Biggie

On the anniversary of Biggie's death, one of my favorite food writers Francis Lam connects the dots between hip hop and food.

I didn't think much of Biggie Smalls while he was alive. He had a few hits, he had ridiculous sunglasses, he was the opposite of a handsome man and he rapped about his girl-stealing suavity with a mushy mouth. But after he died, after I wondered why there were marches in the street for him, after my friend Eric handed me a cassette with the words "Best of Big" scrawled on the label, I came to love him, in that way where the best artists become, you hope, a part of you. He rapped about the life of a street hustler-turned-playboy, about blunts and broads and sex in expensive cars, but along the way he taught me who I would be as a writer on food.

A collection of Biggie's finest food rhymes

Biggie was a funny man, and he mastered the silliness of sex and food. Back to "Juicy":

The Moet and Alizé keep me pissy
Girls used to diss me
Now they write letters 'cause they miss me
I never thought it could happen, this rappin' stuff
I was too used to packin' gats and stuff
Now honies play me close like butter played toast
From the Mississippi down to the East Coast

And he built a legacy in masterpieces of carnal seduction like "Big Poppa":

We can rendezvous at the bar around two.
Plans to leave, throw the keys to Lil' Cease.
Pull the truck up front and roll up the next blunt,
So we can steam on the way to the telly. Go fill my belly –
A T-bone steak, cheese eggs and Welch's grape.
Conversate for a few, 'cause in a few, we gon' do what we came to do.
Ain't that right, Boo? (True.)

I mean, if he can make your girl leave you for that level of romance, what couldn't he do? Outside of sex appeal (when "b**ches used to go, 'Ewww!'") Biggie also rapped often about his fabulous wealth, invoking culinary luxuries, like here, in "Hypnotize":

I can fill ya wit real millionaire shit: escargot.
My car go
160, swiftly. Wreck it, buy a new one –
Your crew run run run; your crew run run.

And just imagine him, all 300-plus pounds, lazy eye and top hat, rollin' through his English gardens, contemplating seafood as he does in "I Love the Dough":

Country house, tennis courts, and horseback
Ridin', decidin': cracked crab or lobster?
Who says mobsters don't prosper?


Read the full post here.

Village Voice Choice Eats

The folks over at the Village Voice are bringing together over 50 of the cities most diverse and delicious restaurants together for a food extravaganza in the third annual Choice Eats Tasting Event!! Some of my favorite restaurants including the homies from An Choi, Mantao Chinese Sandwiches, Pinche Taqueria and Kuma Inn will be dishing a selection from their menus. Check the full list of participants here!

The Village Voice’s Third Annual Choice Eats

Monday March 22, 2010 6:30 - 9:30pm
The 69th Armory at Lexington Avenue
68 Lexington Ave @ 26th Street, NYC

Featuring eclectic culinary favorites of resident food critics, Robert Sietsema and Sarah DiGregorio, The Village Voice is proud to present our third annual curated Choice Eats tasting event. Handpicked restaurants from all five boroughs featured in the Fork in the Road and Counter Culture columns are represented, along with complimentary craft beer pairings, wine and liquor beverages.

Photoshop Cooks

A video made in stopmotion for competition AdobeYouGC. What if you could use photoshop to whip up cookies instead of images?

Food Print NYC Mini Conference

Foodprint NYC is the first in a series of international conversations about food and the city. From a cluster analysis of bodega inventories to the cultural impact of the ice-box, and from food deserts to peak phosphorus, panelists will examine the hidden corsetry that gives shape to urban foodscapes, and collaboratively speculate on how to feed New York in the future. The free afternoon program will include designers, policy-makers, flavor scientists, culinary historians, food retailers, and others, for a wide-ranging discussion of New York’s food systems, past and present, as well as opportunities to transform our edible landscape through technology, architecture, legislation, and education.

Date: Saturday, February 27

Time: 1 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.

Location: Studio-X (180 Varick St., Suite 1610, New York, NY 10014)

Free and open to the public

Adventures with Ruth

Even though Gourmet Magazine shuttered with its last print issue in November of 2009, the brand continues to live on through some interesting programming choices online and on TV. I caught the last episode of Gourmet's Adventures with Ruth first season today on PBS. Part travelogue, part cooking show, Adventures with Ruth has the former Editor-in-Chief jetsetting to food capitols in Laos, Morocco, Mexico, the US and beyond. The episode I caught features the amazingly charming Jeffrey Wright and explores the culinary landscape of Jackson Heights, Queens with chef Julie Sahni. Not only do we get an insider's peak into the community, the restaurants, and the green market, but our guides introduce straightforward recipes to try out at home. In Brooklyn, you can catch the show next Monday, 1/11 and 1/18 at 7:30PM on WLIW Channel 21. Check the clip below.

Bodega Talk

Where does the food in your bodega — or the corner grocer, the local minimart — come from? Who decides whether to stock tortilla chips or salad greens, and how much they'll cost? How come it's easier to find fresh fruits and vegetables in Brooklyn Heights than in the South Bronx? What's the connection between the incidence of diabetes and the food market supply chain?

Last year the Brooklyn-based Center for Urban Pedagogy set out to answer these questions, and the result is Bodega Down Bronx, a 29-minute video created by CUP staff in collaboration with local high school students at New Settlement's Bronx Helpers, a service learning organization focused on civic engagement.-Thanks DesignObserver

Kickstarter

Kickstarter is a funding platform for artists, designers, filmmakers, musicians, journalists, inventors, explorers... Kickstarter is a new way to fund creative ideas and ambitious endeavors. Project creators keep 100% ownership.

At reality bites: a mail-order snackfood company, pledge $ to have homemade ice cream, fig bars and other yummies delivered to your doorstep. Reminds me of those Urban Fetch days when we were too *lazy* to walk from our dorm room to the corner store.

HSNY Screening: Know Your Mushrooms

Im a huge fan of The Horticultural Society of New York and tonite they have an awesome program...a special screening of Know Your Mushrooms followed by a Q+A with Gary Lincoff, one of the experts interviewed in the film. Check the info and trailer below!

WEDNESDAY, October 7
Green Screen Film Series:
Know Your Mushrooms
With special guest speaker Gary Lincoff
Written, Produced and Directed by Ron Mann
Original music by the Flaming Lips

Mushrooms – we put them on our pizza and steaks and in our soups and salads, we marvel at their variety and are sometimes repelled by their grotesque beauty when encountering them in the bush. And yeah, some have even sampled their more exotic possibilities and asked the question: "Do mushrooms come from a far away planet?" Still, others have asked: "Can mushrooms save the planet?"

The world of fungi and their integral relationship with the health of the planet have only recently been appreciated. The oldest and largest living organisms recorded on Earth are both fungi. And their use by a new, maverick breed of scientists and thinkers has proven vital in the cleansing of sites despoiled by toxins and as a “clean” pesticide among many other environmentally-friendly applications.

Know Your Mushrooms follows uber myco visionaries Gary Lincoff and Larry Evans (two of the more expert and unforgettably mercurial characters in the community) as they lead us on a hunt for the wild mushroom and the deeper cultural experiences attached to the mysterious fungi.

At The Horticultural Society of New York
Doors open at 6pm; film starts promptly at 6:30pm
HSNY Members $5; non-members $10

Mmmmm...Deep-fried Butter

My childhood BFF Wendy went to the State Fair of Texas near her current home in Dallas this past weekend and enjoyed the bounty of the State Fair -- corndogs, funnelcake, turkey wings, Texas tater tornado, and deep fried butter. Yes, that's right, DEEP FRIED BUTTER! The evil mastermind behind this artery-clogging creation, Abel Gonzales Jr., is the current State Fair Fry King and has come up with a slew of deep fried goodies over the past year including Fried Coke, Texas Fried Cookie Dough and Fried Peanut Butter, Jelly and Banana Sandwiches. For this year's fair he came up with an idea of scooping a golf-ball sized ball of butter (your choice of garlic, cherry or grape flavored), freezing, battering and dropping the little bundles of butter into the deep fryer. Check the full Dallas News story here. "It tastes like a doughnut hole or butter stuffed in a roll."

Vertical Farming

NOTE: This is one of the most important Op-Ed pieces I've read in awhile! Let's bring agriculture to the heart of our cities!!! Happy Monday reading.

By DICKSON D. DESPOMMIER

If climate change and population growth progress at their current pace, in roughly 50 years farming as we know it will no longer exist. This means that the majority of people could soon be without enough food or water. But there is a solution that is surprisingly within reach: Move most farming into cities, and grow crops in tall, specially constructed buildings. It’s called vertical farming.

"Imagine a farm right in the middle of a major city. Food production would take advantage of hydroponic and aeroponic technologies. Both methods are soil-free. Hydroponics allows us to grow plants in a water-and-nutrient solution, while aeroponics grows them in a nutrient-laden mist. These methods use far less water than conventional cultivation techniques, in some cases as much as 90 percent less.

Now apply the vertical farm concept to countries that are water-challenged — the Middle East readily comes to mind — and suddenly things look less hopeless. For this reason the world’s very first vertical farm may be established there, although the idea has garnered considerable interest from architects and governments all over the world.

Vertical farms are now feasible, in large part because of a robust global greenhouse initiative that has enjoyed considerable commercial success over the last 10 years. (Disclosure: I’ve started a business to build vertical farms.) There is a rising consumer demand for locally grown vegetables and fruits, as well as intense urban-farming activity in cities throughout the United States. Vertical farms would not only revolutionize and improve urban life but also revitalize land that was damaged by traditional farming. For every indoor acre farmed, some 10 to 20 outdoor acres of farmland could be allowed to return to their original ecological state (mostly hardwood forest). Abandoned farms do this free of charge, with no human help required.

Read the full NYTimes Op-Ed here.