Friday Bread Basket: 1/1/21
New Year who dis?
This week’s Friday bread basket is going to be a quickie, because I’m away on vacation in an amazing 1970’s-era modernist rental house out on Cape Cod with not-so-amazing 1970’s-era internet service. (Uploading that image of the Supremes shooting peel-apart Polaroid—my all-time favorite film stock—took about 30 minutes.)
Thi spro ductis notre alnot hin gisreal
This product—from internet hooligan Obvious Plant—is not real, but I sure wish it was. If it was real, I’d ask my mom to buy it for me.
Newsletter News
I was so pleased to see that I made my fellow Substack 2020 fellow Edith Zimmerman’s end-of-year list of favorite newsletters. There are so many good ones to follow these days that I’m super honored to make such a list. Her newsletter, Drawing Links, is one of the ones I always make time for, and love (it helps that it comes in an easy-to-digest comics form, but that’s hardly the only reason). The rest of her list looks great too, I can see a bunch more I need to subscribe to now.
Here’s my own list (partial, for sure, and in no particular order):
Drawing Links, by Edith Zimmerman (comics about life and interesting things; thrice weekly)
Dear Bread, by Amy Halloran (on bread and life; weekly-ish)
Smart Mouth, by Katherine Spiers (shortform food writing by multiple authors; weekly)
Garbage Day, by Ryan Broderick (helpful explainers on internet memes; a few posts a week)
Vittles, by Jonathan Nunn (longform food essays by a variety of authors; a few posts a week)
Soup and Despair, by Rebecca Orchant and Sarah Flynn (food writing and recipes, in a time of crisis; weekly)
The Reading, by Yanyi (creative writing advice; weekly)
Sourced, by Chloe-Rose Crabtree + Anna Sulan Masing (food writing focused on how and where ingredients are sourced; biweekly)
Stained Page News, by Paula Forbes (cookbook publishing news; every other daily)
Indigestion, by James Hansen (longform food writing and interviews; a few posts a week)
From the Hip, by Lisa Donovan (food writing and interviews; a few posts a week)
Make Big Shadows, by Klea McKenna (musings on photography and art; bi-weekly)
The Department of Salad, by Emily Nunn (on salads and life; weekly-ish)
Newsbreader, by Dayna Evans (on bread and life; occasional)
From the Desk of Alicia Kennedy, by Alicia Kennedy (food writing and interviews; thrice weekly)
Process, by Wesley Verhoeve (photography; weekly)
Substack On!
In other news, I’ve been invited to give a talk at the Substack On! conference next Friday, January 8, at 3PM EST, a one-day virtual event aimed at bringing writers together around what's possible on the platform. I’m sure you don’t really want to listen to me jaw on about my newsletter and how it came to be, but there are loads of other way more interesting people also presenting, including Cheryl Strayed, Judd Legum, and Thao Nguyen. It’s free for all, and you can sign up here.
-> Substack On!
Florida Fermentation Fest: Bread and Butter January
And on Sunday, January 10, at 11AM EST, I’m going to be interviewing fermentation god Sandor Katz, for the Florida Fermentation Fest’s “Bread and Butter January”, a series of virtual talks and demos on bread, grains, and fermentation. We’ll talk about his latest book, Fermentation as Metaphor (spoiler alert, it’s really interesting), as well as discuss practical fermentation projects (let me know if you have burning questions you want me to ask him below). You can find all the details for the month of free events—which includes friends and luminaries of the baking world—here.
-> Florida Fermentation Fest: Bread and Butter January
Yeah, yeah, I know I said this was going to be a short one, but it wasn’t. I’ll try harder next time. Welcome to 2021, everyone. So far so good, right? Have a peaceful weekend.
—Andrew