humanity
Humanity topics include pieces on the real lives of chefs, professionals, amateurs, inspiring youth, influencers, and general feel good human stories in the Feast food sphere.
Bring a Plate
The chickpeas have been sitting in their bowl since last night, fat and smug, and the kitchen window is open because it's November and Auckland has finally decided to commit to spring. Somebody down the road is burning sausages. That smell does what it always does to me. It sends me back fourteen years, to a backyard I couldn't find again if you paid me.
By Gautam Atmakuria day ago in Feast
A Recipe for Flame-Grilled Saber-Toothed Tiger
My mother and sister bought me my first cookbook when I left home for university, believing every young man should know at least the basics. The blurb described it as a list of simple recipes every woman should be able to cook. I thought that was a bit sexist, but it was a woman’s weekly cookbook, so who was I to complain?
By Garry Condoseres10 days ago in Feast
Not on Any Menu
Our booking was for 7:30pm. It was our first table for two since our son arrived, four months earlier, and my wife had ironed a shirt for me as if I had a court date. By ten past seven the baby had other ideas. He started the long, round cry that has no obvious cause and no obvious end, and at 7:25 I was on the phone to the restaurant, apologising to a young man who said "no worries at all" in the voice of someone already crossing us off.
By Gautam Atmakuri12 days ago in Feast
The Ramen Wars of Culinary School
In culinary school, they teach you to respect food. They teach you the mother sauces. They teach you knife cuts with names that sound like ballet moves. They teach you to taste everything, season in layers, and never send out a plate you would not be proud to eat yourself. I graduated with honors, and I took every bit of that seriously.
By Overdrive Records12 days ago in Feast
A Few Beers with Michael Douglas
Everyone randomly sits on a weathered deck outside the restaurant patio late summer left to my own devices as my acquaintance who invited me here wanders off to mingle with old friends and family she once estranged. I think it is a first communion or something of the sort. Resembling swaying daisies in the distant field, little girls run in white dresses being chased by little boys or maybe it is a formal kids birthday party. My acquaintance told me what the occasion is, my mind elsewhere at the time it had been so long since I’ve been out of the city I really didn’t care about the occasion, just getting out was a welcoming delight. Not knowing the children or their parents or what the celebration is I sat quietly in the welcoming sunshine and sipped on a cold beer listening to my thoughts in general and the woman are looking lovely so there is that. To my surprise one of the lovely ladies in a short skirt sat across from me, a slight sideways glance, an attempted smile, her eyes never left me as she slowly sat keeping her knees tight as a trap. I didn’t stare back but could feel this penetration of sight on my body, a magic she seems to possess. Struggling not to notice her short skirt and her healthy thighs crossed at the knee gives me the sweats, a feeling of nervous tension as Michael Douglas may have had in that movie. The title of the movie momentarily slips my mind under these circumstances but late summers tapping on autumns shoulder expelling warm sunshine, a comfortable heat, a warmth that wouldn’t produce sweat from sitting motionless, I could feel my arm pits moistening with these tensioning thoughts of all the days pleasures being offered to me, where skin meets hem and that shadowy space between her crossed legs and I try not to make a scene of that particular point of interest.
By Gerry Thibeault13 days ago in Feast
The Bowl That Never Had a Name
It was after midnight and the only light in the kitchen was the one above the stove. His mother had already gone to bed. His sister was upstairs with the door closed. He was sixteen and still awake because the house felt too quiet after his father left for the second time that year. He opened the refrigerator because he did not know what else to do with his hands.
By Overdrive Records14 days ago in Feast
What's On the Menu at My Mother's House
Not on the Menu challenge: The Prompt - Write about something memorable you ate that you'd never find on a restaurant menu. Not every unforgettable meal comes with a reservation. Maybe it was something your grandmother made without a recipe, a questionable combination you invented as a kid, a snack discovered halfway across the world, or a meal thrown together from whatever happened to be left in the fridge. It might have been incredible. It might have been terrible. You might still be trying to figure out what was actually in it. For this challenge, write about something you ate that you'd never expect to see on a restaurant menu. Tell us what it was, where you were, who was there, and why you still remember it. The food doesn't have to be fancy or even particularly good. It just has to come with a story.
By Denise E Lindquist16 days ago in Feast
