Most of us who cook know that saffron is one of the rarest and definitely the most expensive seasoning in the world. We also know that the reason saffron is so expensive and rare is that the threads are actually the stigmas of a specific crocus flower, Crocus sativa, grown primarily in the Mediterranean region and parts of the Middle East, and must be harvested carefully by hand. Cooks use saffron for the concentrated carotine that turns anything it touches bright yellow, as well as its slightly bitter flavor and aroma.
If you want to know more, then let me point you to these three links from 3QuarksDaily, where Elatia Harris has been writing about saffron intermittently since 2007. In these articles, Harris not only writes about the culinary aspect, but also the history of saffron as medicine, luxury, cultural artifact, and more. If these articles aren’t the chapters of a book-in-progress I’ll eat my hat (seasoned with saffron, of course).
Dear Harvey, Pete, Barry, Kevin, and every other weathermonkey on Boston-area TV: Enough is enough. The fucking blizzard was THIRTY-TWO YEARS AGO. It’s time to stop trotting out the same blurry videotape of cars stuck on Rt. 128 that is older than some of the people who are actually on your broadcast, [...]
It’s going to be a long two months waiting for the iPad to actually ship so that all the tech bloggers and their hangers-on will stop writing so much speculative bullshit about iT and turn their attention iNstead to some other thing that’s going to Change Life As We Know iT.
Since you cannot click a [...]
Please, please, PUH-LEEZE stop talking about “What do we call the last decade?” Nobody could come up with an acceptable choice ten years ago, and nobody’s going to come up with one now. “Aughties” and “Naughties” are contrived and stupid, and so is the very idea that anything wraps up all nice and [...]
Thanks to Shelley for alerting me that last night’s edition of the local TV newsmagzine “Chronicle” featured Harvard Humanist Chaplain Greg Epstein, whom I blogged about recently in conjunction with the various atheist billboard campaigns around the country. I was busy helping Charlotte do her homework, so I didn’t watch the show, but WCVB’s [...]
