Golden State-shaped cutting boards

A Brooklyn-based husband-and-wife design duo made state-shaped cutting boards for their wedding last year and, after lots of oohs and aahs, decided to turn their craft into a business venture on Etsy.

The cutting boards are made from Plyboo, a butcher block architectural plywood made from 100% rapidly renewable bamboo. They can be cut to resemble any state -- even Maryland (see below) -- featuring a heart engraved over wherever you call home. Sold for $40 each, the boards can be purchased at etsy.com/shop/AHeirloom.

ALSO:

Ruth Reichl on Gilt Taste

Outstanding in the Field coming to L.A.

Hot cheesecake from Mount Zion Hotel

-- Caitlin Keller

Photo credits: Amy Stringer-Mowat

Survival cooking demo at High Desert Test Sites workshop

Artists Danielle McCullough and Gabie Strong will lead a sun-print cyanotype-process workshop, "Blast Site: A Workshop for Conjecture," on Nov. 12 at the High Desert Test Sites headquarters in Joshua Tree.

The workshop explores survival in the high desert, primarily grounded in post-apocalyptic science fiction, plant guides, archaeological archives and 20th century art history. The day's itinerary includes a guided hike through Blast Site, a cyanotype-process printing demonstration using sunlight and materials gathered from the desert floor, a survival cooking demonstration and a barbecued vegetarian lunch.

The lunch is part of an overall arts experience, incorporating native vegetation. Mushrooms marinated in a homemade vinegar and desert aromatics will be seared on hot rocks in a fire pit and served on mesquite flour flatbread, with pickled nopalitos, homemade yogurt and pinion seeds. Alcohol-based tinctures and teas derived from an assortment of local desert plants will be served to workshop attendees too. 

Registration for the workshop is $120 per person. Highdeserttestsites.com.

ALSO:

Google buys Zagat guides

Turntable Kitchen: food and music

Wine-grape harvest time in Santa Barbara

-- Caitlin Keller

Photo credit: Gabie Strong and Danielle McCullough, Blast Site: A Monument for Future Failures, 2011. Cyanotype fabric, painted leather, slipcrete, silver, ash, paint, pallets, wood, 16mm film with pen and ink,  and 16mm projector. Installed in at Shangrila, New Moon exhibition, Joshua Tree. Photo courtesy of Gabie Strong.

Turntable Kitchen: Pairing food and music

Food and music combined can meld two art forms into one blissful, head-bobbing, hip-shaking pairing. After dancing around the kitchen of their San Francisco apartment time and time again, Kasey and Matthew Hickey decided to take their love for food and music a step further by launching the website Turntable Kitchen.

The couple hand-picks music to be listened to while cooking and eating suggested recipes. Recent pairings include a sweet corn and raspberry ice cream paired with Canadian singer-songwriter Feist's "Let It Die"; and a blueberry-mint jam paired with the self-titled debut album by Brooklyn-based trio Widowspeak.

Through Turntable Kitchen, the Hickeys hope to introduce more people to the natural connection between food and music. To that end, Matthew picks the music and Kasey chooses the recipes. Most recently, the duo launched the Turntable Kitchen Pairings Box, a monthly subscription in which subscribers receive a hand-assembled box in the mail with a custom-mixed vinyl record featuring favorite and up-and-coming bands; seasonal, themed recipes; dried ingredients; and suggested pairing and tasting notes.

Below, the couple share their thoughts on the topic of, you guessed it, food and music:

What restaurants in San Francisco do you find yourself going to again and again -- and what do you order?

Kasey Hickey: Outerlands (any of its soups and a side of bread), NOPA (giant baked beans and a pork chop) and Koo (amazing appetizer called Spoonful of Happiness -- it's to die for, and comes with a shot of sake).

How do you begin when selecting a song?

Matthew Hickey: When I select a pairing, I like to start by thinking about the flavors in the meal. I'll write down a few descriptive terms to help get the process going with words like floral, sweet, rustic, intense, subtle, upbeat, textured, contemporary, etc.  I'll also take into account geographic factors, which can help narrow down my selections. So, for example, if we have a sweet, upbeat and rustic recipe that includes ingredients that are commonly associated with the Pacific Northwest, I'll go through my record collection and rack my brain for a band whose music is also sweet, upbeat, rustic and, ideally, from the Pacific Northwest.

Favorite cookbook?

Kasey: The Canal House series are always on heavy rotation, "Heart of the Artichoke" by David Tanis, "Good to the Grain" (for baking) and both of Heidi Swanson's books. Even though we're not vegetarians, I love her interesting twists on seasonal cooking and choices of spices and grains.

Recent ingredient-obsessed usage?

Kasey: Marash pepper -- I put it in and on everything these days. I'm obsessed!

Five favorite recipe-song pairings?

Matthew: I have a number of personal favorites, but five recent ones that come to mind are (in no particular order):

1. SBTRKT paired with honey and rose water tapioca
2. The Decemberists paired with spicy, picked green beans
3. Beirut paired with poached halibut and corn salad
4. Crab pasta paired with James Vincent McMorrow
5. The Black Keys paired with the American burger

ALSO:

New grapes at the market

Cabana cocktails at the Peninsula Beverly Hills

Eat Florence

-- Caitlin Keller

Photo: Turntablekitchen.com

Nigel Slater's 'Toast' coming to Nuart Theatre in October

Food writer and cook Nigel Slater's bestselling memoir Toast: The Story of a Boy's Hunger, an autobiographical account of his childhood told through food -- 1960s British food, that is -- was made into a film by Ruby Films for BBC1 in 2010, starring Helena Bonham-Carter and Freddie Highmore.

Clancy Sigal, who reviewed the book for the Los Angeles Times in 2004, says "I don't know when I laughed so hard at such a poignant story as Nigel Slater's boyhood.... Among its many delights, his memoir is an easily digestible lesson in how to let your stomach heal your hungry heart" (read the full review here).

The film will be showing at the Nuart Theatre for one week, starting on Oct. 7.

Nuart Theatre, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West L.A., (310) 281-8223, landmarktheatres.com.

ALSO:

Shin-Sen-Gumi to open in Little Tokyo

Atwater Crossing Kitchen to open for dinner

Pancake floor pillows

--Caitlin Keller

Food culture: History's making us hungry at the Norton Simon

"Paintings of food shine out at me with their voluptuous colors and shapes whether I am hungry or not," says Eleanor Congdon. As educator for the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Congdon creates tours of interest for museum guests including a food paintings tour titled “Dinner at the Norton Simon: Food in Paintings” that was featured in June.

Throughout the museum’s galleries are a range of still life and genre paintings depicting food from the 17th to the 19th centuries. The Chardins, Courbets and Manets, among others highlighted in the tour, reveal a subject eternally relatable for its viewers. Whether depicted as necessity or extravagance, with symbolism or none at all, food is visually stimulating enough to provoke its viewer to go beyond the surface and imagine the possibilities of its textures, aromas and tastes.

“Symbolism [in the food paintings] disappears over the centuries and the painting techniques evolve over the course of time just as with other subjects in art," says Congdon. "What does not ever disappear is their lusciousness and the invitation to eat.”

Congdon has kindly re-created the food paintings tour for Los Angeles Times readers, which can be viewed here. Bon Appetit!

411 W. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (626) 449-6840, nortonsimon.org.

ALSO:

Test Kitchen tips: Rolling out pie and cookie dough

The Taste chef panels

Fonuts

--Caitlin Keller

Image: Still Life with Cherries, Strawberries and Gooseberries, 1630, by Louise Moillon
Credit: The Norton Simon Foundation

Tamasin Day-Lewis on jewels and radishes

 

Tamasin Day-Lewis — English chef, food writer and sister of "There Will Be Blood" star Daniel Day-Lewis — and the design house of Hemmerle have collaborated to conceive "Delicious Jewels," a book that simultaneously explores the tastes, textures, shapes and bold colors of both jewelry making and cooking, two different but equally eminent art forms. [Updated 11 a.m. July 18: An earlier version of this post described Hemmerle as a publishing house.]

"Both rely on technique, long experience and tradition, purism and originality without pretentiousness," says Day-Lewis. She adds, "Elegant simplicity at best, both are beautiful to the eye and a joy to the senses."

In celebration of summer and its agricultural offerings, we've asked Day-Lewis to share her thoughts on the recently released book, her favorite California eats, and what she's cooking up this season: