caravia/culture

A historic hamam in Istamboul, a great blog from one of the oldest cities in the world.

La librairie sonore offer excellent audiotapes and remastered material from the beginning of the French radio and television.
This is one of my favorites, the psychoanalyst Francoise Dolto speaking about education of children.

Computer games as fine culture, artists and players working together to make Art, unthinkable when I started to write reviews about computer games in the old Commodore 64 times!

"The video game as a medium and a style of life has reached its middle age along with the first generation of people who grew up playing them. The non-linear, interactive, processor based narratives, which at first mimicked Hollywood and struggled to convey their simple content with 8-bit processors, gradually became the largest entertainment industry in the history of electronic media. RESET/PLAY is a critical exploration of contemporary art inspired by video games. Questioning the history, control mechanisms, political and art-historical implications of electronic games, RESET/PLAY assembles a formidable group of international artists who are making a significant impact on this growing post-game artistic sub-genre."

Excellent mediacritical blog showing interesting weblinks and videos related to mediaactivism and creativity.

The comeback of the offal!

"First came two small bites: at the back, on the fork, is porchetta di testa, which is a boned, rolled, marinated pig's head that's slowly braised, then left to cool and set in its own gelatin until it congeals into something sliceable. It's sort of an upscale head cheese (Cosentino has an excellent step-by-step recipe on his blog--informative, but not for the squeamish). It had a rich, silky texture and a wonderfully full, pork flavour--heaven's lunchmeat. Nice call, too, topping it with a slice of peppery radish and sharp pecorino--like the champagne, they cut the richness beautifully ("cutting the richness" would become the evening's theme).

A soft-boiled egg and shaved cured pork heart topped the crouton in front. Ordinarily, the thought of eating an egg would have made me retch (I haven't touched a bite of egg in almost three decades), but in the spirit of the evening, I managed to swallow this one. It was fine. I don't think soft-boiled egg and pork heart sandwiches will replace ham-and-egg rolls anytime soon, but I'm glad I tried it."

Thanks to my friend Tapwater, tapwater.stumbleupon.com [tapwater.stumbleupon.com] who introduced me to this intelligent and wellwritten blog/magazine about Art, culture and literature. A generous way to present an intelligent review, with all articles online.

From the page: "Colostrum- the rediscovered health food
By Dr Clive Dalton

Every spring I take the risk of asking rural Kiwis if they have ever eaten "beestings pudding"�? When I explain that "the beestings" is colostrum or the first milk from a newly calved cow, their answer inevitably is a "Oh Yuk, Gross, Never!"�

Everyone knows a calf needs its mother's colostrum to protect it from all the nasties in the environment. The dam does not pass these antibodies to the calf via the blood before birth. They have to be absorbed via the small intestine in colostrum -and without delay to be most effective. After about 6-12 hours the ability of the calf to absorb antibodies drops rapidly.

But the thought of making colostrum into anything for the table is unimaginable to Kiwis. The word "beestings" doesn't help. It's a word common in Scotland and parts of England with some modification for example to "beestlings" in the Yorkshire dales.

But things have changed recently in New Zealand, with the recognition of colostrum as an export health food. If men and women body builders are into it -then maybe it has something.

Over the last three years, dairy companies have paid farmers a premium for colostrum in spring, instead of penalising farmers who dared to sneak it in the vat before the cow had been calved four days (8 milkings for a cow and 10 for a heifer). Dairy factories making powder hated colostrum as it clogged up the driers when heated and had to be chipped off.

A high value export market has now developed particularly in Asia and Japan, so our good old "beestings"� is now appearing in small sachets in health shops overseas, at what to us seem exorbitant prices. Long may it continue, and long may overseas consumers believe in the benefits, (real or imagined) and be prepared to pay for them.

But colostrum straight from the cow has the wrong image. It has to be marketed in an expensive pack with a fancy name from a health food or sports nutrition shop. Funny how an image can change things. Remember there's a lot of folk believe that what's expensive in a fancy pack must be good for you.

So take these recipes below and imagine you have just seen them in a glossy woman's magazine by a high-profile TV chef, or in a main-stream sports fitness or body building magazine. Actually they are taken from and old recipe book published by the UK Farmer's Weekly in 1946 -but don't mention that. In 1946 nothing on the farm had to be wasted."

A great book written by one of my favorite writers, Bruce Sterling, the creator together with William Gibson, of the cyberpunk literature.