The Backlog

"Any kind of close listening, though, reveals that the best raps are usually operating in a high gear..."

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:29:00 -0500

“Any kind of close listening, though, reveals that the best raps are usually operating in a high gear of poetical efficiency _against_ the almost Eliotically strenuous limitations of both complex rhythmic demand and the requirement of near-cognate rhyme; the limitations here are the invaluable constraints of form that all good new art helps define itself by struggling against from inside them—the formal Other all ‘fresh’ speech needs. Straight rhyme, for example, is such a stiff formal cincture that in rap it necessitates really complicated prosodic innovations—disordered but effective enjambment, stresses alternated between standard feet, wild combinations of iamb with trochee and of both with spondee, the kind of metrical libertinism that spells f-r-e-e-v-e-r-s-e but is here required by _exactly_ the sort of tight aural walls free verse was all about knocking down”

- Mark Costello and David Foster Wallace, Signifying Rappers 97 [within a Wallace section].

"These ‘nodes of associations’ we call ‘pavlovs’—a unit of measure of..."

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:24:00 -0500

“These ‘nodes of associations’ we call ‘pavlovs’—a unit of measure of everything we feel or think while hearing music we’ve heard before.
Pavlovs can be formed in as many different ways as we can come to love anything. Fucking to an album makes you love that album forevermore (unless of course the woman you were with later breaks your heart into many small pieces, in which case you’ll come to pavlov—yes, it’s also a verb—the album with pain and hate it for all time). Aesthetically, pavloving shouldn’t happen, but in experience it does. Thus at least two young Bostonians alive as of this writing cannot listen to, say, Side A of the 10,000 Maniacs’ In My Tribe in any context without feeling things more pungent than anything sanely attributable to the Maniacs.
Pavlovs are everything we come to associate with music—and can re-experience in listening again—that isn’t ‘in’ the music. They’re what we each bring to bear, when rightly cued. Pavlovs are the saliva that flows when the bells ring.”

- Mark Costello and David Foster Wallace, Signifying Rappers, 90 fn 37 [within a Costello section].

Some links

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 13:32:00 -0500

Here are a few self-promotional links for your Tuesday afternoon.

Back in October, my friend Mahvesh Murad interviewed me for The Herald, the monthly magazine supplement to Dawn, Pakistan’s oldest and most widely-read English-language daily. It was published in November, and you can read it now, by clicking here.

And Velichka Ivanova reviewed my book for the European Journal of American Studies.

"Dixon was alive again. Consciousness was upon him before he could get out of the way; not for him..."

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 16:39:53 -0500

“Dixon was alive again. Consciousness was upon him before he could get out of the way; not for him the slow, gracious wandering from the halls of sleep, but a summary, forcible ejection. He lay sprawled, too wicked to move, spewed up like a broken spider-crab on the tarry shingle of the morning. The light did him harm, but not as much as looking at things did; he resolved, having done it once, never to move his eyeballs again. A dusty thudding in his head made the scene before him beat like a pulse. His mouth had been used as a latrine by some small creature of the night, and then as its mausoleum. During the night, too, he’d somehow been on a cross-country run and then been expertly beaten up by secret police. He felt bad.”

- Kingsley Amis, Lucky Jim, 62.

Roasted Trout, Green Beans, Almonds, and Mint

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 12:48:22 -0500

Last night’s dinner was a big success, combining the idea from Whitney Chen’s excellent piece on roasting whole fish with this side dish from Dinner: A Love Story.

I topped and tailed a bunch of green beans, then tossed them with a good quarter cup of chopped almonds and maybe a tablespoon of chopped mint (if I had more, I would have used more). I took my two boneless whole trout out of the fridge, salted and peppered their insides and outsides, stuffed them with sliced lemon, sliced shallot, and a few sprigs of thyme, and rubbed them with a quickly made garlic oil (i.e., microplaned garlic stirred into olive oil).

I heated up a little too much olive oil in the cast iron pan over medium heat, then added the green beans, almonds, and mint to the pan. After arranging them relatively evenly into a bed, and after they started really sizzling, I laid the trout over top. Then into a 400º oven for fifteen minutes, after which the fish had reached its requisite 145º internal temp.

The fish was perfectly cooked, the combination of green beans with the almonds was really wonderful, and I love that the whole thing only dirtied one pan. I ended up making some simple steam-sauteed spinach as well, so there was a little more dishwashing to do, but nothing too serious.

"Where do these Innate assumptions come from? Not from what We think truest, or most want to..."

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 11:13:41 -0500

“

Where do these
Innate assumptions come from? Not from what
We think truest, or most want to do:
Those warp tight-shut, like doors. They’re more a style
Our lives bring with them: habit for a while,
Suddenly they harden into all we’ve got

And how we got it; looked back on, they rear
Like sand-clouds, thick and close, embodying
For Dockery a son, for me nothing,
Nothing with all a son’s harsh patronage.
Life is first boredom, then fear.
Whether or not we use it, it goes,
And leaves what something hidden from us chose,
And age, and then the only end of age.

”

- Philip Larkin, from “Dockery and Son”

"Grief is, in a sense, the bill that comes due for love."

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 16:25:20 -0500

“Grief is, in a sense, the bill that comes due for love.”

- George Saunders, in his eulogy for David Foster Wallace.

Six ingredients

Tue, 10 Jan 2012 22:12:00 -0500

Three carrots, two stalks of celery, one onion. Two cups of split peas, one smoked ham hock, eight cups of water.

"Why should a life with some unusual metaphysical feature built into it inevitably end in unhappiness..."

Sat, 24 Dec 2011 14:20:58 -0500

“Why should a life with some unusual metaphysical feature built into it inevitably end in unhappiness and early death?”

- Nicholson Baker, The Fermata, 279.

"This obligation to write out one’s own mind, to express the mind’s multifariousness and complexity,..."

Sat, 24 Dec 2011 08:52:00 -0500

“This obligation to write out one’s own mind, to express the mind’s multifariousness and complexity, is something that Wallace and Baker are very interested in. Baker’s subsequent work attests to a slow rumination on everything his eye crosses, while Wallace seems not just committed to cataloging everything that goes through a mind but the act of mental mastication that occurs at the same time. If one could call Baker and find him home thinking, one could find Wallace home thinking about thinking. His stories are above all about thinking, the pain and recursion of it, the entrapment of it.”

- Barrett Hathcock, on Nicholson Baker as the link between Updike and Wallace.

They never made it to the park. They picnicked on each other. As Leonard pulled her toward the...

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:33:00 -0500

They never made it to the park. They picnicked on each other. As Leonard pulled her toward the mattress, Madeleine dropped her packages, hoping the wine bottle didn’t break. She slipped her dress over her head. Soon they were naked, raiding, it felt like, a huge basket of goodies. Madeleine lay on her stomach, her side, her back, nibbling all the treats, the nice-smelling fruit candies, the meaty drumsticks, as well as more sophisticated offerings, the biscotti flavored with anise, the wrinkly truffles, the salty spoonfuls of olive tapenade. She’d never been so busy in her life.

-Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot, 66

I can describe the state I subsequently entered as one of unrelieved busy-ness. Boy, was I busy! I mean there was just so much to do. You go here and I’ll go there—okay, now you go here and I’ll go there—all right, now she goes down that way, while I head up this way, and you sort of half turn around on this … and so it went, Doctor, until I came my third and final time.

-Philip Roth, Portnoy’s Complaint, 137

Oh man, this chicken

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 23:04:00 -0500

Run, don’t walk, to make this Halal-style chicken and rice from the Serious Eats cookbook. The rare recipe that’s as good as the write-up makes it sound. This had me immediately dreaming of variations (as shawarma! swap out the coriander and oregano for cumin and cilantro and make tacos! etc!).

Porchetta, or something like it, at least

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 23:00:14 -0500

I made this poor man’s porchetta a few weekends back, and it was a big success. My pork shoulder was around five pounds (we had seven for dinner), and yet it still cooked in about two hours. Delicious, and even with all the diners, enough leftovers in the freezer for two further meals (for our little family, at least).

From a batch of chicken stock II: black bean soup

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 22:54:34 -0500

After we had the pot pie, I covered a pound of black beans with an inch of water, and left them to soak overnight. They cooked up pretty quickly the next day, with a tablespoon of cumin and a couple of smashed garlic cloves. I guess close to two hours isn’t that quick, but I’m a pessimist when it comes to cooking beans from scratch.

Here’s what I did to make a surprisingly excellent black bean soup.

I cut three slices of smoked bacon into batons, then cooked them over medium heat until a fair amount of fat had rendered out and they were a little shy of crisp. I removed the bacon with a slotted spoon, then added a chopped onion and two minced garlic cloves to the hot fat. After they had softened, I dumped in three cups of cooked beans, a cup of the beans’ cooking liquid, and three cups of that chicken stock. Then I added two tablespoons of the adobo from a can of chipotles. I let the whole thing simmer for maybe twenty minutes, stuck the immersion blender in to partially puree the thing, then added back in the bacon and stirred in some chopped cilantro. A squeeze of lime at the table (ok and some oyster crackers) and we were off.

From a batch of chicken stock I: chicken pot pie

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:28:00 -0500

I roasted a big chicken on Monday.

We were left with plenty of leftover (mostly white) meat, as well as the carcass. On Tuesday night I made a batch of stock from the carcass and the contents of my stock bag in the freezer (various ends of vegetables, as well as a bunch of chicken wing tips).

Wednesday, I made pot pie, and boy was it good. Here’s how.

In my cast iron pan, I sauteed two carrots, a stalk of celery, a medium parsnip, and a medium onion (all chopped) in maybe three tablespoons of butter. After these had gotten soft (I think I let them get a little too soft, actually), I sprinkled on two or three tablespoons of flour, and let that cook for a few minutes. Then I added a few handfuls of the leftover chicken, maybe a half a cup of green beans cut to one-inch lengths, a similar amount of frozen peas, two or three tablespoons of chopped parsley, three or four cups of the chicken stock, and a quarter cup of cream. Salt and pepper too. I brought it to a simmer, and then laid a pie crust on top of the skillet, brushed the crust with egg, and put the whole thing in a 375º oven for about fifty minutes. (I had made two pie crusts the week before—taken from this pot pie recipe—and had them in the freezer.)

The pie emerged golden and at least somewhat flaky. Inside was an intensely savory stew that ended up giving me some pretty bad heartburn. Oh well. It was delicious though.

"There is always something if not a lot to learn by watching a circus—one is both amazed by and sorry..."

Fri, 04 Nov 2011 23:52:00 -0400

“There is always something if not a lot to learn by watching a circus—one is both amazed by and sorry for the animals.”

- Lorrie Moore, on the Republican debates

Back in the mid-1950s, he was employed by Sports Illustrated, briefly. He reported to work, was...

Fri, 04 Nov 2011 13:07:45 -0400

Back in the mid-1950s, he was employed by Sports Illustrated, briefly. He reported to work, was asked to write a short piece on a racehorse that had jumped over a fence and tried to run away. Kurt stared at the blank piece of paper all morning and then typed, “The horse jumped over the fucking fence,” and walked out, self-employed again.

-Mark Vonnegut, on his father

From the beginning, he’s been the only indispensable white male rock dancer of his...

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:31:09 -0400

From the beginning, he’s been the only indispensable white male rock dancer of his generation, the only one worth imitating in mockery. I consider the moment in the “Patience” video when he does slow-motion snaky slide-foot dance while letting his hands float down as if they were feathers in an airless room—one fleeting near-pause in their descent for each note that Slash emphasizes in his transition to the coda—the greatest white male rock dance moment of the video age. What Axl does is lovely, I’m sorry. If I could, I would be doing that as I walk to the store. I would wake up and dance every morning like William Byrd of Westover, and that would be my dance.

-John Jeremiah Sullivan, “The Final Comeback of Axl Rose”

Star Anise and Ginger Chicken

Sat, 22 Oct 2011 09:41:35 -0400

We had this chicken the other night, and it was definitely good. With rice and roasted carrots.

Chilli Pork Chop a la Cay Tre

Sat, 15 Oct 2011 10:59:00 -0400

London comes back to me at odd times. The other night, for no discernible reason, I was hit by the memory of one of our favorite London meals. Cay Tre is a very popular Vietnamese restaurant on Old Street, just a few minutes walk from our old place. Yes, I know there are better Vietnamese restaurants in London, but Cay Tre is often excellent, and it had the benefit of being practically on our doorstep. And cheap.

It became a near-weekly ritual: I’d put on my shoes and jacket, call Cay Tre to place our order, and get going. When I arrived at the restaurant, some seven minutes later, our food was being bagged up. K would often get the “wokked pho noodles with duck,” but I remained loyal to my favorite. I liked many of Cay Tre’s other dishes, but nothing approached the simple deliciousness of their Chilli Pork Chop. Salty, crispy, fatty, savory from the onions, fiery from the chilis—it’s no surprise this was my jam. Last night I tried to recreate it at home; it wasn’t exactly as good as the original, but it was pretty close!

Chilli Pork Chop

1 large onion, sliced thinly
1 large garlic clove, minced
4 chilis (I used jalapenos), seeds removed, sliced into rings
4 butterflied pork chops (or any thin boneless pork cutlet)
flour
2 eggs
panko crumbs
vegetable oil
cilantro

1. Slice onions and chilis, mince garlic, and combine in a bowl. Set aside.

2. Take pork out of the fridge, and flatten a bit by drumming in a crosswise pattern with the back of your chef’s knife. You want them no thicker than 3/4”. Season with salt, and maybe some pepper too.

3. Put maybe 1/4 to 1/2 an inch of oil in a heavy, wide skillet. Heat on medium-high.

4. Prepare three dishes/shallow bowls: one with flour; one with two eggs, beaten with a tablespoon of oil; and one with panko. Season each dish with salt and pepper. When oil in pan reaches 340ºF, dredge pork chops in flour, then egg, then panko. Shake off excess flour before moving to the egg, let excess egg drip off before moving to panko, and really cover the sucker in panko crumbs, pressing them on to make them stay.

5. Then into the pan, two at a time if your pan is as big as mine, to fry. Three to four minutes a side? Turn them when the one side is a deep golden brown. Cook until the pork reaches 137ºF, then remove to a paper-towel-covered cooling rack. Repeat with remaining chops.

6. Pour off all but a tablespoon of oil from your pan, then toss in the onions, garlic, and chilis. Cook, tossing frequently, until just softened, maybe three minutes.

7. Now your pork has rested a good five minutes. Slice into finger-width pieces and put on plates, topping with a good amount of onion, garlic, and chili mixture, and a small pile of cilantro. Serve with rice, and some sort of green vegetable. Sriracha at the table, especially if your chilis aren’t especially fiery, would not be out of place.