How can a home baker get both great flavor and that incredible crust?
Halfway between moussaka and ratatouille
I have a confession. For all my Mediterranean obsession, I hate two of the most essential Mediterranean vegetables: eggplant and zucchini. I would refer to zucchini as a useless vegetable – a filler that restaurants throw in to bulk up better vegetables like cauliflower because it has no particular flavor or texture. As for eggplant, I think it’s horrible in terms of both flavor and texture – mushy, bitter, stringy.
Read MoreDissertation writing (and writing, and writing)
One of the things that’s actually helpful about applying for funding to support me in my final year of dissertation writing is that it forces me to be reflective about the process of writing and take stock of where I am and where I still need to go. I just submitted what is likely my final application, my fifth since October, and I found myself adjusting my completion timeline yet again. As part of the application, most organizations require a timeline of the work you still need to do. I’ve used the same timeline for every application, organized by dissertation chapter, and tweaked it as time has gone on and I’ve actually checked some items off the list. But mostly, I’ve just kept pushing back the date that I’ll finish Chapter 2. My first version of this timeline, back in October, said that I would finish Chapter 2 in November. Now, here I am at the start of February and I just pushed the estimate to mid-February. Have I been kidding myself about how much work I still have to do?
Read MoreOrganized mess: An annotated guide to my office
I’m lucky enough to have a dedicated home office. This was by design – it’s been a requirement for every space I’ve lived in during grad school, at the expense of living spaces that were cheaper, or more private, or in more interesting areas near people I knew. But just because my office belongs to me doesn’t mean it’s not full of all kinds of weird shit that probably shouldn’t be in there.
Read MoreDiastasis recti, the history of round bellies, and making medicine about aesthetics
Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, I am not offering medical advice.
Read MoreIt's not procraftinating, it's productive crafting – Returning to sewing
Last year, I spent most of my time alone in Europe watching historical costuming YouTube (read: costube). After returning home for good and successfully finishing some knitting and crochet projects for pretty much the first time ever, I’m taking the plunge to get back into sewing.
Read MoreThe Ornament of the World: Why we shouldn’t define people by religion
If you are an avid PBS fan, you may have seen the premier of a new documentary titled Ornament of the World in the last month. It’s a piece about the interfaith world of medieval Spain, and given that I work on the very related field of cross-cultural contact in medieval Sicily, I should have been excited to see it, but, frankly, I was surprised and somewhat exhausted at the thought that this movie had been made. Because not only was its perspective on interreligious contact left behind by the field of medieval studies almost 20 years ago, but its entire approach to the question assumes that peoples of different religions should be inherently separate.
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