The Final Feast Countdown 🎄

SB213

December 17, 2024

Welcome to Secret Breakfast / An exclusive newsletter, the best place to bake Xmas gifts, drink mayo and learn more about the world’s most expensive eating disorder

Sixty years ago

Hi there!

Christmas Eve is next week. When I spent the Summer in Finland I saved one story for this very moment.

In Turku, on December 24th, people gather to listen to the Declaration of Christmas Peace. It should go like this:

«Tomorrow, God willing, is the graceful celebration of the birth of our Lord and Saviour; and thus is declared a peaceful Christmas time to all, by advising devotion and to behave otherwise quietly and peacefully, because he who breaks this peace and violates the peace of Christmas by any illegal or improper behavior shall under aggravating circumstances be guilty and punished according to what the law and statutes prescribe for each and every offense separately».

Devotion. Behave.

You sit at the table with family members you haven't lived with for a year, and your life suddenly feels like an episode of The Bear. This one.

Hold fast, guys.

A wise friend once said: Christmas is a chance to see if we've learned anything from our year of therapy.

Quietly and peacefully, then.

Piero

PS: you’ll see one adv on this issue, it’s the last one for 2024.
PSS: the next newsletter will be delivered one random day before December 31st.

Mary Ellen Mark, American, 1940–2015. Santa takes a coffee break, 1964.

ONE ✤ QUOTE

✦ Nigel Slater, Toast. Every Christmas I post a quote by Nigel, you should know that by now.

Sonoko Sakai's "Wafu Cooking" is a chill, weeknight cookbook that's perfect for anyone who wants to add a little Japanese flair to their meals. It's like a warm hug, inviting you to wafu-fy everything from pasta to apple pie. You'll learn how a splash of miso can elevate your Bolognese and how dashi, soy sauce, and sake can turn ordinary beans into something extraordinary.
Bonus: What is Wafu?

Wafu Cooking. Everyday Recipes with Japanese Style by Sonoko Sakai
→ Shortplot: 🥢 🍜 🥮 🍱

In partnership with…*

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*This issue is supported by this ADV.

THIS IS WHERE OUR FOOD COME FROM

Sambhar Lake, in Rajasthan, India’s largest inland salt lake

For his book Feed the Planet: A Photographic Journey to the World’s Food (Bookshop), George Steinmetz used his drone to explore the world, spending ten years taking pictures of how food is produced in over 36 countries across 6 continents, 24 US states, and 5 oceans. His impressive aerial photos show the large scale of modern farming, which covers 40 percent of the Earth's surface.

Please take a moment to check out his pictures and videos.

Juicy content from food creators. This week a sweet Swedish treat for Santa (or just your loved ones)

This is the space where I share some food (un)related stuff of my week

🎄12 Homemade Food and Drink Gifts for Anyone on Your List 🍪The Most Popular Christmas Cookies in All 50 States 🍸Punch’s Favorite Cocktails of 2024 🌽Corn in coffee? 🫠Ever wanted to drink mayonnaise? Now you can 🧑🏻‍🍳Top 10 cooks in fiction 🧄Traditional Toum, the Lebanese Garlic Sauce (★recipe) 🍹Nobu Bar’s teapple (★recipe) 🥚If you’re having people over, this will save you: Shaved Asparagus Frittata (★recipe) 🍞Can’t Get an Even Bake? This ‘Toast Test’ Can Help 📺 Modern Family’s’ Julie Bowen is producing Taste, a new show featuring a TikTok chef against the old guard of a legacy food magazine 🎧Billie Eilish: Tiny Desk Concert 🤳🏻 If you can’t stop scrolling and you can’t stop looking and you just want more, you’re one of the New P*rn0graphers 💻Reset Your Digital (Office) Life in 4 Steps

63 Chinese Cuisines: the Complete Guide
Chinese Cooking Demystified

There are many different types of Chinese food. The main eight styles are Cantonese, Sichuan, Hunan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Shandong, and Anhui, but even these don't include all the food in China. Just reading about them can make you hungry for the whole new year.

Imagine a man so obsessed with living forever that he's developed an expensive eating disorder to trick his body into thinking it's young. That's Bryan Johnson, who spends $1 million a year on a regime of supplements and weird concoctions to keep death at bay.

➤ Last week's most clicked link was Anthony Bourdain's Soupe de Poisson. And that's all for today.