Exhaling Life

Inspired by Anaïs Aa Dao Van Manen’s Vietnam, the cookbook published by Phaidon , I set out to cook Vietnamese food for myself. There is a certain satisfaction—a quiet, private sense of achievement—when we learn to cook within a familiar cuisine that our hands have never actually prepared. I did not realize, until drifting through the pages of Vietnam , how central caramelized sugar is to the cuisine—often referred to as a caramel braising sauce. After my first failed attempt at following the Tôm Rim recipe from the cookbook, I turned inward to develop a version that simplifies the process while preserving the dish’s essential tension: the salinity of fish sauce meeting the sweetness of caramelized sugar. INGREDIENTS LIST [serves one with rice] fourteen whole prawns, shells on, slit along the back and deveined two tablespoons of vegetable oil one tablespoon of sugar one tablespoon of fish sauce one tablespoon of Cambray onion, white part only, diced one tablespoon of red onion, diced o...

Floral imagery has long threaded itself through the history of dress, less a passing embellishment than a quiet language stitched across centuries. In Ancient Egypt, garments and decorative textiles often carried stylized flowers, especially the sacred lotus. The motif was not simply decorative. The lotus symbolized rebirth and the daily return of the sun. Painted on linen or woven into ornament, flowers entered clothing as symbols of cosmology and renewal. Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash Across the Silk Roads the motif deepened in complexity. During the Tang Dynasty in China, silk garments appeared with peonies, chrysanthemums, and plum blossoms rendered with painterly delicacy. In Persia similar botanical motifs flourished in brocades and tapestries. Printed florals as we recognize them today emerged centuries later in India, where artisans produced cotton fabrics known as chintz. These vividly printed flowers traveled to Europe and reshaped fashion. By the eighteenth century flor...

It bothered me. Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was subpoenaed by the House Oversight Committee in connection with its investigation into the Epstein files, along with her husband, former President Bill Clinton, over his past associations with Jeffrey Epstein. Both ultimately agreed to appear for closed-door depositions before the committee. Her connection to Jeffrey Epstein appears, at least publicly, to be no little more than a grey dotted line, loosely drawn by association. There has been no public reporting that she traveled on his planes or stayed in his homes. Former President Bill Clinton, by contrast, has acknowledged flying on Epstein’s plane during travel connected to his foundation. Yet the committee insisted on her presence at the closed-door deposition. Meanwhile, Melania Trump—who had appeared in social circles that overlapped with Epstein and Donald Trump in New York and Palm Beach during the same era—has not been subpoenaed by House Oversight. I...

Off the southern coast of the Korean peninsula lies Jeju Island, a place where the sea shapes both livelihood and cuisine. Among its prized catches is Jeju squid, known for its clean sweetness and tender bite—qualities that have long made it a favorite in Korean kitchens. Whether grilled over charcoal or gently simmered in spicy stews, Jeju squid carries the unmistakable flavor of the surrounding waters. This dish brings that ingredient into a conversation between two culinary traditions. Linguine al nero di seppia, the Italian pasta tinted black with squid ink, becomes the canvas for a sauce layered with Korean flavors. The foundation begins with olive oil, onion, and garlic, followed by white wine and tomato paste that deepen in color as they cook. Then comes gochujang, whose fermented heat introduces the unmistakable character of Korean cooking. Ceramic bowl has wheel-thrown and glazed by me What makes the dish sing, however, is its balance. The richness of butter softens the intens...

Denim is French in name, Italian in early use, and American in myth. The word itself is French, a contraction of serge de Nîmes, the sturdy twill woven in the southern city of Nîmes. Denim began as geography stitched into cloth, a textile defined not by attitude but by endurance. Long before it was runway shorthand or rebellion’s uniform, similar hard-wearing cotton was used by sailors in Genoa. The French called the city Gênes. From that mispronunciation came “jeans.” They were work trousers then—sun-faded, salt-stiffened, cut for labor rather than legend. Photo by Maude Frédérique Lavoie on Unsplash America, however, does not leave cloth alone. In the 19th century, riveted denim trousers became standard issue for miners and laborers in the West. Utility was reinforced with copper. Durability became design. And somewhere between gold dust and railroad tracks, fabric turned into folklore. Hollywood later burnished it into masculinity. Counterculture tore it open and called it free...

This stir-fry is what happens when comfort overlaps. Udon for its quiet sturdiness, the way its thick strands absorb sauce without collapsing. Short ribs because richness belongs in a proper noodle dish. Baby broccoli because it is sweeter, more tender, and far more interesting than its mature counterpart. It is not traditional. It is not polite. It is deeply satisfying. Ceramic bowl was wheel-thrown and glazed by me. INGREDIENTS [serves 2 as a main dish] ten ounces of boneless short ribs, roughly cubed ten ounces of udon, cooked one cup of diced baby broccoli, including stems and leaves a quarter of a yellow onion, sliced one garlic clove, sliced three tablespoons of soy sauce two tablespoons of brown sugar one and a half teaspoons of sesame oil one teaspoon of mirin a half teaspoon of gochugaru half a tablespoon of cornstarch two tablespoons of room-temperature water vegetable oil for cooking In a bowl, combine the soy sauce, brown sugar, sesame oil, and mirin. Mix...

I am fat. That is neither a confession nor a plea for reassurance. It is not coded self-loathing nor an invitation for affirmation. It is a description of my body. Yet the moment I say it aloud, people rush to correct me, as though I have misidentified myself. “You’re not fat,” they insist, with the urgency of someone extinguishing a small fire. The discomfort is not mine. It is theirs. Fat is not an identity. It is not a character assessment or a moral condition. It is a descriptor of a body. The body is a vessel that carries who we are; it is not the entirety of who we are. When I describe my body as fat, I am not reducing myself. I am describing the state of the vessel. Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash We have constructed a culture in which self-acceptance is treated as a moral virtue—but only when it follows approved language. Love your body, we are told, but do not describe it in ways that unsettle others. Do not call yourself fat unless you meet some publicly agreed-upon thre...