Category: food history

Buttery Muffins in Wet, Wintry London

wet winter night in london

Did the muffin boy trudging through London’s dark, dank streets ever curse the hot, buttery wares that forced him outdoors? Perhaps, though the thought of going penniless no doubt bedeviled him more. And perhaps as means of consolation his mind would settle on a remark made by Charles Dickens, who found that a cold night did wonders for the streets of London. Such wonder-working happened, he wrote, when “just enough damp” fell from the sky to “make the pavement greasy without cleansing it of any of its impurities.” If that falling damp also made the gaslights glow brighter and the small shops that lined the street “more splendid,” then so much the better.

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Parrot Pie for Paranormal Picnics

 
hanging rock, australia

Only the pause of a train in their sleepy station lured the inhabitants of Woodend, Australia from their homes to consider the faces of passengers en route to larger cities. Not that Woodend lacked attractions; quite the contrary. Standing some 1,850 feet above sea level, the town enjoyed a climate moderate enough to recommend it as an attractive summer destination. Its eucalyptus forests hid within them health resorts and mineral springs. Its rich volcanic soil, the color of chocolate, made it a thriving agricultural district that trafficked in root vegetables, raspberries and currants. Its winds, which blew wholesome and tranquil, cooled those travelers disembarking at Woodend to eat, rest and recover their nerves.

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Forest Trump: Hansel and Gretel’s Sweet Trick

 
hotel in the black forest in germany

South of Stuttgart and north of Basel spreads the Black Forest, so named by ancient Romans for the conifers populating it, which grow thickly enough to block the sun. Copses of white pine jut from rolling hills, and ancient oaks crowd deep valleys, sheltering strange fauna not found elsewhere. The Lumbricus badensis, an earthworm of record-setting girth and length, dwells there, as do rare Hinterwälderberg cattle and the tawny Sperlingskauz, an owl that nightly takes to the sky in search of mice and voles to eat.

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