A monastic brewery near Munich, where my auntie Ota escaped in 1948, performed a miracle. The Monastery says it's created the first powdered beer. Just add water, and it'll froth up, complete with a foamy head and full flavor. The result promises massive savings on transport, because it can be shipped at 10% of the weight.
German monks create world’s first powdered beer New Atlas
The ‘last writings’ collected here include the texts of several lectures Kuhn gave in the 1980s, which circulated as samizdat texts among academics close to him, but the main interest of the book is in the edited drafts of about two-thirds of the ‘magnum opus’ on which Kuhn had been working for more than ten years when he died in 1996, given the provisional title ‘The Plurality of Worlds: An Evolutionary Theory of Scientific Development’. Last Writings will be assessed and picked over by philosophers in the Kuhn commentariat. I won’t do that here. Instead, I describe the significance of the path that Kuhn took from his study of physics as an undergraduate at Harvard in the 1940s, to the writing of Structure, and then on to his lifelong effort to manage the outbursts of both enthusiasm and criticism the book unleashed.
A theory of scientific change isn’t an obvious subject for an American bestseller. But in the culture at the time Structure was published, thinking about the nature of science was highly charged. In the Second World War, radar and the atomic bomb had established that science could deliver military might, and the US government began to pour unprecedentedly large sums of money into academic research. The continuing mobilisation of science in the Cold War arms race secured the place of physics and several other disciplines in the state’s favour, but the closeness to government, the military and big industry made some sectors of the intelligentsia uneasy. Were the virtues of science the same as those of liberal democracy – open-minded, universal, set against authority – or could science flourish in secret spaces, its agenda controlled by external forces, its beliefs distorted by dogma? The American scientific community was much engaged by questions of this sort, the tone set by the physicists who had built the Bomb. In 1961, Eisenhower’s farewell address warned of the political dangers posed by the ‘military-industrial complex’ and of the potential for the corruption of science when it was done at state command. In the first part of the 20th century in capitalist countries, science was considered to be a fragile plant, thriving only in the soil of open societies; by the early 1960s, anxieties were emerging about the role of science in buttressing political authority and even setting authoritarian agendas.
Paradigms Gone Wild London Review of Books. “Steve Shapin on Thomas Kuhn.”
Food for friendship
I always have conversations about food when I go to see my hairdresser Fereshteh. “Iranians are feeders,” she says. “A bountiful table is essential, especially for Nowruz.”
We swap recipes and enthuse about sumac, saffron and pomegranate molasses while she snips away. Nowruz is a largely secular festival that signals the arrival of the spring.
This year, it will take place under the devastating shadow of the unrest sparked by the death last September of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini during her detention by the morality police for allegedly breaking rules on hijabs. In turbulent times, food brings us comfort, but it’s also a powerful form of resistance.
It’s a force for bringing people together and creating spaces for nourishment, conversation and protest. #CookForIran is a volunteer-led human-rights campaign founded by entrepreneur Layla Yarjani to raise awareness for the people of Iran. It calls for a sort of culinary solidarity.
“My hope was to build a space where Iranian people and their allies could unite,” she says. “By encouraging people to prepare Persian dishes, they may be more inclined to talk about the protests and then spread the word instead of getting desensitised to the news.” Fereshteh fondly remembers celebrations in Tehran before her family fled post-revolutionary Iran for Britain.
“Cooking gives me solace,” she says. “Celebrating something that reminds me of the good times brings me hope.”
Gathering to break bread is key to building communities and friendships. We take food to new neighbours or new parents. We eat together in celebration, and we eat together in loss. Now we must cook and eat together to fight oppression, for women, freedom and life.
Barberry chicken polow
Serves 6
Perfectly cooked rice is the culinary emblem of Persian cooking. This opulent dish celebrates the tradition of mixing meat with fruit, nuts and persistent but subtle spice.
Quantity Ingredients
A generous glug of olive oil
60g flaked almonds
60g barberries
2 cinnamon sticks
8 green cardamom pods, bruised
1 bay leaf
2 red onions, finely sliced
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
750g skinless and boneless chicken thighs, cut into bite-size pieces
1 tsp each ground ginger, turmeric and cinnamon
600ml boiling hot chicken stock
4 dried limes, pierced and soaked in enough hot water to cover them
300g basmati rice
A large pinch of saffron threads soaked in 50ml warm water A handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped
Heat the olive oil in a wide casserole dish, then add the almonds and barberries.
Fry until the almonds are golden.
Remove the almonds and barberries from the pan with a slotted spoon, then add the cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods and bay leaf.
Sizzle briefly, then add the sliced onion and garlic and fry over a low heat until caramelised.
Add the chicken and sprinkle in the ground spices. Once the spices are fragrant and the chicken is sealed, pour in the hot stock.
Once it comes to a boil, add the dried limes and their soaking water, two-thirds of the fried almonds and barberries and sprinkle in the rice.
Cover and cook over a very low heat for 10-12 minutes until the rice has absorbed the stock.
Transfer the polow to a serving platter and drizzle over the saffron with its water.
Scatter over the remaining almonds and barberries and the parsley, then serve.
Ravinder Bhogal is chef-patron of Jikoni. Follow Ravinder on Instagram @cookinboots and Twitter @cookinboots
