In The Years Annie Ernaux writes: They searched for new models of existence in space and time, in the exotic or the peasantry, India or the Cévennes. There was an aspiration to purity. Though she is reflecting specifically on the early 1970’s in France, I find this statement to capture something of an ever-reoccurring phenomenon. One which strikes me as deeply relevant to the philosophy and trend of “Natural Wine” as it currently reigns. Was it this last fall that Bon Appétit published its four page spread on natural wine? Long-time enthusiasts everywhere shook their heads in quiet dismay while the masses began showing up to their haunts tittering about orange wine. Suddenly, words like funky and glou glou had...

  I was raised by 20-something skater bros in the late 90’s of Southern California. I’ll attribute this to my equally pragmatic and idealistic view of the world. And so, I do not exist in some elevated delusion that the rest of my life will resemble my New York liberal arts classrooms, however, I suppose I do have high expectations of something resembling justice. I want to talk about what it means to have “women” cooking professionally, to have people of color, and queer people, and poor people getting paid properly to do labor that only became exalted into an actual profession when it became a domain of men. Mostly, cis straight white men. Chefs. Lately, I find people are...

What is missing in what’s conveyed about food/eating on social media platforms like Instagram?  I’ve been asking myself this question a lot lately and contemplating the role of women and femmeness in the food & wine world I like/sort of inhabit. There is a persistent trend towards concepts easily construed as masculine, or perhaps made more acceptable in masc people, that I see a lot of in the natural wine realms and in the foods scenes that accompany them. The ever-familiar glorification of a kind of “punk-rock-ness” that gets attached to everyone from the wild-haired wine maker who smokes too much pot and lives in a trailer on his vineyard to the red-faced chef loaded with the requisite sleeves of...