THE GURGLING COD

Mario says the darndest things....

“Well, the Food Network has made the conscious decision to go a little more mass market than I would say that I appeal to...”

-Mario Batali, author: Mario Tailgates NASCAR Style (New York: The Sporting News Press, 2006).

Separated at Birth?

  Not only do Lyle and Mario share similar Rabelaisian appetites, but now Mario has ganked Lyle's steez for his blog:
Mario:

All meet at 9 and drive 700 km to bilbao...easy ride with pete and maria   arrive to cool hotel combine directly across the st from the gooogy   it is simply stunning… meet at 7 to shoot in the plaza of the basque language school then 4 run and gun tapas scenes that worked remarkably well  home at 1030 to rest  play golf tomorrow at a olazabal course with cp and maybe a sick eric

Lyle:
fn manager at Corleone's gave me the saklc tonight cause I was eatin stuff off plates onn away back from busin the table. fn people shouldn't oredwe4r a staek if they'er not gonna finiash it. fudcking quaiil too an dpasta s lookin too good ot leanve alone like barely mot ven touched. fuckers and look how they live throw away food and go off in a fucking jaguruar, ill fucken eat it cause don't waastrew good shit like that on hte sculler anywaysa he'll eaet it an he nevaer getrs sacked assahoel

Uncanny.

Via Eater, out of Snack.

Shoes News

No time for the sort of reflection this news deserves, but I do want to get Dr. Crocso out there as a possible name for the lead character in the inevitable Mario cartoon.*

*Dr. Rockso is a rock and roll clown. He is fond of cocaine.

Mario: Not rocking with Dokken, oddly enough

This may fall under the category of shooting fish in a barrel, as there is no list like this that is not immediately vulnerable to criticism, but this list of Mario's fave tunes  has some surprises, in having few surprises.The list has the feel of being put together by Mario's people, rather than by any individual. When I was wooing the cinetrix, there was once a grad seminar that met at one of my classmates' houses. He happened to be dating someone I had dated previously, so I gave his crib more scrutiny than otherwise. My grad student self was impressed by his ownership of curtains, an undreamed of refinement for me, but dismayed by his cd collection, which I described in a letter to the cinetrix all the hallmarks of having been assembled by a a team of FBI agents charged with creating a plausible CD collection for someone in the Witness Protection Program, part whose cover was that he liked "indie rock." Mario's list is kind of like that in its predictability.

In other hard- rocking music news, The Edge honored at  Food Bank NYC's Can-do Awards. No word, however, if the U2 axeman shares bandmate Bono's low tolerance for finger food.

Food: the new cocaine?

Just wondering. There are significant differences. Many kinds of food are legal in many parts of the country. In moderation, food can be good for you. There is no cocaine pyramid. However, in yesterday's DI/DO, when Pete Wells stepped down from the quarterdeck and checked out the Spotted Pig employee party, the consumption he described was on a level of conspicuousness that reminded me of nothing more than the scene near the end of Scarface, when Al Pacino consoles himself with a salad bowl full of cocaine:

He left the kitchen for a moment, carrying a blowtorch. This was to ignite the grappa he’d poured inside two hollowed-out wheels of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. When the flames died, Mr. Ladner filled the wheels with boiled rigatoni, grated cheese, olive oil, butter and what the menu called “mad amounts of large chunk Black Truffle.”

Freebasing parmigiano, followed with large chunk black truffle? You can read the whole menu here, if you dare. Lavish, to be sure, but too perverse to be strictly Rabelaisian, viz: "Foie gras and monkfish, Whole roasted, and served with Molto’s world famous 'Starburst & Red Bull sauce.'" Between Grub Street and DI/DO, you get a pretty good sense of the scope of this thing, but two points might bear further reflection. One: Mario's celebrity has reached a level where his absence from a dinner is news. Two: Lavish as it is, six pigs plus  foie, plus all the other goodies, plus the fee for the "babes" passing the cakes, is still a pretty good investment for the publicity it generated. I may have to clip and save this piece and suggest an upgrade from the miniquiches that plague the holidays at my job.