All in ManSchool

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MANSCHOOL #1 | 8 JULY 2009

 

It's no secret - an inordinately high proportion of the world's best chefs are men.  Joël Robuchon, Gordon Ramsay, Paul Bocuse, Tetsuya Wakuda, Alain Ducasse.  Let's leave aside all questions of right, wrong, equality, yay, nay or otherwise, because that's for another time.  What actually puzzles us most about the high number of haute cuisine male chefs is the lack of a corollary - if the creme de la creme is mostly male, then why are most mortal men utterly hopeless in the kitchen?

 

Summer is here, of sorts, and short dresses have lured the heterosexual male from the sofa to the beer garden, in pursuit of love and lust.  (Yes, this is primarily directed at straight men. ManSchool's gay friends just don't need as much help in this area.)  So you've met a nice lass at the pub, got her number, and are poised to call her up to ask her on a date.  ManSchool suggests that you don't take her to a white tablecloth overpriced restaurant.

 

Cook her dinner instead.

 

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PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN | 6 JULY 2009

Weird things happen when American ex-pats living in London get together en masse.  For starters a lot of England bashing goes down (light-hearted of course) but strange yearnings for the products of home arise.   This is pretty much how July 4th manifested itself for me this year.  I confessed to bringing Ziplock and Force Flex garbage bags, Bounce fabric softener and mini white (only multi-coloured exist in England, don't ask me why) marshmallows back with me from trips to the states.  My friend Ann, who is returning to NY, offered me a couple bottles of Tide laundry detergent and some Windex and tears came to my eyes.  It was, therefore no surprise that I would rush home to Notting Hill bang down the doors of Mr Christians (literally), which has recently been stocking American items a la Partridges, and buy not one but two packages of probably the most abhorrent product on the US market.