I had one solo post for The Athletic subscribers this week, something out of the ordinary: To participate in the site’s Book Blitz, I gave 25 recommendations for non-sports books, five apiece in literary novels, sci-fi/fantasy, detective/mystery, non-fiction, and short story collections. I also joined the site’s Authors Roundtable, answering some questions on the book-writing process.
Over at Paste, I reviewed Floor Plan, a new roll-and-write from Deep Water (publishers of Welcome To…) that is quite easy to learn, but where the theme and the strategy don’t work together.
My second book, The Inside Game, is out now, and you can buy it on bookshop.org through that link, or find it at your local independent bookstore.
And now, the links…
- Vulture‘s interview with Thandie Newton is a must-read for her unbelievable candor, speaking about racism and sexism on set as well as some lousy experiences with Tom Cruise.
- Patients who are hospitalized with COVID-19 and recover can face weeks or months of delirium, anxiety, depression, fatigue, and physical and cognitive deficits.
- The Washington Post looks at how the pandemic has made the struggle working moms face impossible for employers to ignore, as we’ve seen with the recent backlash to bizarre decisions by Florida State and Georgia Tech.
- The new invite-only audio app Clubhouse is paying a price for omitting any protections for users against harassment. Given what this Verge article says about the app I’d have zero interest in participating in it.
- The Paris Review explains how Neapolitan cuisine became synonymous with Italian food.
- Human rights lawyer Derecka Purnell explains why she became a police abolitionist, the first of three links this week from the Atlantic. The crux of her argument is the lack of accountability for officers who commit violence against civilians.
- Ed Yong continues his tremendous work for the Atlantic on the pandemic, writing about how the experts trying to help hospitals and policymakers are getting burned out, while the pandemic is exacerbating issues of gender equity in the field, and charlatans from outside of epidemiology are trying to make names for themselves with shoddy research.
- Also in the Atlantic, why death rates haven’t risen even as cases and hospitalizations continue to rise. Hint: it’s not necessarily good news.
- A new study published in The Lancet found that antibody levels were extremely low in populations in COVID-19 hotspots, meaning that herd immunity isn’t coming any time soon.
- Axios explains how public health efforts have to step up their efforts to combat COVID-19 misinformation.
- This tweet showing average new cases per day of COVID-19 along with Trump’s comments on the pandemic is rather damning.
- NPR looks at how crowdfunding has changed the board game industry in the wake of the RPG Frosthaven, the sequel to Gloomhaven, taking in $12.9 million in its Kickstarter run.
- A Minnesota State Senator, who is also a physician, is now under investigation after spouting nonsense conspiracy theories about COVID-19 on social media. He has a history of voicing anti-vaccine sentiment too.
- This isn’t exactly news, but a new study showed that anti-vaxxer parents are fraudulently using state religious exemptions to avoid vaccinating their kids. With no penalty for doing so – and minimal enforcement – they’re not going to stop until this loophole is closed.
- Mental Floss has nine possible uses for sourdough starter discard.
- I included this last week as well: There’s a petition online to demand the removal of the Conferederate flag and monument to Confederate soldiers at the Nutter Marvel Carriage Museum in Georgetown, Delaware. It’s a private institution, so unlike the statues and flags coming down in public spaces, the state and local governments can’t just remove the offensive objects.
- Meanwhile, everything is fine in Poland, where the state TV station is warning that the opposition candidate for President will “fulfil Jewish demands” if he wins.
- Board game news: Marvel Villainous, a new standalone game in the Disney Villainous series that introduces some new rules and five new villains to play, is available for pre-order at Target.
- Bézier Games has announced an upcoming Kickstarter for Ultimate Werewolf Extreme, an expanded and upgraded version of their popular Ultimate Werewolf game.
, the “four-star” model (which just refers to the handle style). It’s a workhorse, has only needed professional sharpening once, and is a comfortable grip and weight for my rather small hands. However, it’s $100, and I doubt it’s worth the premium over the $30 
, which America’s Test Kitchen has long recommended and, therefore, so have I.
. You might look at a 10” blade if you get a lot of large, artisanal loaves. Any strong paring knife will do, such as this 
for $7. With a modicum of knife skills, you can tweak and hull strawberries with one of these without any risk to your fingers or waste of fruit. It’s also good for cutting citrus supremes, slicing apples and pears, pitting olives and cherries, and other fine-motor-skills work.
and just … I don’t know, regift the 5” version or something, because I can’t see any use for it. I also own this exact 
, which is ideal for breaking down a whole chicken – it’s substantially cheaper to buy a whole chicken (sometimes called a broiler-fryer, usually 3-5 pounds total weight) and cut it into parts, and you get the bones to make stock – or for deboning other cuts of meat like short ribs. Some folks recommend a flexible blade instead, but I have never used that kind so I can’t give an opinion. I do not own a home sharpener.
, an absolute workhorse that can handle about 90% of what I need from a skillet or a saute pan. I still use a nonstick skillet for egg dishes, and a saucier (sadly one that’s no longer made) for sauces or custards, but the Lodge skillet is past a decade old and just keeps getting better. The work of seasoning them is nowhere near as arduous as you’ve heard.
model for $85.
for about $20 that works great for things like root-vegetable chips or thinly slicing onions. I love this 
, which at $10 is cheap enough that I don’t feel bad when inevitably I drop it into something and ruin it. (I’ve only done that once.) Amazon tells me that I bought my 
in November of 2003, and I’ve had their 
for almost that long. The former is great for zesting citrus fruits or grating nutmeg; the latter is ideal for creating a snowfall of hard cheese over a pasta dish. In that same 2003 order, I bought my first 
for weights up to about 2 kg, which is ideal for precise measurements like grams of coffee (more on that in a moment), and a larger scale that’s long discontinued. This $13 
looks like a more than adequate replacement, measuring up to 12 kg; I rarely need to measure more than about two pounds of anything, maybe a little more for some large-batch baking but that’s about it. You need at least one good scale if you’re serious about baking, though; the best bread and pastry recipes all use grams, not cups or liters. I’ve also done horrible things to this 
over the ten years or so that I’ve had it, including making forty or more batches of jam, dozens of batches of macarons, and engaging in numerous deep-frying experiments, and it still rocks. You absolutely must have one of these to make caramel, any kind of jam or preserves, or true buttercream frosting.
is what I own; we got ours in 1996, and in all that time I’ve just had to replace the plastic bowl, which cracked during a move. At $100, it is an essential, at least in my mind; it makes so many things easier, from pie doughs and biscuits to pesto and hummus and nut butters and mayonnaise (although I do that by hand because I’m a wacko) … and the pumpkin pie I make every Thanksgiving.
“food preparing machine” (it’s a blender, stupid), and it’s amazing. I can make smooth vegetable soups with it, no cream required; don’t toss those broccoli stalks, just peel, quarter, and roast them, then blend them with some vegetable stock and season to taste, maybe with some basil oil and toasted pumpkin seeds on top. It’s nearly $400, however, too much if you’re just making milkshakes and smoothies (and there is nothing wrong with just making milkshakes and smoothies). You’ll probably be fine with just a basic blender and the food processor.
, which is down to $229 right now after a $50 rebate. I kind of wish I had the next model up, mostly for bread-baking, which is still a bit of a chore for this model, but it’s great for everything else – mixing up cookie dough, brownie batter, quick breads, whipped cream, and Italian meringues (for macarons). The pasta-maker attachment is overpriced, but it does the job, and the grinder attachment has been good for me in a handful of uses, especially for turning stale bread into bread crumbs.
burr grinder is the least expensive grinder of its kind and caliber; when my first one had an issue with the motor, I sent a quick video of it jamming to Baratza and had a new machine within two weeks. I do make pour-over coffee at home using this 
machine that is a wonder. The boiler is huge, so it bounces back quickly between shots and you can heat up the steam wand before your shots go cold. If you get your ratios right (for me it’s 17.5 to 19 grams per double shot, depending on the bean and roast), you’ll get great crema, 32-35 grams of output in 25-30 seconds, with almost no bad pulls. I use it every morning and I miss it when I travel. 
came out earlier this year, and it is devoted to that one indispensable ingredient, the one item in your fridge that really ties the whole room together. He approaches the egg from every angle, all the different ways you can prepare it on its own or use it as a building block in other recipes. That means you get instructions for all of the basic egg dishes – fried, poached, scrambled, hard- and soft-boiled, shirred, baked, and more. Ruhlman’s poaching technique is one I haven’t seen before, and it is easier to anything I’ve tried before, with better results. 