The Washington Post :: Last Launch

Last Launch: Discovery, Endeavour, Atlantis

by Dan Winters

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"As NASA’s space shuttle program came to a close, photographer Dan Winters scrambled to create a historical document for future generations. He shot the last launches of Endeavour, Atlantis and Discovery. Here are Winters’s thoughts on the experience of shooting the shuttles. On August 6, NASA enters a new phase with its unmanned Odyssey project to Mars."

View the slide show at washingtonpost.com  »

Washington Post :: Oaxaca al Gusto

Oaxaca al Gusto:
An Infinite Gastronomy

By Diana Kennedy
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Diana Kennedy to Jose Andres: Your tamales are “bloody awful”

By Associated Press, Updated: Tuesday, October 4

To listen to Kennedy is to listen to a woman obsessed. Tiny, impish and now 88 years old, the world’s recognized authority on Mexican cuisine still braves one-lane mud roads through Mexican mountains in search of cloistered delicacies and chilies rumored to be better/hotter/more complex than others.

“It’s tantalizing,” she said. “I know a trip to find a certain chili will take hours and hours and lots of gray hairs.”

Which is why she’s published only a half-dozen books during her 50 years of preserving Mexico’s culinary identity. That life’s work culminated in the publication of “Oaxaca al Gusto” last year. More astute culinary anthropology than cookbook, its recipes for huitlacoche (corn fungus) and wasp nest gravy are likely to go unmade by most readers. Ditto for beef brains and a sauce made of flying ants (which Kennedy insists tastes “like hazelnuts”).

But the book’s rich photographs — many taken by Kennedy — offer a lush look at the biodiversity of Oaxaca and it’s cooking that she has spent a lifetime protecting.

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The Washington Post :: Oaxaca al Gusto

Oaxaca al Gusto:
An Infinite Gastronomy

By Diana Kennedy
Buy It Now

2011 Beard Award winners
Published: May 10

Washington chef-restaurateur Jose Andres was the only local culinary star to come home with a medal at the 2011 James Beard Foundation Awards for restaurants and chefs, held Monday night at Lincoln Center.

Andres was honored as outstanding chef, for a career that “has set national industry standards” and has inspired other food professionals. The owner of Jaleo, Cafe Atlantico, Oyamel, Minibar, Zaytina, China Poblano and the Bazaar was also the subject of a “60 Minutes” profile that won for best television segment in Friday night’s book, broadcast and journalism awards ceremony, held at Espace in New York.

Eleven Madison Park in New York was named outstanding restaurant, and ABC Kitchen in New York was named best new restaurant.

Michael Solomonov of Zahav in Philadelphia was named best chef in the mid-Atlantic.

At the event Friday, Tim Carman, now a Washington Post Food section writer, received a medal for his food-related columns and commentary in the Washington City Paper.

Other major awards presented that evening included:

Cookbook of the year: “Oaxaca al Gusto: An Infinite Gastronomy,” by Diana Kennedy (University of Texas Press). Read more »