Johanna Derry
Contributor
This Ancient Agricultural Ceremony Is Basically a Massive Piss-Up
The centuries-old tradition of wassailing sees local people take a cup of something—preferably alcoholic—and toast their neighbours with good health for the coming year.
Robert Burns Was a Secret Cheesemaker
Robert Burns, the great Scotsman who revolutionised Romantic poetry and whose memory we celebrate on Burns Night, had a sideline in cheesemaking on a farm near Dumfries.
How to Eat Your Christmas Tree
A London-based design duo says that come January 6, instead of throwing out our Christmas trees, we should turn them into beetroot and spruce-cured salmon, spruce pickles, and pine-smoked cauliflower.
This Ukrainian Cookbook Is Part Family History, Part Dumpling Heaven
“Cookbooks don’t have to be about recipes from a chef,” says Olia Hercules, author of Mamushka: Recipes from Ukraine & Beyond. “I like recipes because of the stories they might tell about a culture and all these things our grandmothers used to make.”
This Baker Is Turning 17th Century Witches’ Broth Into Pie
Four hundred years after the trial of Lancashire’s Pendle witches—12 men and women executed for witchcraft and murder—baker Christine Turner makes pies inspired by the broth served at their illicit gatherings.
This Bartender Wants to Microwave Your Negroni
“More and more people are cooking exciting things and having a go with food. I want it to be the same for drinks,” says Ryan Chetiyawardana, London bartender and inventor of the Nuked Negroni.
A Hand-Carved Ice Ball Could Make Your Drink Taste Better
Bartender and ice carver Andrea Patelli’s hands are huge and he’s tossing a block of ice around without gloves. With short jabs, he chops off the corners, then rounds the edges as a pile of frozen chips melt to a puddle.
These Nomadic Winemakers Are Taking Over Europe’s Vineyards
London-based wine collective Birds and Bats beg, borrow, and (not quite) steal other winemakers’ grapes from vineyards across Europe to turn into their “Wines of Momentary Origin” or “WMDs.”
Hey France, This Cornish Distiller Might Make Better Pastis Than You
A Cornwall-based distiller is beating French distillers at their own game and making the UK's only pastis, a wheat spirit with notes of aniseed, liquorice root, and fennel.
This Is What It’s Like to Get Drunk Through Your Eyeballs
A new project from food art duo Bompas and Parr uses humidifiers to turn spirits and mixers into a fine cloud. Without taking a sip of liquid, you simply breath and let the alcohol mist enter through your eyeballs, straight into the bloodstream.
London’s African Chefs Are Mixing Yorkshire Puddings and Ugali
From Jamie Oliver’s “Jollofgate” to groundnut stew supper clubs, African cuisine is gaining popularity among British diners. “The thing is,” explains chef Folayemi Brown, “it’s not ‘African food.’ We can’t represent the whole continent.”
Slovenia Is Too Shy to Tell You How Great Its Wine Is
“If this were the US, maybe there’d be a Disneyland-style theme park built to the wine here but we’re shyer people,” says Robert Gorjak, one of Slovenia’s 10,000 little known winemakers and sellers.