halopub

Two links: Antony posing with some stunning korovai last week in Greece. The show tweeted a best-of-Antony clip

Lamb gives me heartburn but are beef keema naan good too? Peshwari naan are yummy but I do prefer savory varieties. I had to look it up but I vaguely remembered that a bunch of contestants made naan as their signature flatbread in series 3. I could go for some spiced mango naan right now.

Awww...it sounds like he went into Bread Week assuming that'd be the end. I didn't realize naan would be that hard to make well. Like Ruby I usually just pop some frozen ones in a toaster oven. I bought some fresh naan from Tesco once - and while I'm generally not a fan of that supermarket chain, I remember being jealous that Brits get such a nice variety of quality, unfrozen naan at just the everyday grocery store. I think that sounds like an apt description of Rahul. He is pretty introverted, though - so maybe his joy comes across as more muted. Be confident Rahul - your bakes are great! Well it's not just Manon's attractiveness that is generating such a negative response. If that were true, so would current Ruby. I can't quite put my finger on it, but to me anyway there's something not quite authentic/relatable about her these last two episodes - something feels off. Whereas I thought she was likeable in her first episode. (shrug) The tent does need more smilers with Antony gone. I thought it was cute that he and his partner were dressed alike on their balcony. Did Kim-Joy use pandan leaves again in her bread? I thought I heard her mention them. I'm not a bread baker at all, but I would think Paul would be familiar with Tangzhong roux. Is it just one of those things where he knows the technique but not necessarily the name? Ruby keeps pulling out these amazing showstoppers and I'd love to see her generate more consistent results.

Apparently he lived there a number of years, teaching English after graduating from NYU. It's hard to hear in that interview which has English dubbing, but it's a pretty thoughtful soundbite. I'm not familiar with the numbers at all, but I've heard that unless its hand is forced by the media, Japan quietly doesn't usually enforce the 1985 nationality law that regulates dual citizenship. It would be a lot of bureaucratic effort to track down/force folks to choose and with its aging population the government needs to keep the country attractive to corporate and scientific talent. In the case of elite athletes it makes sense for them to not risk losing people who want to represent the country in the Olympics, etc. About ten years back, though, I think baseball player Yu Darvish did give up his Iranian citizenship to compete at the Beijing Olympics.

Good to know...I’ll keep my expectations low when I give it a try.

What do you think so far? I don't know that I could take that much Tom Allen. He already dominates Extra Slice.

The P series starts today. An official clip from the first episode: I've missed Phill.

@BitterApple No worries, I didn't think that at all. Yeah, it's unfortunate. And in this case my annoyance is with random posters and not the professional media. I think people who are just hearing about Naomi and only casually follow the US Open assume the American media is ignoring her Haitian father. It's not and neither is the Japanese press.

New York Times: In U.S. Open Victory, Naomi Osaka Pushes Japan to Redefine Japanese So on the champion for a minute....we are also seeing a bit of the outrage machine trying to percolate over Naomi, on the issue of identity. In English there are a lot of cranky posts about why she's called a Japanese champion and not a Haitian-Japanese one, or even a Haitian-Japanese-American winner. In Japanese social media, even with her win, there's some lingering ugliness about her not being "really Japanese." I haven't seen the sports or regular media ignoring her complex identity at all. Maybe her father isn't photographed as much because he won't sit in the players box, but on ESPN there were explanatory cutaways to Haitian flags in the crowd and her parents' story - and when Naomi's called a Japanese champion, it's because she chooses to represent that nation. Haitians, Japanese, New Yorkers, Floridians and other Americans can all celebrate her win, but Japan gets the stat. While she's charming audiences by just being herself, in the run up to the Tokyo Olympics Naomi will have to work on the specific kind of Japanese needed in sports media training. I know she's not confident in her language skills but Naomi gets a lot of the same questions and could further practice how she wants to answer them. (Her parents and the Japanese Tennis Association folks could all help with that. Her father's Japanese, for example, is not rusty at all.) I was glad to see that Japan's nationalistic, WWII revisionist prime minister offered his congratulations and I'm hopeful Naomi's prominence will mean true movement for racial progress in a country that still doesn't really understand something as basic as the offensiveness of blackface.

If you watch her press conference, Osaka said last night that she still had no idea what had happened because the crowd was loud and her back was turned before getting ready to serve the next game. The mixed emotions at the trophy ceremony, including the apology was in part because she knew how much Serena wanted another Major: I'm not disputing that his tennis visibility has benefited immensely from the Serena coaching gig, but Mouratoglou apparently comes from money. As for whether he needs Serena to continue bolstering the academy's reputation, they already are working with upcoming talent, including the top two juniors and Tsitsipas. I haven't found game penalties yet, but there have been a couple of outright disqualifications in Majors. McEnroe in the fourth round of the 1990 Australian Open.... Tim Henman in doubles at 1995 Wimbledon for inadvertently hitting a ball at a ball girl. If I recall correctly, Jeff Tarango and his wife got into it with an umpire at the same tournament and he then was banned from Wimbledon the following year too. I think you might agree with Slate's piece on this whole mess. Serena's been around so long, I'd actually forgotten the 2004 US Open quarterfinals with Capriati and how that helped institutionalize Hawk-Eye.

I just rewatched the judging and I think you're right. He was specific when praising Ruby's showstopper and did try to explain himself in the judge's tent. Watching the episode back I found some of Manon's expressions a bit off-putting this week. I don't know. Cute that her family farm has a random wallaby, though. This has been the case for me the last couple of seasons. I've been slow to remember everyone, let alone pick a favorite baker. I find it helps when contestants have very distinct fashion styles (e.g. James Morton & his sweaters) or almost cartoonish reaction shots (Nadiya). Or if they get cool intros like Selasi riding to his finance job on a motorcycle. Showing clips of Luke walking his dogs or Rahul swimming at his local gym don't help them make an impression.

It's been interesting to see what has been going viral on Japanese social media. Apparently this one little moment of Naomi eating a banana while the tournament was prepping the stage is blowing up: Folks are calling it cute and asking if she was still in game mode. Naomi's told the press that it was probably just out of habit but Japanese tweeters are finding it really endearing. I used to be more bothered by her ums and uptalking but the more I hear Naomi speak...the more I hear Japanese speech patterns than anything else. I hope she keeps her funny, fresh personality and doesn't get jaded as her career progresses.

This came up again in the thread for season 9, episode 1 - but to avoid being off-topic, I elaborated my thoughts further in Baking on Both Sides of the Atlantic.

I don’t know the backstory but she appears to have only one finger on that hand. Briony called it her little hand on Twitter.

How much does it taste like spinach, though? Is it just enough spinach water to get the color? If I saw an unlabeled Gateaux Vert, I'd probably expect green tea flavors from the color. One of the things I love about Bake Off this season is how they have yet to acknowledge Briony's left hand at all. It would have been a total sob story on the Food Network. Instead we get her fun commentary about the bakes. Don't let the show make you cry girl! Yay for Dan getting that first handshake for his childhood favorite. He makes great faces when he does better than he expects. "Go like the clappers," was a new expression for me. Very happy for Rahul and Ruby with their showstoppers - I hope the value of the Hollywood handshake doesn't get too diluted, though.

Sightings of Conan in Japan are starting to pop up. He was in Tokyo today trying out Harajuku street style. He's been to Japan before for vacation. Edited to add: Team Coco have posted a long video from a kaiseki meal with Conan and Jordan. I usually chuckle at how Jordan pushes Conan's buttons but wow, a full hour is a lot.

Yay, the show got officially renewed.

Venus turned 38 this summer. I've never been a huge fan of either sister throughout their long careers, but I'm much more sympathetic and likely to root for them now that they're pushing 40. It doesn't hurt that Serena's carefully edited HBO show gave a glimpse of how much more fun/self-reflective she is off the court. Dorky, even. I agree that something about the shape of the tutu doesn't quite work. Her practical practice and press conference outfits have been more flattering. I do think the tutu looks cool when it splays out in all directions at once. I'm surprised/impressed her fishnet stockings provide adequate leg compression - I thought they were hard to see until ESPN showed zoomed-in replays of Serena rolling her ankle last night. First, I agree with you that the umpire shouldn't have needed to give that demo. And yes, an elite player should know what a foot fault looks like. Kyrgios is in a universe of his own, though. If umpires treat him exactly like any other player and completely limit their interactions with him, isn't there a risk of escalating his meltdowns instead of moving along the match? That unusual moment at Wimbledon, as unnecessary as it should have been, did stop the griping about foot faults. I don't know. Dealing with him is so messy for the umpires and the tour. He needs to hire Andy Murray for PR. I think his social media posts with Nick give me some sense of how fun/likeable he could be.

Out of curiosity, what did you think about that foot fault tutorial Krygios got at Wimbledon? Obviously the chat was very different, but in your mind was it a brief enough interaction to avoid improperly influencing the momentum of the match?

There are exceptions but in the US, the word is generally acceptable only to describe woven rugs. Here we hear "Asian flavors" instead - usually meaning East Asian, or Southeast Asian inspired tastes. The term gets overused a lot on US cooking competitions. For example, on Iron Chef or Chopped. It doesn't carry the same patronizing tone or emotional baggage but it seems a bit lazy to just say their dish is "Asian-inspired" when the well-traveled chefs actually mean something quite regionally specific - like Szechuanese, Okinawan.... (shrug) Ceindreadh, I'm going to let the topic go for more cheerful Bake Off discussion, but feel free to message if you want to discuss further.

ESPN: USTA says umpire at Nick Kyrgios match will keep working Brian Earley and chief umpire Soeren Frienel reviewed the incident. While Mo Lahyani will be monitored, he's going to stay at the US Open due to his "exemplary track record as an international tennis official." According to Kyrgios's press conference - and we know his sense of reality can be unique - he was not feeling well and during the chat Mo Lahyani was saying things like "it was not a good look." With all that partial audio, I'm still undecided on what to think. My guess right now would be that on the umpire's part it was half medical questions and half a paternal, I-don't-want-to-have-to-fine-you-for-not-trying speech. I'm not sure I would characterize it as a pep talk. I was fascinated by Federer's reaction, who said in his press conference that he didn't care about what was discussed but rather that there was any prolonged interaction on the ground at all. So I guess even if it wasn't a pep talk that just coming down the chair to talk could change the momentum/tenor of a match.

I replied to Ceindreadh's question in the Both Sides of the Atlantic thread, but I would point out the term's got a pretty awful and violent history here. It's not just outdated. I agree that context and intention are important. The word can certainly be a neutral term when discussing Japonisme and Chinoiserie. I don't agree that it's an acceptable use in the voiceover when the production company wants to bring in a ton of revenue from the US market where such casual use of the word is considered truly effed up. Would the show ever use the word Negro to describe flavors? No. And its negativity/neutrality also is contextual. I fully realize that the English language breathes and evolves differently around the world - but knowledge matters when asking us for our money. I remember when Spooks changed its name for the US and that was not nearly the same scale of a revenue property.

From an episode thread: So American context....At best it's considered a patronizing, outdated Eurocentric term that harkens back to imperialism. While ignorance lingers, it really hasn't been acceptable for use here since the Vietnam war era. At worst, it's a super negative, pejorative term that was used to help stoke immigration/terrorism fears. (We had effin' internment camps for Americans in WW2 and before that, Yellow Peril laws like the Chinese Exclusion act.) The umbrella term became further loaded with violent, hateful, racist baggage in the 1970s after a 1965 immigration law lifted racial discrimination in quotas and highly educated immigrants from countries like Taiwan once again were allowed in.

It does feel like the same four sponsors keep running one piece of creative over and over. Emirates and IBM for example, use their non-tennis themed ads a lot. At least Chase might have heard you - I've noticed that they've started swapping out placements of Serena's Way for a new take on LL Cool J's Mama Said Knock You Out. In the meantime, Nike seems to have run their kid Serena spot everywhere the last couple of days.

I wonder, though, if the chip eating was one of those things that got milked for TV. I myself, didn't read the moment as arrogance but as one where she was undeservedly and weirdly relaxed. I will refrain from jumping into the spectacularly polarized social media response to her, but I'll concede that Kim-Joy's work was beautiful. justmehere, does Ruby remind you of Sandra Bullock at all? One complaint I neglected to mention in my earlier post was Sandi's painful inclusion of "oriental flavors" in the voiceover. A complaint I made last year. Again, Bake Off, you have an international audience, with a financially valuable fan base in the US. Our Anglophilia does not extend to the casual use of the word "oriental" unless it's a rug. And even then it's inaccurate.