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Weekend Butler: Your pantry wants — no, needs — this sauce. Your cat wants — no, needs — this. A great Hitchcock thriller you’ve never seen. Streaming: Jesse & Ghislaine have their “moment.”
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Published: Jun 24, 2021
Category:
Weekend
CAT HOUSE
There was never a cat because I don’t like them and they know it and, self-amused sadists that are, they come right to me. But now there is a cat. A model cat. Self-amused… and amusing. And smart. He likes to be fed at an ungodly hour, which is ordinarily not a plus, but I have a lot to write, so getting up earlier is, if not a delight, at least a Good Thing. Cats love boxes, and here’s one you’ve never seen: a house with great paintings on 4 sides, with holes positioned so he’s the unlikely star. [To buy one, click here.]
LAO GAN MA CHILI CRISP SAUCE WITH ROASTED CHILI PEPPER FLAKES
Tao Huabi started as a street vendor selling noodles and sauce to students near her hometown in the southern Chinese province of Guizhou. In the mid-1990s, she began to bottle her sauces. She became a billionaire.
Sam Sifton, in the Times: “It’s magical: a boon to noodle soups and kitchen-sink stir-fries, to eggs and cucumbers, to plain steamed fish.”
Amazon reviewer #1: “I read somewhere a post that the person liked it so much that they put it on everything. I ordered it and put it on rice. Next I topped my yellow fin tuna with it. I add it to salad. I’ve used it as dop for bread. Yes, I see how this can go on anything. Despite its look, it’s not spicy. It’s crunchy and flavorful and when I originally bought two, my thought was to keep one and give the other as a gift. I kept them both.”
Amazon reviewer #2: “Laoganma Spicy Chili Crisp Sauce is the condiment that you did not realize you are missing and once you try it you never want to go without. The 7.42 oz bottle looks ideal for use and then you realize you are almost halfway finished the bottle! Or at least that is what I found out! The chili oil is spicy, sweet, crispy (and no joke – it maintains its crispy texture!), savory, and well balanced. Some of its ingredients include soybean oil, chili, fermented soybean, and monosodium glutamate. I have put it on scrambled eggs, omelettes, pho, ramen noodles, fried chicken, beef, white rice, and vegetables. I have eaten it straight out of the bottle because it tastes this good! Honestly, the spicy chili crisp compliments everything! I envisioned fire and brimstone after seeing all the chilis but it is not as spicy as I had imagined — it did not blow off my head. It also does not have a vinegar accent or presence like other chili-based sauces out there.
The video makes the case…
[To buy 2 7.4 oz jars with a cute serving spoon from Amazon for $19.99, click here. To buy one jar without the cute spoon for $8.99, click here.]
A DANISH PSA FOR WEARING BICYCLE HELMETS IS THE BEST VIKING MOVIE IN 63 YEARS
IT’S THE FINAL WEEK ON CONAN’S SHOW: SETH ROGEN GETS HIM TO LIGHT UP
HOW LEGENDARY PHYSICIST RICHARD FEYNMAN HELPED CRACK THE CASE ON THE CHALLENGER DISASTER
The truly brilliant are often also unafraid. A great short piece about brainpower in action.
JESSE AND GHISLAINE… TOGETHER AT LAST
If you haven’t already heard the story of my “moment” with Jeffrey Epstein’s Gal Friday (and every other day), I fear it’s streaming on Peacock.
THE WEEKEND FILM: A LITTLE KNOWN HITCHCOCK TRILLER
Hemingway said no. Steinbeck said yes. And once he had Steinbeck’s script — which he’d revise and revise — Alfred Hitchcock had a movie. It would take place in a single location — a lifeboat. On it would be the survivors of a ship sunk by a German submarine. Would they ignore any personality differences in order to survive? Would they make decisions together, or would a leader emerge? And what would they do when food and water became scarce, or when one of them got sick?
Only one set — a Hollywood set with a water tank, but the characters were more than sufficient to provide drama and conflict. A rich and social woman, wearing cynicism like perfume. An opportunistic tycoon. Two meek women, one with a dead baby. Four men from the ship’s crew, one of them a Cockney, one of them Black. And a man no one had seen before. With good, very Hitchcockian reason: he’s the captain of the German U-boat. Which was quite a choice for a movie released 1944, with World War II raging.
“Lifeboat,” often overlooked, is one of Hitchcock’s most interesting movies. It won him his second Oscar nomination for best director. [To rent the stream from Amazon, click here.]
