Milk
maiale al latte—pork
Michael Pollan • Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation
For us right now, in this period science has some understanding of what’s going on, but historically fermentation has been such a mystery that it’s been really seen in many contexts as something quite literally divine. And there’s a huge amount of ceremony and ritual organized around fermentation. We can even look at some of the major world religio... See more
Sandor Katz • Fermentation as Metaphor
quickly. Families that cannot afford a cremation but want their dead loved one to go into the Ganges will place the entire body into the river by night, leaving it there to decompose. Visitors to Varanasi see bloated corpses floating by or being eaten by dogs. There are so many of these corpses in the river that the Indian government releases thous
... See moreCaitlin Doughty • Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory
On other platforms, ceramic vessels have been found with a hole cut out of the base. Anything poured or placed into these vessels, which stood upright on the inundated timbers, would slowly disappear, melting away as if being consumed by the powers of the water—proof of the offerings’ acceptance.