Cultured Pickle Shop

"I'd like a pickle"
"A pickle? What kind of pickle? Parsnip? Turnip? Curried Carrot? What?"
"Uh. A pickle."

There's a sign outside of Cultured pickle shop in Berkeley, CA, that says Pickle Shop. Which makes sense. It seems like one of the most logical phrases to put on a sign intended for placement in front of such a shop. Sure, it might strike a more poetically minded person as a bit on the nose. Not a lot of subtext. Little intrigue. Just the facts, ma'am. And sure, there are more verbose, stylistic options. Ye Olde Dispensary of Brine Bathed Curiosities comes to mind. The Lactobacillus Enriched Vegetable Emporium, perhaps. But in terms of verbal economy, Pickle Shop has it pegged. Why then, does this paragon of linguistic efficiency induce a steady stream of slightly befuddled customers, staggering into the shop, unable to acquire the vinegar-soaked, dill-laden cucumber they envisioned, like some poor sap requesting Stevie Wonder's "I Just Called to Say I Loved You" at a vintage vinyl snob-shop? As anyone who's as big a nerd about anything as Alex Hozven is about pickles can tell you, when you spend the majority of your waking hours obsessing over some silly (yet completely fascinating and wonderful) little thing, it's easy to lose perspective. For most people, a pickle is a sour cucumber. For Hozven, a pickle is an alchemical marvel of lactic-acid fermentation; a vegetable, as the Japanese put it, altered without the use of heat. Whether it be standards like kimchee and sauerkraut, or more unusual fare such as picked blood oranges, kasu carrots, which utilize the filtered-off byproduct of sake, or the flash-pickling microbial hotbed of the nuka pot, it's all pickles to her. So if all you want is a dill cucumber, you can probably get one. You just have to know what to ask for. 

A Fresh Take on How We Eat

FRESH continues a trend in food films and literature, encouraging our culture to rethink how we eat. Quite a feat indeed. Relying less on shocking and depressing its audience and more on revealing a series of positive role models in our quest for redeeming local, biodiverse farms, FRESH is a celebration of community and a call to action. FRESH celebrates the farmers, thinkers and business people across America who are re-inventing our food system. Among several main characters, FRESH features urban farmer and activist, Will Allen, the recipient of MacArthur’s 2008 Genius Award; sustainable farmer and entrepreneur, Joel Salatin, made famous by Michael Pollan’s book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma; and supermarket owner, David Ball, challenging our Wal-Mart dominated economy. Check out the trailer here. We're looking forward to being inspired! Produced and Directed by: Ana Sofia Joanes. Check here for a screening near you.

Pathfinder Chef Challenge Spotlight: Tim Kirker

Though the French were the fourth largest group of immigrants to Peru (thanks wikipedia!), and both French and Peruvian cuisine are among the world's best, I’m not sure if French-Peruvian cuisine has really taken hold internationally. But depending on how thing shape up for Tim Kirker, he could end up as the ambassador of a new culinary movement. The head chef of Bistro Zinc on State Street in Chicago’s beautiful Near North Side, Kirker is a master of traditional French cuisine the likes of croque monsieur, escargot, profiteroles, and assiette de charcuterie. But, no stranger to the outdoors, he's also "done quite a bit of hiking and biking cooking in the outback," not to mention preparing straight-from-the-river fish over an open campfire in Alaska. With those kind of Top Chef meets Man vs Wild credentials, can the Brandade Stuffed Rocoto Pepper, or Ceviche Confit be far off? Check out all the great chef videos at our YouTube page.

If you’d like a chance to perfect your own Peruvian hybrid cuisine, make a 60-second of yourself showing why you should be our guest chef, and go here to upload it and learn more about the contest! And if you're not a chef, you can enter to be the lucky Pathfinder for which our winning chef will be whipping up those exquisite meals! Enter here.

Featured Book: Everything that Rises

In biology, convergence refers to the phenomenon of unrelated plants and animals developing superficially similar features in comparable environmental conditions. For instance, echolocation in animals of both sky and sea, or the similarly streamlined bodies of aquatic birds, fish, and mammals. These traits don't suggest a particular commonality between the creatures themselves, but rather reflect the forces, seen and unseen, of their environment upon them.

When Lawrence Weschler, in his book "Everything that Rises: A Book of Convergences," points out the echo of Rembrant's "The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicholaes Tulp" in Freddy Alborta's famous photograph of Che Guavera's death, he's not implying that Alborta knowingly referenced the Dutch Master any more than he'd suggest that a duck, inspired by a dolphin's elegance, could suddenly become a penguin. However, an artistic coincidence such as this surely merits further examination, which is precisely the cause taken up by Weschler's book. Just as the meme is the cultural analog of biology's gene, these cultural convergences parallel the natural commonalities between the branches of dendrites, rivers, and trees, or the waves of the sea, sound, and our brains. Weschler steadies his aim on the intricate aggregate of unseen forces that gently shape human culture. After reading an article by John Berger which initially drew attention to the Alborta/Rembrandt likeness, Weschler developed an increasing awareness of such convergences, especially in the visual art world, and began collecting them like stamps. "Everything that Rises" is his display case. He shows off a stunning series of essays that focus on these strange little moments when bits of culture overlap, reverberate, and feedback upon themselves. His personal narratives often unfold like murder mysteries, with excerpts from The Iliad and ancient clay tablets popping up as clues while we wait on edge to discover how it'll all tie together in the end.


As with most seemingly bizarre coincidences of daily life, these convergences do benefit from the deliberate focus on the pieces of the puzzle that fit snugly, and the disregard of those that don't. Fortunately, much of the beauty in what Weschler does lies curiously in the fact that there is no central thesis. He sets out to prove nothing. The aim is merely to revel in the wonderment of it all. And what emerges is absolutely brilliant. These convergences strike at something deeply satisfying. Comforting. A strange kind of faith in the underlying order of artistry and perception. A thread that ties human culture and experience together. It's a very specific and profound version of beauty.

And ultimately, even if there is nothing more to be gleaned from these seemingly stochastic observations than a simple amused smile, this should by no means be undervalued. Delighting in such marvels is nothing short of training ourselves to find the beauty in the quotidian, to absorb life as fully as possible rather than letting it quietly pass us by. This is a sentiment which can surely be appreciated by anyone who's ever paused to cherish the cherry aroma of a nice glass of pinot. And then, rather than wonder what it all means that we might transform the humble grape into this endlessly complex repository of art and culture, we simply touch the glass to our lips, and drink it in.