http://mondomagazine.net We're not geeks! Fri, 30 Jul 2010 20:51:42 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 en hourly 1 http://mondomagazine.net/2008/digesting-japan-pt-1/ http://mondomagazine.net/2008/digesting-japan-pt-1/#comments Tue, 28 Oct 2008 04:00:16 +0000 lifestyle http://mondomagazine.net/?p=2751 A thrilling travel and food mini-series! Not a break-up story. By Leo K. Moncel Japan is crazy, right? Is there any other country that looms so large in the international imagination as a haven for the bizarre? Over the years, I became so used to hearing urban legends and ridiculous-sounding cultural generalizations about Japan that I started to disbelieve by default whatever I was told about it. I became certain that people were exaggerating the national character of Japan with each new conversation about it, like a fishing story. It seemed to have become a place known for extremes, used by people as a canvas on which to project their own outlandish visions. The truth about Japan, I assumed, was probably like most things in life: far more mundane than the fantasy. I spent three weeks in Japan at the end of August. Upon my return, the first thing I was asked by a lot of people was, "What was the most surprising thing about Japan?" My response: surprise that it did actually conform to almost every outlandish-sounding [...]]]> http://mondomagazine.net/2008/digesting-japan-pt-1/feed/ 2 http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-meat-im-yours/ http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-meat-im-yours/#comments Fri, 05 Sep 2008 04:00:20 +0000 lifestyle http://mondomagazine.net/?p=2107 A spirited defense of why it is sometimes okay to MURDER a helpless animal and eat it.05 By Leo K. Moncel Meat, meat, meat, you femme fatale. You're literally killing Canadians as I write this. You're killing the planet faster than ever. I used to know better than to tango with you. But I'm done with this love/hate relationship. Wicked, corrupting as you are, I'm giving my heart to you. You're my salty poison and my never-ending possibility. I love you more than I thought was possible in my youth. [...]]]> http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-meat-im-yours/feed/ 5 http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-horse-slaughterhouse-problem/ http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-horse-slaughterhouse-problem/#comments Tue, 15 Jul 2008 04:00:27 +0000 lifestyle http://mondomagazine.net/?p=1313 Excessive scale, not horse consumption, the real problem in Saskatchewan disgrace. By Leo K. Moncel Last month, Canadians were shocked by a CBC exposé of a Saskatchewan slaughterhouse. Hidden cameras revealed animals being crammed in oversized pens, being brought to slaughter in a panicked state, then slipping around the killing floor while an operator failed to stun them unconscious before they were killed. It was a scene of factory farming at its worst taking place within our borders at Natural Valley Farms in Neudorf, Saskatchewan. But the conditions of the slaughterhouse were especially appalling to many of the Canadian public because of the type of animal on the killing floor — the horse [...]]]> http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-horse-slaughterhouse-problem/feed/ 7 http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-chinese-beef-lamb-house-reviewed/ http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-chinese-beef-lamb-house-reviewed/#comments Fri, 20 Jun 2008 04:00:05 +0000 lifestyle http://mondomagazine.net/?p=1224 Foodstuffs' hippest young hypocrite with another hit! By Leo K. Moncel Attentive internauts may notice that in the previous column, I expressed my opinion that we all need to eat less meat and implied I was working on it myself. So why have I turned around and run out to eat at an establishment called the Chinese Beef Lamb House? Even more attentive readers may recall that the first paragraph of last week's column was about how I'm really big on traditional cuisines. Basically, when I heard there was a good Chinese-Muslim restaurant in the GTA, I had no choice but to put my eat-less-meat reform on pause and get on the hated purple subway line to Scarborough to gorge myself with some good friends. [...]]]> http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-chinese-beef-lamb-house-reviewed/feed/ 0 http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-food-crisis/ http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-food-crisis/#comments Tue, 03 Jun 2008 04:00:42 +0000 lifestyle http://mondomagazine.net/?p=1174 Gangs, Grains, and Grimness! By Leo K. Moncel Before we get going, I'd just like to point out that this is in fact a continuation of the column that began as, "Taste Test: A New Beginning". There was some confusion between myself and our devoted, young section editor over the name of my column. So, let me explain what's going on with "Red Food." It is a reference to Timothy Taylor's Stanley Park, a novel that I have not yet read, but have heard discussed on CBC Radio's Canada Reads. Blue Rodeo's Jim Cuddy synopsized a section of the book in which two different kinds of foodies are arbitrarily designated gang titles. The first group, "Crips" are people who are interested in innovation. "Bloods" are those who are attracted to tradition. Though I think it's impossible to be a pure innovator or a pure traditionalist, I do tend to favour the "red" end of the spectrum when I do serious cooking or plan to eat out. Hence, red food. I could easily go on, as food traditions and street gangs are two topics of great interest to me, but there is something more urgent on my mind: The Food Crisis [...]]]> http://mondomagazine.net/2008/red-food-the-food-crisis/feed/ 1