The Cobb salad is an American garden salad typically made with chopped salad greens (authentically romaine lettuce), tomato, bacon, chicken breast, hard-boiled eggs, avocado, chives, blue cheese (often Roquefort; some versions use other cheeses such as cheddar or Monterey Jack, or no cheese at all) and red wine vinaigrette.  The ingredients are laid out on a plate in neat rows.  It is served as a main course.  Various stories recount how the salad was invented.  One says that it came about in 1937 at the Hollywood Brown Derby restaurant, where it became a signature dish.  It is named after the restaurant's owner, Robert Howard Cobb.  Stories vary whether the salad was invented by Cobb or by his chef, Paul J. Posti.  The legend is that Cobb had not eaten until near midnight, and so he mixed together leftovers he found in the kitchen, along with some bacon cooked by the line cook, and tossed it with their French dressing.  Another version of the creation is that Robert Kreis, executive chef at the restaurant, created the salad in 1929 (the year the Brown Derby's Hollywood location opened) and named it in honor of Cobb.  The same source confirms that 1937 was the reported date of the version noted above, with Cobb making the salad.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobb_salad   

List of foods named after people  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_foods_named_after_people 

At the start of the 16th century the Opera del Duomo—the committee of officials in charge of the decoration and maintenance of the Italy’s Florence cathedral—had a tricky unfinished project on its hands.  A document from 1501 refers to a massive barely begun statue, “a certain man of marble, named David, badly blocked out and laid on its back in the courtyard.”  The stone was a leftover from a long-running decorative project:  in 1408 the committee had decided to decorate the roofline around the dome of the cathedral with massive statues of biblical prophets and mythological figures.  The first two, put into place in the early 15th century, were a statue of Joshua sculpted in terra-cotta by Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi (Donatello) and painted white to look like marble, and a statue of Hercules, sculpted by one of Donatello’s students, Agostino di Duccio.  A statue of David, the Biblical hero who slayed the giant Goliath, had been ordered in 1464.  This commission went to Agostino, and a huge slab of marble was extracted from the Carrara quarries in Tuscany, Italy, for the project.  For unknown reasons Agostino abandoned the project after doing only a little work, mostly roughing out around the legs.  Another sculptor, Antonio Rossellino, was hired to take over the project in 1476, but he backed out almost immediately, citing the poor quality of the marble.  (Modern scientific analyses of the marble have confirmed that it is indeed of mediocre quality.)  Left without a sculptor but too expensive to throw away, the massive slab sat out in the elements for a quarter century.  In the summer of 1501 a new effort was made to find a sculptor who could finish the statue.  The 26-year-old sculptor Michelangelo was chosen and given two years to complete it. Early in the morning on September 13, 1501, the young artist got to work on the slab, extracting the figure of David in a miraculous process that the artist and writer Giorgio Vasari would later describe as “the bringing back to life of one who was dead.”  In 1504, as Michelangelo finished his work, Florentine officials concluded that the statue was too heavy to place in its intended location on the roofline of the cathedral.  A committee of artists, including Sandro Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci, met and decided that the statue should be placed at the entrance to the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence.  In 1873 it was moved indoors to the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence and a replica was erected at the original site.  In the summer of 1501 a new effort was made to find a sculptor who could finish the statue.  The 26-year-old sculptor Michelangelo was chosen and given two years to complete it.  Early in the morning on September 13, 1501, the young artist got to work on the slab, extracting the figure of David in a miraculous process that the artist and writer Giorgio Vasari would later describe as “the bringing back to life of one who was dead.”  https://www.britannica.com/story/how-a-rejected-block-of-marble-became-the-worlds-most-famous-statue    

Vietnam is the world’s second-largest coffee exporter behind Brazil.  Most Vietnamese coffee beans are grown in the Central Highlands, more specifically the Da Lat region.  Here, the climate differs from much of the country, given that much of the area is at a higher altitude.  The combination of mountains, sunshine, rain, and good soil conditions make it good for both Robusta and Arabica beans.  Whilst Western-style lattes and cappuccinos are on the increase, the best Vietnamese coffee is served with a phin.  This is a French-style filter, used for making drip coffee.  Unless you specify, coffee here will be served with sugar, and a fair amount of it too.  This does result in a fabulous-tasting blend, but it can make a drinker hit the ceiling from a caffeine and sugar high, and not come down all day.  https://www.tourhero.com/en/magazine/gastronomy/coffee-in-vietnam-a-way-of-life/   

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2870  October 28, 2024