This is a quick note to let you know that Google is going to do away with the email subscription part of FeedBurner in July. So if you have signed up to receive notifications of new posts on SheSimmers, you will no longer be getting those emails. This could very well be the last email notification of new content on my site.
I will continue to post new recipes and essays, but they will be published in the form of my newsletter, The Epestle. You can sign up for free content, which is published occasionally, or premium content, including Thai recipes (that I have not published anywhere, which goes out weekly.
I had written and trashed a lot of drafts before I ended up with the introduction you’re reading now. At one point, I wanted to explain to you why I hadn’t updated the blog in nearly three years. But whatever I went through is trivial in light of the fact that we’re still very much in a devastating pandemic, and that, to date, over 250,000 people in the US—more than 10,000 in the state of Illinois where I live—have died from the Coronavirus.
I’ve figured out that the only way forward for me as a writer is to seek out the people who are curious about the same things that I am—to the degree that I am—and to write fearlessly with the goal of delighting them. I will still write for various publications, and I still want to publish more books. However, in order to not fall out of love with writing again, I need to make curiosity, freedom, and connection with like-minded people my priority.
So, here we are—my first newsletter, The Epestle. I’m sure you can tell already that it’s a portmanteau of epistle (a letter—a newsletter, in this case) and pestle,
the thing you use together with a mortar to make various pastes for
Thai cooking. At first, I felt a tinge of shame for my love for
portmanteaus (portmanteaux?) in general and for choosing one as the
title of my newsletter, but that feeling went away quickly. This list on Wikipedia (which is a portmanteau) shows that The Epestle is in good company.
This
is a place where my writing is unshackled from the need to please
everyone, where I zero in and double down on the things I know people
who share my interest will like, where I become as unapologetically
obsessive about those things as I want to be. These are the things I
don’t need anyone’s permission, except my own, to publish.
There will be lots of food, with the emphasis on Thai food, of course. There will also be interviews, thoughts, cultural and linguistic tidbits, tales and stories, cooking and gardening tips, essays on an ingredient or a cooking method, etc. While there will occasionally be posts that are available for all subscribers, posts with recipes will be available only to paid subscribers.
I’ve missed hanging out with you. Won’t you please sign up now so you don’t miss the first issue? Thank you.
Around this time last year, I met with some of my friends who are part of Dill Magazine to talk about something I had wanted to see for a long time: a story on Thai relishes, nam phrik. These dishes form the most significant segment of Thai cuisine, but they’re the least understood and the least appreciated. I thought it was about time this changed.
Western food media doesn’t like to publish a story like this. It’s too niche. It doesn’t have a broad appeal. For them, it doesn’t make sense to dedicate their precious real estate on something most people don’t already know and love. Nam phrik, therefore, hasn’t received a lot of coverage in mainstream publications, and when it does, the coverage doesn’t go deep and is often rife with misinformation.
I took the idea to Dill, because of this. I wanted to see a story on nam phrik; I wanted it written with competence, understanding, and insight; and I knew the group behind Dill was capable of pulling this off. Even though they’re new and small and don’t have the resources of a large publication, they don’t shy away from specialized materials. I also know the Dill people don’t present niche stories in a “hey, look at the bizarre foods these other people eat!” manner either. In other words, I knew this story would be in good hands. Continue Reading →
