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Dame Edna Everage's Breakfast Dress (Stephen Adnitt)

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Dame Edna Everage's Breakfast Dress (Stephen Adnitt)

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Painting of a Medieval Cinnamon Seller (unknown artist)

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Painting of a Medieval Cinnamon Seller (unknown artist)

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The Senses of Hearing, Touch and Taste Jan Brueghel

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The Senses of Hearing, Touch and Taste Jan Brueghel

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How to Make a Waxed Cotton Tote Bag (some history)

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This is the technique I decided to use for coating some of my fabrics (without the coconut oil), as it was inexpensive, relatively safe, and plant based

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How to make reusable wax cloth alternative to cling film

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Linseed oil is traditionally used in tablecloth coatings as it makes the surface of fabrics repel liquid - I looked into this as a coating method but found that linseed oil is prone to spontaneous combustion and therefore rather dangerous...

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About the ortolan - traditional french dish

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About the ortolan - traditional french dish

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Article about a traditional french dish, the ortolan. "The bird is roasted for eight minutes and then plucked. The consumer then places the bird feet first into their mouth while holding onto the bird's head. The ortolan is then eaten whole, with or without the head, and the consumer spits out the larger bones. The traditional way French gourmands eat ortolans is to cover their heads and face with a large napkin or towel while consuming the bird. The purpose of the towel is debated. Some claim it is to retain the maximum aroma with the flavour as they consume the entire bird at once, others have stated "Tradition dictates that this is to shield – from God’s eyes – the shame of such a decadent and disgraceful act"

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Credit... iStock

PARIS - The menu at Les Prés d'Eugénie, a three-Michelin-star restaurant in the bucolic Landes region of southwest France, reads like a decadent litany of the terroir: truffle blini in a silky galette; toasted pigs' feet with smoked eel; verveine soufflé scented with citronnelle.

But the chef, Michel Guérard, says that one essential dish is missing: the ortolan, a tiny songbird that gourmands, including former President François Mitterrand, used to covet, consuming the head, bones and body in a single, steaming mouthful, while covering their faces with a white napkin to conceal the act.

Now, Mr. Guérard and three other celebrity chefs who hail from southwest France - Alain Ducasse, Jean Coussau and Alain Dutournier - are trying to engineer a public comeback for the ortolan, an overhunted species that France banished from restaurant menus in 1999. If they get their way, the forbidden food will be legally offered to napkin-wearing diners at restaurants in Landes for one weekend a year - the gastronomic equivalent of a visitation from the holy grail.

"The bird is absolutely delicious," said Mr. Guérard, who recalled preparing ortolans for Mitterrand and his successor, Jacques Chirac, back when it was legal. (Mitterrand was said to linger over two ortolans in his last supper before his death in 1996, also consuming three dozen oysters, foie gras and capon.)

Michel Guérard, left, the chef of Les Prés d'Eugénie, and Jean Coussau, the chef of Relais de la Poste, are among a handful of chefs trying to bring the ortolan back to the restaurant menu in France. Credit... Ulrich Lebeuf/M.Y.O.P for The New York Times

"It is enveloped in fat that tastes subtly like hazelnut," Mr. Guérard said, "and to eat the flesh, the fat and its little bones hot, all together, is like being taken to another dimension."

But the campaign has provoked environmentalists, who accuse the chefs of engaging in a publicity stunt to promote what they say is an archaic custom that will further endanger the bird, and that treats the ortolan inhumanely before it is killed.

"These chefs are totally backward; they are not living in the 21st century," said Allain Bougrain Dubourg, the president of France's Birds Protection League. "They aren't doing this for gastronomy. It's all about raising their profile."

Mr. Ducasse, who has several restaurants around the world, had already alarmed animal-rights activists in New York City when he served about 20 ortolans during a 1995 dinner at Le Cirque that grabbed tabloid headlines.

Today, Mr. Ducasse and his confreres say their main objective is to revive a culinary tradition that dates to Roman times, when emperors sought out the ortolan's intoxicating taste, and to pass the savoir-faire to a new generation of cooks. "We want to be able to do this so as not to lose all the beautiful things that make up the history and the DNA of French cooking," Mr. Guérard said.

The European Union banned the hunting of ortolans and declared them a protected species in 1979 amid concerns about their survival and an outcry from environmentalists. But France waited two decades to codify the measure.

Still, many people in France continue to capture and eat the birds. Families in Landes would traditionally savor them once a year, "like a bonbon" at the end of a big lunch, eating them in total silence with a glass of Sauternes and the shades drawn, said Mr. Dutournier, a native of Landes and the head chef at Carré des Feuillants in Paris, which has two Michelin stars.

Wearing the white napkin allows diners to savor the aromas and enjoy some privacy while devouring the bird - or, critics say, hide their indulgence from the eyes of God.

Eating ortolan is also a surreptitious pleasure beyond France: The author and chef Anthony Bourdain, in his 2010 book, "Medium Raw," described a secret, late-night meeting of French chefs in a New York restaurant to eat ortolans. "It's sort of a hot rush of fat, guts, bones, blood and meat, and it's really delicious," he told Stephen Colbert in an interview.

Such extravagance can involve an uncomfortable trade-off. Poachers lure the ortolan into ground traps during its migratory flight from Northern Europe to Africa. Mr. Dubourg, the activist, said that because the birds are prized for their fat, they are kept in darkness for 21 days and are sometimes blinded, prompting them to gorge on millet and grapes. Once the ortolan's fat has tripled in volume, the bird is drowned with Armagnac, plucked, roasted and served hot in its entirety. "Good cuisine cannot be used as an excuse for the condition these animals are kept in," Mr. Dubourg said.

Guests eating ortolan at a private dinner party in southwestern France after the bird was banned from restaurant menus. Credit... Richard Cottenier/MAXPPP

Last month, he led a group of activists into the fields of Landes, where they released scores of trapped ortolans and demanded that poachers be arrested. The police declined to take action, and a scuffle broke out between protesters and trappers.

Mr. Dubourg's group estimates that the ortolan population fell by more than 40 percent between 2001 and 2011. About 30,000 wild ortolans are still being culled illegally in the South of France every summer, while the police look the other way, he added. A single ortolan can fetch up to 150 euros ($189) on the black market.

Lifting the hunting ban would reduce prices significantly, the chefs argue.

Mr. Coussau, the chef at the two-Michelin-star restaurant Relais de la Poste in southwest France, insisted that the birds were not treated inhumanely, and cited an unpublished Canadian ornithological study indicating that the ortolan population in Northern Europe is around 30 million. "They are hardly endangered," he said.

Besides, Mr. Guérard added, he and his fellow chefs are seeking a waiver from the French government to serve ortolan only one weekend a year. But with all of the other problems confronting the nation, they don't expect quick results.

He said the chefs do not want to wipe out the birds: "We just want to maintain a tradition."

Mr. Coussau rebuffed critics who say the ortolan is an unnecessary extravagance. "There are many things that we eat that are not essential to live," he said. "We could survive on nutritional pills if we had to."

"But if we go down that path," he concluded, "the notion of pleasure will disappear."

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Chefs Fight for Songbird (Published 2014)

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PARIS - The menu at Les Prés d'Eugénie, a three-Michelin-star restaurant in the bucolic Landes region of southwest France, reads like a decadent litany of the terroir: truffle blini in a silky galette; toasted pigs' feet with smoked eel; verveine soufflé scented with citronnelle.

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Maria Allen "To Hide Ones Face From God"

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Maria Allen "To Hide Ones Face From God"

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Maria Allen "To Hide Ones Face From God"

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Maria Allen "To Hide Ones Face From God"

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Jacob Joardens, The Feast of the Bean King

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Jacob Joardens, The Feast of the Bean King

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"The one person who got the bean was proclaimed “the bean king." He put on a fake crown, chose a queen, and appointed a staff of courtiers - from minister to jester. Royal duties were extremely simple: one had to regularly raise a glass and proclaim “the king drinks!” as an appeal to the participants in the feast to follow the king’s example. Judging by the condition of the characters in the paintings of Jacob Jordaens, it happened often enough. The participants in the feast were then obliged to obey the proclaimed king and queen. When the king raised another glass of wine, everyone had to exclaim in chorus: “The king drinks!” and such feasts dragged on the whole night."

In the paintings, the 'bean king' is also depicted to be wearing a white napkin as a bib. Those present at the feast are 'peasants' and are drunk and unruly - not fine dining.

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DailyArtMagazine.com - Art History Stories

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Jacob Jordaens (1593 - 1678), a wonderful artist of the Baroque era, was keen on painting the scenes from peasants' life. He first painted the famous feast of the bean king in the mid-1630s. Due to the popularity of the holiday, he began to receive regular orders for picturing it again and again.
What is the feast of the Bean King?

A feast with the bean king is a common custom in 17th century Flanders, a secular way to celebrate the Catholic Epiphany. The bean symbolized the guiding star that led the Magi to Bethlehem to worship the baby Christ. Traditionally, the table was set on the evening of January 6, when all religious rituals were already finished, and people returned from church. But the bean, naturally, was kneaded into the dough the day before. The one person who got the bean was proclaimed "the bean king." He put on a fake crown, chose a queen, and appointed a staff of courtiers - from minister to jester.

Jacob Jordaens, The King Drinks, ca.1640, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. Wikimedia Commons.

Royal duties were extremely simple: one had to regularly raise a glass and proclaim "the king drinks!" as an appeal to the participants in the feast to follow the king's example. Judging by the condition of the characters in the paintings of Jacob Jordaens, it happened often enough. The participants in the feast were then obliged to obey the proclaimed king and queen. When the king raised another glass of wine, everyone had to exclaim in chorus: "The king drinks!" and such feasts dragged on the whole night.

Why was it so popular?

A feast with the bean king was extremely popular both among ordinary people and noble burghers. A nationwide game of the king and his retinue was a good safety valve for overcoming dissatisfaction with the existing order of things. Carnivals in medieval Europe performed this function precisely - butchers dressed up as barons, kings hid under the guise of bakers. During the holidays, people took on the roles of their rulers. It was possible to dress up in their costumes and make fun of them. Carnival, holiday, feast - this is the territory of the game and of freedom, fenced off from the space of public institutions. The drunk paintings of Jacob Jordaens capture this perfectly!

Jacob Jordaens, The Bean King, ca.1638, State Hermitage Museum, St.Petersburg, Russia. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Look at this colorful example! It depicts a noisy and cheerful feast scene in a rich Flemish house. Looking at the lively faces, it becomes clear that the guests have drunk more than one glass. The king sitting in the center - a good-natured gray-haired man - proclaims another toast, and the whole company greets him with enthusiastic drunken cries. The young woman on the right also raises her glass, completely forgetting the baby on her knees. But the men are especially noisy. At the same time, one of them, dressed in a traditional clown-like costume, very shamelessly hugs his neighbor. And her little daughter, seizing the moment, drinks from her mother's glass.

Jacob Joardens, The Feast of the Bean King, 1640-1645, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Culture of the feast of a bean king

We can trace several details reflecting the culture of that time. Individual forks in the 17th century have already appeared, although they were considered a luxury. But at this feast, we do not see any individual devices - only common plates on which the food is piled on. Also, the ritualized nature of drinking - at first the king pronounces a toast, then only the rest raise their glasses. The cup, according to tradition, rises to the sky.

Children and pets are actively taking part in the fun of adults. Obviously, the educational side of this did not worry the Flemish people. Their fun drinking party was the equivalent of watching family movies today. Children as the participants in adult feasts are completely in the tradition of European painting. All the paintings of the bacchanal are always crowded with children and angels.

See more cute babies in art here!

Jacob Joardens, The Bean King, 1640-1645, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden, Germany. Wikimedia Commons.

Family first

Interestingly, in all of his feast paintings, Jordaens depicts his loved ones as central characters. The artist was a student and subsequently son-in-law of the Antwerp painting teacher Adam van Noort. Jordaens often captured him as the central figure of the bean king. A good tip to make your father-in-law like you!

A woman with a child is usually Jordaens' wife Elizabeth, and the most active man, vis-a-vis the bean king in the foreground, is the artist himself.

Jacob Jordaens, Self-portrait among Parents, Brothers and Sisters, ca. 1615, State Hermitage Museum, St.Petersburg, Russia. Wikimedia Commons.

Jacob Jordaens was not the only one who portrayed this popular holiday. Although in Jan Miense Molenaer's case, the king does not have vivid detailed attributes and the feast itself is not as big as in Jordaen's paintings.

Jan Miense Molenaer,The King Drinks, 1636-1637, Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna, Austria. Wikimedia Commons.

Jacob Jordaens painted about ten bean kings - huge canvases, each about 2-4 meters on the long side, complex in color and light, with lively multi-figure compositions. The noisy revels were a great success. They fully reflected the character of the Flemish people - direct and simple, sometimes rude, but always cheerful, full of inexhaustible energy.
Read about other Greatest Baroque Painters! Or try to recreate some artsy feasts at home with Cocktails inspired by Art guide.

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Jacob Jordaens and the Feast of the Bean King | DailyArt Magazine

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Jacob Jordaens (1593 - 1678), a wonderful artist of the Baroque era, was keen on painting the scenes from peasants' life. He first painted the famous feast of the bean king in the mid-1630s. Due to the popularity of the holiday, he began to receive regular orders for picturing it again and again.

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Napkins have been recorded as being in use, from the times of ancient Roman Empire and prior to then, in ancient Greece. References to word napkin dates back to 1384 AD. It is believed that the first napkin was a lump of dough the Spartans called "apomagdalie." It was a mixture that was cut into small pieces, rolled and kneeded at the table, that led to using sliced bread to wipe the hands.

In Roman antiquity, napkins known as "sudaria" and "mappae" were made in both small and large lengths. The sudarium, Latin for "handkerchief," was a pocket-size fabric earned to blot the brow during meals taken in the warm Mediterranean climate. The mappa was a larger cloth spread over the edge of the couch as protection from food taken in a reclining position. The fabric was also used to blot the lips. Each guest brought his own large mappa "napkin" and they became the first known "doggy bags" as guests leaving a Roman dinner had their mappa filled with leftover delicacies from the enormous feasts to take home. With the fall of Roman Empire, napkins disappeared from the dining table .

Napkins returned to adorn the dining table many centuries later and the classic painting Last Supper from 1464-1467 AD by Dieric Bouts depicts the use of napkins on the dinner table. The use of the napkin in Europe began in 1400 on the tables of royalty, where they started to use napkins made from warm or even perfumed cloth. By the 16th century, napkins were part of rich dining experience and came in many sizes, known by various names like diaper, serviette, touaille (towel) depending on the size and intended use.

The art of napkin-folding in Europe began in Italy. The most popular, were those that were resembling animals. The folded napkins, or "serviettes", caught the eyes of all fashionable British, after the Restoration. Samuel Pepys wrote in 1669 in his diary, of a grand dinner held. The day prior, he wrote of having a caterer come to lay the table cloth and fold the napkins.

17th century saw the use of big sized napkins measuring 35" by 45" inches to help accommodate the needs of eating with bare hands instead of spoons and forks. The size reduced when forks and spoons were accepted as part of regular dining experience in major parts of Europe in the 18th century including Great Britain.

The 17th century also saw French come up with elaborate rules for nobility class which included instructions on napkin usage, a predecessor to modern day napkin etiquette, including the one which instructs the guests to not use the napkin for wiping the face or clean teeth or worse, rub one's nose.

The French court imposed elaborate codes of etiquette on the aristocracy, among them the way to use a napkin, when to use it, and how far to unfold it in the lap. A French treatise dating from 1729 stated that "It is ungentlemanly to use a napkin for wiping the face or scraping the teeth, and a most vulgar error to wipe one's nose with it." And a rule of decorum from the same year laid out the protocol:

"The person of highest rank in the company should unfold his napkin first, all others waiting till he has done so before they unfold theirs. When all of those present are social equals, all unfold together, with no ceremony."

Fashionable men of the time wore stiffly starched ruffled collars, a style protected while dining with a napkin tied around the neck. Hence the expression "to make ends meet." When shirts with lace fronts came into vogue, napkins were tucked into the neck or buttonhole or were attached with a pin. In 1774, a French treatise declared, "the napkin covered the front of the body down to the knees, starting from below the collar and not tucked into said collar." Margaret Visser

Napkin rings or "serviette holders" began in the Napoleonic period in Europe. The rings were used mainly by upper class families as a way to identify which napkin belonged to what family member. At the beginning of the 1800s, napkins became part of the bourgeois lifestyle, mostly to protect the sumptuous dresses of the period during meals. The art really took off around 1880 with the incoming prosperity of the Industrial Revolution. One etiquette book advised "one should, if possible, avoid taking the bones into your mouth and when removing any, should shield your mouth with your napkin."

Mrs Beeton's book of Household Management, published in 1861, had an extensive reference section on napkin folding. It also offered tips for the home's servants:

"Dinner over, the housemaid removes the plates and dishes on the tray, places the dirty knives and forks in the basket prepared for them, folds up the napkins in the ring which indicates by which member of the family it has been used, brushes off the crumbs on the hand-tray kept for the purpose, folds up the table-cloth in the folds already made, and places it in the linen-press to be smoothed out.

After every meal the table should be rubbed, all marks from hot plates removed, and the table-cover thrown over, and the room restored to its usual order. If the family retire to the drawing-room, or any other room, it is a good practice to throw up the sash to admit fresh air and ventilate the room." Mrs. Beeton

"Sit gracefully at the table; neither so close as to make your movements awkward, nor so far away as to drag your food over your dress before it reaches your mouth. It is well to carry in your pocket a small pincushion, and, having unfolded your napkin, to pin it at the belt. You may do this quietly, without its being perceived, and you will thus really save your dress. If the napkin is merely laid open upon your lap, it will be very apt to slip down, if your dress is of silk or satin, and you risk the chance of appearing again in the drawing-room with the front of your dress soiled or greased." Florence Hartley

And Arthur Martine's book of etiquette from the same period, gave advice on napkins and finger-bowls:

"Finger-glasses are generally handed round as soon as the viands are removed, but they are intended merely to wet the fingers and around the mouth. When the finger-glasses are passed, wet your fingers in them and then wipe them upon your napkin. The habit of rinsing the mouth at table is a disgusting piece of indelicacy, which is never practiced by any well-bred person. Upon leaving the table, lay your napkin beside your plate, but do not fold it."

In 1895, George Rippey Stewart lamented the British and their habits on the use of napkins:

"It is a matter of regret that table napkins are not considered indispensable in England; for, with all our boasted refinement, they are far from being general. The comfort of napkins at dinner is too obvious to require comment, whilst the expense can hardly be urged as an objection. If there be not any napkins, a man has no alternative but to use the table-cloth, unless (as many do) he prefer his pocket handkerchief- an usage sufficiently disagreeable."

In 1911, Agnes Morton, in her book "Etiquette," wrote about napkins:

"Napkin rings are discarded by many who hold that a napkin should be used but once, and must be re-laundried before reappearing on the table.

Practically, such a fastidious use of table linen would exhaust most linen supplies, and overcrowd the laundry. The neat use of a napkin renders this extreme nicety superfluous as a rule of home dining, Care should certainly be taken to remove all soiled table linen. Nothing is more disgusting than a dirty napkin, but the snowy linen that comes spotless through one using may, with propriety, be retained in the ring to be used several times. This, of course, refers to every-day dining at home. On formal occasions no napkin rings appear on the table; the napkins are always fresh, and used for that time only. At the close of the dinner they are left carelessly on the table; not rolled or folded in any orderly shape.

Small fringed napkins of different colors are used with a dessert of fruits. Fancy doylies of fine linen embroidered with silk are sometimes brought in with the finger-bowls; but these are not for utility, the dinner napkin doing service, while the embroidered 'fancy,' a dainty bit of effect to the table decoration.

Modern Day Napkin Etiquette

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Napkins have been recorded as being in use, from the times of ancient Roman Empire and prior to then, in ancient Greece. References to word napkin dates back to 1384 AD. It is believed that the first napkin was a lump of dough the Spartans called "apomagdalie."

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If you frequently host dinner parties, you should have a couple cool napkin folds in your arsenal. Impress everyone before they’ve taken a single bite of food.

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Subway Hands - Touching Stories - Plastik Magazine

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Tell us a bit about you, the person behind the work we see, where are you based and how old are you?
I'm 29 years old, a photographer. Originally from Amherst, Massachusetts, I now live in Brooklyn, New York.
Can you tell us about when and why you started your page?
I started @subwayhands when I moved to NYC in 2015. My commute between Brooklyn and Manhattan was a solid 45 minutes. I spent a lot of time people watching on the train and I noticed how expressive the strangers' hands can be. I began shooting portraits of their hands.

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Subway Hands - Touching Stories - Plastik Magazine

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@subwayhands tells touching stories of bravery, human kindness, pride, and resilience, through close-up photographs of hands. It all started when founder hannah lafolletteryan first moved to New York in 2015: "I spent a lot of time people watching on the train and I noticed how expressive the strang

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Jean Paul Gaultier, Pain Couture 2004 exhibition

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Jean Paul Gaultier, Pain Couture 2004 exhibition

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Interesting placement on body

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The Classy Ankle Skirt is the ultimate statement piece and a favourite among our customers! This skirt features a simple, elegant silhouette and a bold photographic print with a monochrome colour palette. Made from a recycled polyester jersey, this piece is designed to flatter and can be easily worn from day to night and summer through to winter. Pair with our By The Sea Cowl Top for a fully printed look or style simpler with our Charcoal or Sport Power Top!

This piece is ethically made in small family-run factory in Slovenia where all offcuts from production are reused in the construction industry!

Size and Fit Information

- Model in image 2 is 5 ft 9, Size 8/10 and wears size small
- GOTs Certified digitally printed
- Recycled Polyester Jersey & Organic Cotton Rib
view size guide

Wash and Care

Designed in London; Ethically Made In Slovenia

50% RPET 47% PES 3% EL / 100% Organic Cotton

Hand wash in lukewarm water | In a rush, machine wash using a delicates bag at 30 degrees | Air dry

A little about our manufacturing

We work with two small manufacturers. Our London factory is based in the same building as the garments are designed, allowing us to be involved at every stage of production. We also work with a family run factory in Slovenia where all offcuts from production are recycled and used in the construction industry. We produce in very limited quantities so you are buying something very special to you.

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The Classy Ankle Skirt is the ultimate statement piece and a favourite among our customers! This skirt features a simple, elegant silhouette and a bold photographic print with a monochrome colour palette. Made from a recycled polyester jersey, this piece is designed to flatter and can be easily worn from day to night and summer through to winter.