Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Jonathan Gold wins Pulitzer!
Los Angeles Weekly food critic Jonathan Gold has won a Pulitzer for food criticism. Gold writes Counter Intelligence, a regular feature (variously at the Weekly and the Times, over the years) in which Gold explored LA’s ethnic holes-in-the-wall to the delight of many — including Karen and me.
When I get the chance, I’ll update this with snippets of Gold. Suffice to say the man richly deserves that Pulitzer.
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When writing about food, the key to excellence is love. Passion. From Jonathan Gold’s 99 Essential L.A. Restaurants, take this, for example. Feel the love:
Wat Thai
At the northern end of drab, endless Coldwater Canyon Boulevard lies this massive, gold-encrusted Thai Buddhist temple, grounds crowded with parishioners, saffron-robed monks, and small children who run about as if the temple were a private playground. On weekend afternoons and during festivals, the air around the temple almost throbs with the smells of Thai cooking: meat grilling at satay stands, the wheat pancakes called roti sizzling on massive griddles, pungent, briny salt crabs being pounded for the ultraspicy green-papaya salad. This spread may be more or less the equivalent of the smothered chicken and collard greens eaten after services at some African-American churches, and it feels just as homely; the inexpensive Thai feast is open to everyone who cares to come. 8225 Coldwater Canyon Blvd., North Hollywood, (818) 785-9552, www.watthaiusa.org/engmenu.html. Thai.
D.
Are you sure it wasn’t the pulletzer prize?
😉
Eeeew. Punishing.