Jun

The Art and Philosophy of the Doggy Bag

by Meredith Mullins on June 27, 2016

Dog with Doggy Bag, showing how different cultures deal with restaurant leftovers. (Image © Meredith Mullins & Charlie Meagher.)

Did someone say “Doggy Bag?”
© Meredith Mullins & Charlie Meagher

How Different Cultures Look at Leftovers

Are restaurant leftovers going to the dogs?

That depends on to whom and where you pose the question. Different cultures have different approaches to taking restaurant leftovers home. The history of the doggy bag is a bit furry . . . er, blurry.

The First Doggy Bag

Some say the idea dates back to Roman times, when food was often taken home in a napkin from multi-course, recline-while-you-eat meals.

We can trace the first doggy bags back to the U.S. during WW II when food was scarce and waste was unthinkable.

The idea was to give diners a way to bring leftover meat and bones to a canine best friend waiting eagerly at home. The dog was sometimes just a pretense, as the doggy bag was also a way to stretch food a little bit further in struggling households.

The first marketed doggy bag, created by the Chicago-based Bagcraft Corporation, included a poem written by the wife of the co-founder, as well as a diverse range of friendly dog faces (equal dog opportunity).

Oh where, oh where have your leftovers gone?
Oh where, oh where can they be?
If you’ve had all you can possibly eat,
Please bring the rest home to me.

The doggy bag evolved from there, into containers of all shapes and sizes, as well as creative art made by upscale restaurants.

Containers serving as doggy bags, ways that different cultures deal with restaurant leftovers. (Images © Thinkstock.)

The modern doggy bag takes many forms.
© rimglow (L)/design56 (M)/liopt (R)

Sometimes the dog got the leftovers and sometimes the food became the next meal for the humans in the family.

A large steak dinner, showing the need in the U.S. for a doggy bag for restaurant leftovers. Different cultures have different size portions. (Image © Monkey Business Images.)

Large portions in the U.S. lend themselves to doggy bags.
© Monkey Business Images

Doggy Bags Around the World

In addition to the U.S., where portions are so generous that doggy bags have become standard practice, many Asian cultures seem comfortable with “take home” requests. Restaurants have the requisite containers—from India to China to Singapore to Hong Kong.

Chinese take out boxes serving as Asian doggy bags for restaurant leftovers, showing that different cultures have different approaches. (Image © Medioimages/Photodisc.)

The familiar Chinese doggy bag
© Medioimages/Photodisc

The doggy bag concept, however, has been a bit slower to come to Europe.

You Can’t Take It With You

Years ago in France, the idea of even asking for a doggy bag sent fear through the heart. When diners finally conjured the courage, they were met with scorn, as only a French waiter can muster. An eye roll. A smirk. A “Ce n’est pas possible.”

Sometimes the waiter relented, but continued the theatrical production through public embarrassment or intentional torture of the food in question.

The dramatic sweep of a plate of choucroute, en masse, into an empty lard bucket—the only container that the kitchen staff could spare.

Waiter with bucket for restaurant leftovers, as different cultures have different solutions for the doggy bag. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Why not take home leftovers in an empty lard bucket?
© Meredith Mullins

The rolling of a salad into a tight aluminum foil cigar. The offer to allow the diner to take the casserole dish home and bring it back the next day. The stories are endless.

Even the best restaurants, anxious to please customers, had difficulty finding containers for the take-home food.

Doggy bags just weren’t part of the culture. They were an affront to dining etiquette. Portions were correctly sized so that diners were expected to savor every bite. Presentation, freshness, and impeccable timing for each course were priorities for the chef.

The idea of food being jostled, jarred, and rearranged by transport—or eaten or reheated hours later—was a well-sharpened knife to the heart of the French chef.

French dinner, making it difficult to package these restaurant leftovers into a doggy bag, the reason different cultures have different approaches. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

How could such a beautiful presentation be packaged “to go home?”
© Meredith Mullins

Oh, I See. You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

In January 2016, life in France changed forever. A new doggy bag recommendation took effect.

No more waiter scowls when you ask to take your leftovers away. No more eye rolling. No more smirking in the kitchen about the “crazy Americans.” No more furtive searching for an appropriate container. When you ask for a doggy bag, you get one. A new era has been ushered in.

Why?

The French restaurant industry accounts for nearly one million tons of food waste annually. The government vowed to reduce food wastage by 50% by the year 2025. The doggy bag promotion was a first step.

Aluminum foil roll at Café de l'Homme, a doggy bag for restaurant leftovers signifying the approach of different cultures. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

Salad smashed so beautifully into a tight aluminum foil roll
© Meredith Mullins

Other European countries are also tackling food waste reduction. The UK’s Sustainable Restaurant Association launched a “Too Good To Waste” campaign in 2011, giving out 25,000 recyclable doggy bags/boxes to participating restaurants—from Michelin-starred to fast-food chains.

Sweden also has a campaign called “Do Not Throw Away Your Food,” which educates the public on the effects of waste and promotes the use of doggy bags.

It may take awhile to change dining etiquette, especially when thinking about restaurant leftovers, but the wheels are in motion in several different cultures.

An aluminum foil swan, an artistic doggy bag, part of the different cultures approach to restaurant leftovers. (Image © Meredith Mullins.)

An artistic approach to the doggy bag
© Meredith Mullins

The restaurant industry in France is already promoting a change from “le doggy bag” to “le gourmet bag.”

Soon, everyone will want one.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Meredith Mullins 8 Comments

Cultural Do's & Taboos

Jun

Bookmarking the British Library

by Joyce McGreevy on June 20, 2016

The carved lettering of the British Library's main gate, an artifact of English cultural heritage designed by David Kindersley, (Image C.G.P. Grey)

As designer of the iconic main gates, David Kindersley was truly a man of letters.
By C. G. P. Grey – C. G. P. Grey’s Photography, CC BY 2.0

Online Treasure Hunt of the World’s Cultural Heritage

Search engines—including some that rhyme with kugel, king, and kazoo—are the world’s “auxiliary brain,” the one we count on to have all the answers, all the time. But when it comes to repositories of cultural heritage, literary artifacts, and linguistic wisdom, all search engines lead to London. There you’ll find the ultimate must-know for all who must know: The British Library.

The interior of the British Library, with the smoked glass wall of the King's Library reflecting England's cultural heritage.

Every year, six million searches are generated by the British Library
online catalogue–more than 12 times the number of on-site visitors to the building.

Global Treasure Trove

The British Library is that figurative extra room that householders often dream about. And with 14 stories, nine above ground, its stacks are packed with treasure.

This 1899 book cover, A Floral Fantasy in an Old English Garden, found at the British Library online reflects Victorian English cultural heritage.

From the whimsical to the wonderful, the library’s
digitized images inspire obsessive exploration.

Officially tag-lined “The World’s Knowledge,” the library’s a mere babe by British standards. It was founded in 1973. Before that, collections were chambered within the British Museum. In those pre-digital days, “oculus” referred to an eyelike opening in the dome of the passholders-only Reading Room. And how did one obtain a reader’s pass? It helped if your name was Charles Dickens or Virginia Woolf.

The oculus in the dome of the British Museum Reading Room was part of Victorian England's architectural cultural heritage.

The oculus of the British Museum Reading Room
watched over a privileged few.

Today everything from the handwriting of Woolf and Dickens to artifacts of punk rock are on offer to everyone who navigates busy Euston Road, crosses the brick piazza beside King’s Cross and St. Pancras Stations, and enters the stately portico.

Or who simply logs on.

Want to see the world’s earliest dated printed book? Here it is. Care to leaf through Leonardo da Vinci’s notebook? Leaf away. Shakespeare’s First Folio? Hie thee hither.

A design by Leonardo da Vinci for an underwater breathing apparatus, one of the treasures of world cultural heritage found in the online archives of the British Library.

Da Vinci’s design for an underwater breathing apparatus rises
to the surface of the British Library’s digital archives.

Oh, I see: There are more things in the British Library, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. If you looked at five items every day, it would still take 80,000 years to see the entire collection, give or take a century. So let’s tour just a few highlights of the Library’s incredible treasures.

Sounds Amazing

An image of two birds on branches from the book British Ornithology (1811), reflecting the visually rich cultural heritage of the British Library.

A pre-digital era “tweet”?

The Sound Archive dates back to 19th century recordings made from wax cylinders. So after reading the Incomparable Bard, listen to an “Immortal Bird.” It sings in the manuscript of John Keats’ “Ode to a Nightingale” and in this recording. You can even tweet it to your followers.

Discover the origin of the word soundscape and explore countless such audible places. Travel in two clicks, from the Amazon riverside at night to a distant thunderstorm in Zambia.

You can also experience the peaks and valleys of language itself. Anyone who’s seen Colin Firth onscreen as George VI in The King’s Speech will appreciate the poignancy of this example from the real-life royal.

Mystery Miscellany

Does your curiosity tend toward mysteries? Point your online magnifying glass at text evidence of how J. Sherrinford Holmes—alias Sherlock—became the world’s most famous literary detective.

Then hear the chief witness, Arthur Conan Doyle, reveal his real-life model for Holmes. The famed empiricist also enthuses about Spiritualism, reflecting a popular obsession of his era made all the more understandable by the tragic losses of World War I.

The library hosts hundreds of historical resources from both sides of the conflict, from personal letters and poetry, to speeches and posters.

The cover of Revelations of a Lady Detective (1854), reflecting the range of artifacts from English cultural heritage found online at the British Library.

The trail of online clues leads to 1854, when the fictional
Mrs. Paschal became one of the first female detectives to appear
in a novel—30 years before real-life women could land such jobs.

Artifacts of Peace

Humanity’s quest for peace and universal cultural respect is also represented here. “When I despair,” wrote Mahatma Gandhi, “I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won.” Nelson Mandela, in a now-famous speech, urged his audience not to let fear get in the way of racial harmony and freedom.

The original pamphlet of Nelson Mandela's speech during the 1963 Rivonia trial in South Africa, reflecting the range of world heritage artifacts at the British Library.

After Mandela’s 1963 speech, he was sentenced to 27 more years in prison,
not to be released until 1990.

You can read their words in such primary resources as Gandhi’s letter to a South African newspaper in 1903 and a booklet of Mandela’s speech at his 1963 conspiracy trial. Mandela, who refused to testify in his own defense, instead expressed his ideals.

Sights Onsite

Here, too, are more than one million public-domain images, including maps to get lost in, art for finding creativity, and illustrations and photographs for traveling through time.

A lion-shaped historic map (1617), reflecting an artifact of cultural heritage available online at the British Library.

The British Library holds a vast collection of historic maps,
some of them meticulously “drawn within the lions.”

Travel to specific moments—like the day that T.S. Eliot wrote a rejection letter to an aspiring author:

A rejection letter by T.S. Eliot to George Orwell, reflecting England's literary and cultural heritage, as archived at the British Library.

In his 1944 rejection of George Orwell’s manuscript, T.S. Eliot suggested that what the novel
really needed was “more public-spirited pigs.”

Or, listen as a former drugstore employee recalls how she found a more fulfilling career.

Unlimited Discoveries

Still, you’ve only scratched the surface. From apps that put library collections on your cell phone to music that puts a smile on your face, the online universe of the British Library rewards exploration.

The one thing this resource of British and world cultural heritage cannot offer you is a proper cup of tea. For that, there’s simply no substitute for the piazza café known as—what else?—The Last Word.

A graphic treatment of "Finis" (The End), one of countless free images reflecting the world's cultural heritage and available online at the British Library website.

The end? Or just the beginning of
another online search?

Unless otherwise stated, all images in this article are in the public domain.

Tour British Museum highlights here. Explore the 1,023,705 images here.

See a totally hip video on “A Day in the Life of the British Library” here.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Joyce McGreevy Comments

Cultural Heritage & Traditions/England/Language & Culture

Jun

When the Catch of the Day is a Cultural Experience

by Eva Boynton on June 13, 2016

The tail of a fish, symbolizing the fishing lessons that provided the writer an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton)

The catch of the day
© Eva Boynton

Fishing Lessons to Share

Travel is a sea of opportunity, but often one in which people and places come and go in a kind of “catch and release” game. And yet, travelers who take the time to dive into local waters, engaging with people from within the culture, often go home with a rich sense of satisfaction, anchored in the authentic cultural experience.

I know. I learned about that during an “Oh, I see” moment in Mazunte, Mexico, when fishing lessons from Melchor, a local fisherman, turned into a bigger catch of the day.

The local fisherman, who gave us fishing lessons, walks down a trail to his favorite fishing spot near Mazunte, Mexico, the site of an authentic cultural experience that enhanced the writer's travel memories (image © Eva Boynton).

Fishing for Local Knowledge

In Manzunte, my travel companion stumbled upon a group of local fisherman and struck up a conversation. Her show of interest and inquisitive mind were enough to land an invitation from Melchor to a day of casting the line ourselves.

“Hasta mañana!” we said, and the next day we were headed down a gorgeous trail to a rocky perch that overlooked the blue horizon of the sea.

A view from a cliff to a fishing spot by the ocean in Mazunte, Mexico, showing the site of fishing lessons that provided an authentic cultural experience for the writer. (image © Eva Boynton).

We had arrived at Melchor’s local fishing spot, a place beyond any guide book, discovered through trial and error, tested and developed over time. The kind of place you get to only through “local knowledge.” Such places are windows to a culture’s customs and daily life, a gift to the traveler who reaches past the English-speaking tour guide.

Learning the Local Technique

Another gift of an authentic cultural experience is the insight that there are many ways to accomplish the same goal.

Take fishing, for example. Melchor and his family used a simple and effective technique. No fancy fishing pole. No net. Just a hook, bait, fishing line, and a cloth wrapped around the index finger and thumb for protection from the line.

Two people stringing fishing bait together, showing the fishing lessons learned from an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton).

Through this technique, tools are simplified, the mind more creative and focused on the practice.

A hand holding fishing bait on the end of a hook, demonstrating part of the fishing lessons learned during an authentic cultural experience while traveling in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton).

With bait on the hook, the hook on the line, and the line wrapped around the fingers, Melchor and his family were ready to fish.

They swung the baited line around their heads, helicopter style. Then—one, two, three, swoop!—the line soared towards the sea.

Reeling the fishing line in has a specific form and precision as well. Both hands hold the line, one hand brings the line to the other, forming a swift and constant crossing motion. This technique reels in the line without getting it into a tangled mess.

Melchor and his family were experts.

A boy throwing a fishing line into the ocean, as he demonstrates part of fishing lessons learned during an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton)

Trying Our Hand

After watching from the shade of the rocks, it was time to apply our fishing lessons. We stepped into the sun and took a stab at fishing with the local technique.

After her fishing lessons, a girl throws a fishing line into the ocean, during an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton).

Sure, it may sound simple—fishing with only a string and bait—but we soon hit the rocks, literally.

A local fisherman gives us fishing lessons as he demonstrates setting a fishing line free from the rocks and teaches the writer a lesson during an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton).

I threw my line into the sea. That went well.

When I felt my first mighty tug, I began pulling in my line haphazardly, using the local crossing-arm technique. I expected to pull out a sizable fish.

But the pull I felt was nothing more than my novice hands reeling too slowly and unsteadily, and the bait lodged in a crevice between two rocks. My catch of the day: a sizable boulder.

Fishing line, we also discovered, is one hundred times harder to untangle than a box of last year’s Christmas lights. With untrained hands, we often reeled the line into microscopic knots.

Melchor and his family patiently helped us out of trouble. We were no longer just travelers passing through. We were students gaining local knowledge from Melchor and his family, our teachers.

A boy untangling fishing line as he offers fishing lessons during an authentic cultural experience in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton).

Catching More than a Fish

At the end of the long day of fishing, we triumphantly returned to our campsite with a 3-foot-long blue beauty. Melchor had caught the fish, the only one that day, and handed it over to us so we could experience the local cuisine.

The head of a fish caught during an authentic cultural experience in which local fishermen offered the writer fishing lessons in Mexico. (image © Eva Boynton)

On our small camp stove, we cooked fish tacos, thankful for the local flavors that had spiced up our dinner and our lives. We had learned the power of engaging and exchanging.

A pan of cooking fish, the result of some fishing lessons that were part of an authentic cultural experience in Mexico (image © Eva Boynton).

Our willingness to meet and learn had given us new friends, unexpected skills, insights, and a tasty meal. The cultural experience enriched our trip and deepened our connection with Mexico.

From their fishing lessons, Melchor and his family gained in the exchange, too. Sharing local knowledge is an empowering opportunity to teach others about your culture and daily life. And that’s no fish tale.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Eva Boynton 5 Comments

Crossing Cultures/Mexico

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