Three Beautiful Things 12/18/16: Stocking the Pantry, LSD and Immigration, *Serious Eats* and *Special Sauce*

1. I knew when I arrived back in Maryland that our apartment home's pantry would need replenishing and so today I sprang into the Sube and buzzed down to the Co-op and bought lemons and limes and eggplant and a bottle of red wine and garbanzo beans and potatoes and coffee and a host of other groceries that I like to have on hand.

2. It turns out that this new podcast I enjoy, Undone, here, is a project inspired by a similar short video documentary project, Retro Report, here. Both enterprises endeavor to explore what's happening with stories that were once in the headlines, but have faded away ("Headlines fade. The stories continue.") Over at Undone, today, I listened to the story of a Kurdish immigrant named Ibrahim who suddenly found himself, twelve years ago,  facing charges from HSA of being a terrorist and he faced deportation. If you listen to his story, you'll learn about the attorney, citizens, and elected officials, people of various political persuasions, who came to his defense and you'll find out where his case stands today. You can listen to the story "Ibrahim", here.  Over at Retro Report, I watched a story updating LSD research, here, and revisited the policy of "Three Strikes and You're Out", here.

3. The food devotees over at Serious Eats, here, sponsor a podcast, Special Sauce, here, hosted by New York City food reviewer and journalist, Ed Levine. I love this podcast.  I've learned more about places to eat in Baltimore from David Simon, here, and Laura Lippman, here, about Murray's Cheese from Rob Kaufelt, here, and about her restaurant and cooking show empire from Lidia Bastianich, here, among others. What I had never done, until tonight, was click around the Serious Eats website -- and I had a blast doing that as bedtime reading. I learned more about carving and slicing knives and roasting potatoes and I found a number of guides to restaurants in New York City and Portland and other cities. If for no other reason than to imagine the pleasures of restaurants I'll never visit, knives I'll never use, and cocktails I'll never mix, I know I will keep visiting Serious Eats and keep clicking around, finding recipes, columns about cooking, and so much more.