[Exit, pursued by a warthog.]

Kindly readers! I shall be away for a week or so, finishing a manuscript at Pullen Farm in the lowveld. I believe there may be warthogs. I have packed, of course, a copy of C. Louis Leipoldt’s Bushveld Doctor. And a lot of mosquito repellent.

In the meanwhile, I leave you:

This piece I wrote for Africa is a Country about Johannesburg’s newest museum in Fietas.

This photograph of street food in Fordsburg:

This new video from the Lumineers:

And these links:

• How will climate change affect agriculture in southern Africa?
• The US government shutdown poses a risk to food safety.
• Traffic fumes prevent bees from finding flowers.
• Vegetables are being left to rot on South African farms.
• Are GM, organic, community-owned farms the future of agriculture?
• Searching for new, climate change-resistant varieties of lettuce.
• Using food trucks to end food deserts.
• What really goes into chicken nuggets?
• ‘the brain knows that low-calorie or no-calorie sweeteners are imposters.’
• When chocolate was used as currency.
• An interview with Rachel Laudan.
• The theft of 600 pumpkins.
• What 9/11 had to do with the rise of Paula Deen.
• How to make your own soft brown sugar.
• A guide to garlic.
• The hangover face repair guide.
• What does the Underground taste like?
• Death by hazelnut – a conundrum.
• A tasting menu from … McDonald’s.
• Dinner Lab.
• A potato that looks like a sheep.
• Popcorn, the affordable luxury.
• Hundreds of uses for vinegar (all of them non-culinary).
• A review of The Dog’s Bollocks in Cape Town.
• Candy corn.
• How to make a watermelon slice cushion.
• Cooking for Paul Dacre.
• Farming octopi.
• Celebrities matched to vegetables.
• Julia Child’s list of alternative titles for Mastering the Art of French Cooking.
• ‘Within minutes of consuming the alcohol, Swino lost control, starting a fight with a cow and demolishing nearby tents and rubbish bins in his hunt for a midnight snack, recklessly swimming into the middle of a river, before eventually collapsing underneath a log.’
• Beautiful corn.
• Wooden or plastic chopping boards?
• Make your own cultured butter.
• These links are courtesy of my mum:
• A brief history of Worcester sauce.
• ‘Branston Pickle lorry crashes near Cheddar.’
• Food in medieval Sicily.

Be back soon xx