Food for a Pandemic

The food critics at the Seattle Times recently shared their favorite takeout food experiences, which inspired me to share a few of my own recommendations! Food is a huge part of my life and the pandemic food experience has been bittersweet. For every sad story I’ve read about a restaurant struggling or going out of business, there have also been wonderful stories about chefs harnessing their ingenuity to create fun and delicious takeout experiences. Here are a few of my favorites:

Delivery

Fremont Bowl

I miss my meals inside Fremont Bowl

I miss my meals inside Fremont Bowl

Located right next to one of my favorite places in the city (Book Larder), Fremont Bowl has a simple concept - “homestyle Japanese comfort food” - and executes it perfectly, every time. My favorite dish is the Sake Don, a deceptively simple preparation of raw salmon, rice, and soy sauce. When a dish is this simple, it has to be absolutely perfect - and at Fremont Bowl, it is. The salmon is exceptionally high quality, melting in your mouth like butter. The rice is even better, as if every grain of rice was individually cooked to the perfect amount of doneness. Happily, because this dish is served at room temperature, it travels well; it’s the perfect pandemic delivery meal. On nights when I am craving protein and Japanese food, this is my go-to order.

Takeout

Flora Bakehouse

Photographic evidence of how much I enjoyed my Flora Bakehouse croissant!

Photographic evidence of how much I enjoyed my Flora Bakehouse croissant!

The weekends are when I visit my favorite bakeries and check out new ones. I think everyone who knows the wonderful vegetarian restaurants Cafe Flora and Floret was eagerly anticipating the opening of Flora Bakehouse. And it totally delivers! The Bakehouse is located in an up and coming section of Beacon Hill, so it’s fun to visit and explore a new neighborhood. When you enter, the interior is beautiful - I loved the huge windows to look into the kitchen! They have a huge selection of baked goods, including tons of vegan and alternative options. I sampled a plain croissant and an empanada filled with roasted corn, chard, and chilis. Both were top-notch. Highly recommend!

Take Home & Cook

Sea Star

My contribution was the beurre blanc!

My contribution was the beurre blanc!

The best deal out there for a meal to bring home and prep is from Seastar. For less than $100, my family of four was given enough food to last us multiple meals. None of my photos do justice to the quantity - but perhaps they can almost do justice to the quality. Everything was TASTY and the amount of home preparation was always the perfect amount - just enough to make me feel like I was making a contribution, but never so much as to feel even an ounce of stress. We ate several meals from Seastar and each was better than the last. I will be very curious to see if this new kind of meal - the “take home and prep yourself” will continue after the pandemic. With food this great from Seastar, I sure hope so.

Lessons and Gratitude: To My BFF bffs

When I was writing my last post about BFF, I realized that I had far too many reflections to capture in a single, cohesive post. So many people there have touched my life in extraordinary ways and it is not hyperbole to say that this remarkable team helped me become the adult, the professional, and the human being that I am today. I want to thank you all.

In the first chapter of Meditations, Marcus Aurelius makes a list of those who most impacted his life - family members, teachers, friends, and critics - and writes down the lessons he learned from them. In that spirit, I wanted to share lessons that I have learned from my team at the Foundation along with my gratitude.

(I am a huge fan of Gregory Hays’ moving, poetic translation of Meditations. My attempts at poetry are an homage to his work.)

 
October 31, 2018: Some of the beautiful people mentioned below when we dressed up as our favorite thing for halloween - the Alaska Airlines Fruit & Cheese Platter.

October 31, 2018: Some of the beautiful people mentioned below when we dressed up as our favorite thing for halloween - the Alaska Airlines Fruit & Cheese Platter.

 

Leonetta

To lead by example and with kindness. To give feedback with love and receive it with gratitude. For helping me identify and develop my strengths and weaknesses. For your commitment - to our mission, to our organization, to our team, and to each of us as individuals.

Elyse

That the most successful team is made when the individual talents of each person are given space to flourish. To work hard for the sake of excellence. To look towards the future while planning for today. That serenity in the face of volatility inspires others to be steadfast.

Greg

To fight for good processes. To tear down inefficient processes.

Melissa

To do exceptional work quietly - with no expectation of praise or reward. For your entrepreneurial spirit, endless creativity, and indefatigable work ethic. For your green thumb and advice about plants. For your delicious sweet treats.

Jess

To show up with real authenticity, confidence, and vulnerability. For gently correcting me when I made mistakes. For laughing with me about typos and funny quotes. For endless conversations about food and restaurants and for sitting through an hour long presentation about noma. For your marvelous fashion sense. For your encouragement, inspiration, and vocabulary.

Nicole H

To immerse oneself fully in the task at hand. To live life passionately. To remember the point of work - any work: the greater good. To sacrifice momentary comforts for experiences, ephemeral, culinary, and otherwise. For your amazing hugs, baked treats, and unceasing support.

Michael

To work faithfully and efficiently - and to save room for family. For your jokes, immaculately constructed for maximum impact.

Jackie

For your love and support. For taking a risk to hire me. For your huge vision and sense of responsibility to all the children of the world. For bringing your whole self and your devoted attention wherever it’s needed. You are the strongest person I know.

Michele

To look for passion and common cause behind heated words before looking for malice. That ideas are worthless if they cannot be clearly communicated or planned for.

Nicole D

To handle mistakes - my own and those of others - with sincerity, understanding, poise, and resolve. That sturdy plans, definitive decision-making, and strong relationships form the foundation for successful projects and teams. My first manager and my favorite manager.

Val

To be uniquely myself - and to invest time looking for myself if I hadn’t found him already. To prioritize physical and mental health. To make creativity integral in the beginnings, process, and output of good work. For an exceptional naturopath referral. For ordering the best SR pens. For a brilliant dog - Agnes: I will always look forward to her overwhelmingly loving greetings.

Molly

To lead with gratitude towards others and empathy for myself. That the workplace can and should be equally fun and serious, goofy and professional. For your music selections - even when you had to teach me about the artists.

Sara

For your constant council and constant jokes. To pay attention to detail and to fix even the tiniest errors before they can accumulate. For your willingness to provide moral support regardless of whether I really needed it. For teaching me when to take things seriously and when not to. I miss sitting across from you.

Kasey

The epitome of a team player. For welcoming me on my first day, your birthday, with open arms - even though I was unexpected. For your patience, your wisdom, your enthusiasm, your laughter, your joy. To dive into work wherever it is required, with a smile.

Rebekah

For simply being real. For reminding me that my feelings are valuable no matter how big or small. For laughing and crying with me. For being there when I need you. To focus on what is truly important - the welfare of our fellow human beings.

Megan

To be articulate and diplomatic in all circumstances. For your ability to parse and navigate bureaucracy, while doing your best to avoid creating unnecessary bureaucracy for us. For bouncing back no matter the pressure or challenge. For your great taste in baked goods.

Mike

For your sunny attitude, your infectious smile, your pats on the back. To question costs and scopes. To ensure every dollar is going towards the right work.

Carly, Andre, Elektra, Ann, T2, Mariel, Magda, and my countless friends and partners outside of BFF

For your professionalism. For knowing when to accept criticism and when to push back, gracefully. For holding an extraordinary amount of information straight. For tactical lessons in design, advertising, digital infrastructure. And for delivering consistently beautiful, ingenious work. To future work together.

Book Rec: The Mirror and The Light

This is not the cover for the version that I own… this is the British/Australian version and it is much more attractive than the American version!

This is not the cover for the version that I own… this is the British/Australian version and it is much more attractive than the American version!

A few days ago, I finished The Mirror and The Light by Hilary Mantel, the third book in her trilogy about Thomas Cromwell in Tudor England. Long story short: I loved this book as much as the first two.

Disclaimer: Except for a few readings from Martin Luther in college, I know little about the Protestant Reformation and even less about this time in history. I haven’t even read other books or watched movies about this period. So I am coming at this topic with very fresh eyes.

In most other books, movies, etc., I’ve heard that Thomas Cromwell is portrayed as a conniving, power-hungry, cynical man… borderline evil, in a cartoonish sort of way. In contrast, Hilary Mantel portrays Cromwell as a complex human being. Ambitious - of course - conniving and power-hungry - maybe - but also a man who is incredibly smart, humane, and loyal to his friends and family. As the series (and this book in particular) progresses, you see the fine line between the kinds of ambition that create good in the world and the kinds of ambition that harms and destroys others. Dramatically oversimplifying the plot of this nuanced book, Cromwell does some remarkable things for the country - rebuilding fortifications, stabilizing finances, and rebuilding political alliances - but he also does some horrible things - more political executions than I can remember.

What stood out to me in particular while reading The Mirror and The Light - which was particularly resonant during this moment of pandemic and social upheaval - was the overriding sense of the world changing in a violent, unknowable way, more like a crack, a fracture, or a shattering than an imperceptible drift. Set in the 1530s, England is caught in the winds of the protestant revolution. The bible is being translated into English (and other common languages) for the first time. While the church in Rome tries to consolidate its power, England begins the inexorable process of breaking off - accommodating Henry VIII’s whims to marry over and over again. Cromwell, our protagonist, is in the middle of this storm, constantly trying to steer the country (and the world) with his politicking, bribes, wars, alliances, and more. And what is he steering towards? It’s not always clear… and that’s the fun part!

This feeling of being unmoored is how I feel most days of quarantine. If this book were to propose a model of how to proceed through a period of chaos - a model after Cromwell - it might be a dictate to take life as a game: learning the rules, learning the strategy, considering the other players, practicing extensively, and, of course, playing the game to the best of your ability. In some ways, this is an exciting way to think about life because it turns every piece of information out in the world into something to be studied and considered, turns everyday choices into carefully strategized decisions, and raises the stakes of work and personal relationships. If life is a game then there must be ways to win and lose it. And the ultimate challenge is to do so with grace. While perhaps I can integrate some more strategic thinking into my life and my decisions, I promise I won’t model my life from that of Thomas Cromwell!!!

If you have the stamina for 3 long (exciting) books about medieval politics, I highly recommend this book!! PBS also made a television series based on the first two books in the series. It is excellent. Mark Rylance as Cromwell and Claire Foy as Ann Boleyn give exceptional performances and the clothing and sets are gorgeous. As a bonus, I hear rumors that The Mirror and The Light will be adapted into a second season…. catch up before it comes out!

Three Lessons from my BFF

This week marks my first 6 months at Luum. Although it’s hard to believe that 5 of those 6 months have been in quarantine, the time has flown by. I am lucky to have found myself on a team with driven, creative, kind people who have welcomed me with open arms, encouraged me to ask questions, and challenged me to produce great work. I look forward to the next 6 months and beyond. (And I look forward to working with my team in person as soon as it is safe to do so!)

But, considering it is 6 months since I started at Luum, that means it’s also 6 months since I left the Bezos Family Foundation - my beloved BFF. During my 5 and a half years at the Foundation, I worked with a group of wonderful people - most of whom I am lucky to call my friends and mentors today (and one of whom is practically my landlord!).

Starting at BFF directly out of school, I was mostly clueless about the world of the office. I barely understood how to use a digital calendar. I did not understand how to use a phone extension. I did not (and still don’t) know how to use a fax machine. But more than that, I didn’t know how to effectively communicate with people or form relationships. I didn’t know how to lead a meeting or provide meaningful feedback, I didn’t yet understand how the health and wellbeing of all my colleagues was an intrinsic factor to the quality of my own work. When I showed up to the front desk at BFF 6 years ago, I had no idea that I would be surrounded by a group of people who would help me grow as a professional and challenge me to be a better human being.

To fully capture their contributions to my development would require a book. In lieu of a book, I wanted to share the biggest lessons I learned while working at BFF. All of these values started at the top - with our fearless leaders, Jackie and Mike. I am forever indebted to them for taking a risk in hiring me, nurturing me, and letting me contribute to their world-changing mission.

  1. Always remember the end user

    I will always remember when I went to Jackie and Mike for approval on my first project proposal. With the goal of redesigning one of our websites, I was asking for more money than I had ever asked for in my life - I was nervous! They sat through my little pitch with patience and then started asking me a few questions about the contents of the scope and why things cost what they did. Although I had pushed for a cost-effective proposal from the beginning, there were many line items in the budget where I had trusted our partner’s recommendation that certain pieces of work were required. When I asked Mike why he pushed back on some of the costs, he simply responded, “But Taylor, how is this piece of work going to help the low-income parents that we are working for?”

    In this moment, and many others, I was given an important reminder: Always analyze costs - whether time, energy, or budget - by determining what will have the greatest positive impact on the end user. While it is easy to get lost in the weeds of process, of budgets and timelines, of the way business is “supposed” to be done, it is imperative to routinely pause, re-focus on the end user, and use that focus to re-evaluate the efficacy of how we work and what we are investing in. Thanks to Mike, I have learned to speak up whenever I’m told that we’re doing something because “that’s the way it’s done.” It is always possible to rethink business practices to better serve those we work for.

  2. Celebrate colleagues

    I didn’t realize that our special celebrations were unusual until I told my friends about my first birthday at BFF. For birthdays, work anniversaries, new hires, departures, and innumerable other little occasions, our entire team would gather in our little kitchen, tell jokes and stories, laugh and cry, and - of course - eat. As a food lover, I would eagerly guess what kinds of treats my colleagues would pick for their special day - sometimes sugary indulgences like Hello Robin cookies… other times savory snacks like a platter of Salumi.

    I now know just how lucky I was to be celebrated in this way and to have a budget available for treats in the office. But the food was only one manifestation of the spirit of celebration in our office. Jackie and Mike made a point of celebrating us as a team and as individuals with countless smiles and compliments, innumerable hugs, and frequent congratulatory emails. This spirit pervaded our teams and we would begin meetings and emails with words of gratitude and appreciation for each other. In the beginning I appreciated the kindness and it made me feel happier. But I quickly realized there was something deeper: When colleagues trust and respect each other - and make those feelings visible through mutual celebration - they work together happier and more efficiently, and they consistently produce much better work. I am thankful to Jackie and Mike for introducing celebration into our office, but I am also thankful for my colleagues Leonetta and Molly who led the charge and integrated celebration into the everyday functions of our work.

  3. Chase the biggest goal imaginable

    In 2018, a few of us got together to buy Jackie a special birthday present: a black leather jacket with a dove and the words “World Peace” lovingly painted across the back. We found the artist to commission the gift, but the words came straight from Jackie. If you were to sit long enough in any meeting at the Foundation and anyone were to ask the question “why are we doing this?”, Jackie would respond immediately and directly - “World Peace.”

    When I started at the foundation, I thought Jackie’s invocation of World Peace was a sort of cynical joke - of course many organizations are striving for grandiose visions, even though our daily work too often feels like tiny wins, bureaucracy, and fundraising. But I quickly learned that Jackie was dead serious when she said that World Peace was the goal of every project, of every iota of work. Although this vision obviously went above and beyond our business plans and annual goals, it imbued all of our work with a greater sense of meaning. And I know that this world-changing attitude inspired everyone who walked in our door and made them want to partner with us. From Jackie, I learned that one should always shoot for the biggest goal imaginable and not settle for anything less.

    I have tried to bring that perspective to Luum. When we pitch our commute software, we are advocating for a totally reimagined transportation ecosystem - a world in which every commuter is able to travel safely, economically, and conveniently. A world that accommodates this kind of transportation is a world with cities that are livable, healthy, and sustainable. That is the world I want to live in - and the vision that brought me to Luum in the first place. It’s easy to get focused on market position, individual features, costs, and other details, but none of those things can light up the face of a sales person (or prospective customer) like a great, big, ambitious story about Luum’s mission. As a Product Marketing Manager it is my challenge and opportunity to integrate the visionary, audacious story with the business stuff. I can’t say I’ve figured it all out yet… but as long as I remind myself of Jackie’s big vision, I am inspired to inspire others and I get back to work.

Book Rec: The Plague

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Some might say I’m a glutton for punishment for reading a book about a plague during a plague. I don’t disagree. At times The Plague by Albert Camus hit too close to home, especially when it described the grief of losing loved ones and the pain of those unwillingly separated from their lovers and families. But, all that being said, The Plague is a marvelous and inspiring little book and I encourage everyone to read it before the pandemic is over. After all, our shared pandemic mindset may disappear quite abruptly when life returns to some version of normalcy. (I wouldn’t be upset if it did!).

Throughout the book, I was inspired by the unique characters, the interesting storytelling technique, and the continuous moral discussion around what it means to do good in the world during times of great difficulty. Although the rest of this reflection may come across as gloomy, this is an inspiring story if you choose to read it that way. The story of courageous men and women confronting a slow moving, inevitable disaster. It is heartwarming to read about people doing what is right and refreshing to see human and societal behavior that I have seen during the pandemic described with so much insight and humanity.

There are a few sentences of the book that have lingered with me, but there is one that I just can’t stop thinking about. About a third of the way into the book, the narrator reflects on the way interpersonal relationships have changed during the pandemic. He reflects:

If, by some chance, one of us tried to unburden himself or to say something about his feelings, the reply he got, whatever it might be, wounded his feelings. And then it dawned on him that he and the man with him weren’t talking about the same thing. For while he himself spoke from the depths of long days of brooding upon his personal distress, and the image he had tried to impart had been slowly shaped and proved in the fires of passion and regret, this meant nothing to the man to whom he was speaking, who pictured a conventional emotions a grief that is traded on the marketplace, mass-produced.... This was true of those at least for whom silence was unbearable, and since the others could not find the truly expressive word, they resigned themselves to using the current coin of language, the commonplaces of plain narrative, of anecdote, and of their daily paper. So in these cases, too, even the sincerest grief has to make do with the set phrases of ordinary conversation. (


This paragraph is so insightful and so true. When I think about the world around me, it’s as hard to describe everything that’s changed since the beginning of the quarantine as it is to describe my tenuous state of mind: constantly mourning my old life and lifestyle with no indication of when or if it will return. And yet, despite the extraordinary circumstances, we‘re left to describe it with the same vocabulary we’ve always had; we are challenged to describe new things with the same old words. As Camus writes, “the current coin of language.”

For me, even the word “unprecedented” doesn’t feel sufficiently unknown, revolutionary, or chaotic enough to describe the groundbreaking world in which we find ourselves living. In the past, I might have used that word to describe a new movie, a remarkable piece of architecture, or even the menu at a phenomenal restaurant. No more: without a word to surpass “unprecedented,” I use it sparingly so it can maintain a little of its force. I need “unprecedented” to mean something so I can continue using it to mentally wrap my head around the world. Do we need to make up more words? Or is the challenge to describe the indescribable an eternal human preoccupation?

The consequence of using everyday language to describe our lives and the state of the world is an incapacity to express our full, deep selves. This leaves us feeling ever more separated from one another. In this passage, Camus writes about how one person’s great emotion is compressed and commodified when communicated through our language. I think about the now-pervasive COVID commercials, many of which speak about lofty themes of family, unity, and healing. They use the same words of courage and grief that I use. And so when I use those words, they are necessarily filtered through this great cultural lens before they can be understood by others. Which renders my unique feelings into commonplace experience.

I know this is not a new problem. The act of communication between human beings has always been fraught. Other people are often unknowable. But each of our individual experiences feel so deeply eccentric, so strange, so new. It feels like the division of our language is worse than ever before. And with that, I take my mission for the next few weeks. Like I attempt to do with this blog, I will try my hardest to communicate myself and my feelings with simple language. I will try my hardest to make my needs easy to understand. And I will try my hardest to be receptive to all kinds of communication in return - to maintain my relationships and spark new ones. After all, I firmly believe our sharing is what keeps us human.

 
 

P.S. Only after finishing the book and reading a few scholarly pieces did I realize that the “plague” in The Plague is not only a narrative about an epidemic but also an extended metaphor for the experience of living under Fascism. I am not embarrassed to say I completely missed that angle. To me, the themes of culture, courage, and doing good still ring true. And if anything, it makes me more excited to give the book another read in a future outside of the pandemic. The moral? Give this book a shot - it will reward you with many layers!

New Articles on Urbanism in New York

The New York times published not one, but two excellent pieces this week that explore the transformative power of deprioritizing cars and prioritizing pedestrians and bikers on our streets. Although New York likes to think of itself as a great city like Paris, London, or Vancouver, New York has fallen dramatically behind on improvements to the urban space. I liked these two pieces because they harness our imagination to show how small improvements (a repainted street, a bike bridge) could help shape the city in which we all deserve to live.

Diagram showing how space that’s currently devoted to cars could be shifted to create more space for pedestrians (nytimes)

Diagram showing how space that’s currently devoted to cars could be shifted to create more space for pedestrians (nytimes)

A diagram of a complete street - with room for pedestrians, bikers, buses, shared transit (taxis), and cars (nytimes)

A diagram of a complete street - with room for pedestrians, bikers, buses, shared transit (taxis), and cars (nytimes)

Pre street improvements (nytimes)

Pre street improvements (nytimes)

Post improvements (nytimes)

Post improvements (nytimes)

I’ve Seen a Future Without Cars, and It’s Amazing - Farhad Manjoo

This is an amazing piece and worth checking out for the powerful graphics alone. I am a firm believer that simple and intuitive graphics (backed up with data and best practices) are one of the simplest ways of advancing the cause for a better city. When people oppose zoning changes or bike lanes, I optimistically believe that deep down they share our mission - a better city - but lack the vocabulary and institutional knowledge required to imagine the potential positive effects of the improvement and the possible negative ramifications of not improving anything. Graphics like this are going to start great conversations - I can’t wait to see where they lead.

I was very interested to see the that the url slug for this article was “ban-cars-manhattan.” The idea of banning cars is one that very few urbanists prescriben to… but one that is often thrown in our faces when we propose changes to the city. Giving the NYTimes the benefit of the doubt, I’d like to think that this was simply the most convenient way of abbreviating this longer headline. But my cynical side thinks the editors were being intentionally inflammatory to attract tens of thousands of angry comments!

New York as a Biking City? It Could Happen. And It Should. - Michael Kimmelman

This article explores a remarkable plan for a 425-mile system of protected bike lanes throughout New York City that was proposed by The Regional Plan Association (boring name but awesome work!). Protected bike lanes are one of the best and cheapest ways to encourage more people to use their bikes to get around. And as has been demonstrated by cities like Paris, the COVID pandemic is a huge opportunity to grow these bike networks. This was my favorite quote from the article:

Getting through this whole crisis depends on city leaders’ capacity to think ahead, not hunker down. Robert Moses, New York’s storied planning czar, plotted during the depths of the Depression so he could be ready when the money materialized. Whatever else one might say about Moses, he knew how to get stuff done.

Although it’s funny to find inspiration from a reviled planner like Robert Moses, in this he’s right. Now is our time to plan the city we aspire to live in - tomorrow we’ll make it happen.