Concept tag
#craft-knowledge
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“Because that’s how it works”: when is that an explanation and when is it a refusal?
I run a kitchen of twenty-two people. New cooks ask why a lot. Why rest the meat? Why salt the pasta water and not the sauce at the start? Why does this sauce split if you rush it? When I was an…
Started by Joel D'Souza5 replies251 views -
Nineteen years with one blade: Cook Ding and the discipline that wu wei is usually sold without
I make cedar doors and ceilings in the Andalusian style, the way my father taught me in his workshop in Tetouan. A customer from Europe, watching me cut a joint, told me it looked effortless and that I must be practising wu…
Started by Hicham Ouazzani6 replies236 views -
My clients can’t tell walnut from stained beech, but they still mean walnut
I make furniture in Tetouan. Half my customers ask for walnut. Most of them could not pick walnut out of a pile of stained beech if their life depended on it, and some unscrupulous workshops count on that. A friend lent me…
Started by Hicham Ouazzani5 replies235 views -
Anscombe was right: we see causing all the time
I make cedar doors and ceilings in Tetouan. When I push a chisel through cedar I do not see a chisel, then a cut, and infer a connection. I see the chisel cutting. When my apprentice drops a plank and it cracks,…
Started by Hicham Ouazzani6 replies234 views -
My father knew which cedar beam would split. He could never say how. Did he know?
I make cedar doors and ceilings in Tetouan, the way my father taught me. When I was a boy he would walk past a stack of beams and tap one with his knuckle and say: not that one, it will split when…
Started by Hicham Ouazzani6 replies270 views