The very lovely people at Bistrotheque in London are throwing a party tonight, and our friend Hattie Fox of That Flower Shop has created a fifth dimension of floral reality for the occasion.

Monocle EIC Tyler Brûlé was kind enough to show us around the not-yet-open Monocle Café in Marylebone — the London counterpart to Monocle’s Tokyo café and shop in the Hankyu Men’s department store in Chiyoda-ku. Espresso, homemade muesli and symphonic salads will make a great introduction to desserts by Japanese chef Masayuki Hara — we’re particularly looking forward to the macarons, green-tea roll-cake and strawberry gateau from Hara’s own shop, Lanka. “We wanted to create a relaxed space for a morning coffee meeting, a lengthy weekend lunch with the papers, and a glass of prosecco after work too,” Tyler says. Stay tuned to this channel for recipes and more from the Monocle team — they cut the ribbon this coming Monday.

We have a serious eating disorder called ClydeCommonitus. We don’t want to eat anywhere else. Chris DiMinno is just a totally fucked up genius. We stopped in the other day for a sampling of some new things on the menu beginning with smoked trout chowder and a salad of seared braised bacon, frisée, fingerling potatoes and sauce gribiche, followed by porchetta, shelling beans, pickle relish, and poached eggs. A pair of dishes that cast every other dish you’ve eaten in your life in a very unflattering light. We devoured a quiche of Calabrian chili, rosemary, blue cheese and caramelized onion followed by a beef tongue omelette with horseradish, romesco, grilled onion and potato croutons. As in, crispy croutons made of potato. You do the math.

After we loosened our belts a bit, we wept with joy into a chef’s board of brûléed french toast with spiced apples and an almond butter parfait topped with roasted almonds. We died, and then we started counting the days until we could go back.

Stay tuned for more from Chris and his team here — we’ll be posting recipes, good ideas and food porn on the regular.

Rest assured. Why didn’t we think of that?

April Bloomfield hosts chef and preservation maestro Paul Virant with The Breslin this Sunday evening at Ace Hotel New York to celebrate Paul’s new cookbook The Preservation Kitchen with a 5-course dinner, dessert and cocktails in Liberty Hall. Paul and April met half a decade ago when they were both honored as Food & Wine Magazine’s Best New Chefs. They became fast friends, bonding over their love of Chez Panisse, charcuterie, pickling and rock. Back in July, Paul hosted April at Perennial Virant for the launch of her first cookbook A Girl and Her Pig. Now, she responds in kind.

The acclaimed chefs will each prepare a course, along with additional courses from chef Nick Anderer of Maialino and chef Josh Even of The John Dory with dessert prepared by The Breslin’s pastry chef Jane Tseng. Cocktail hour begins at 7pm, followed by dinner at 8. After the feast, you can stay for an afterparty featuring book signings with Paul and April on The Breslin’s mezzanine. Limited tickets are available here, and you can find out more about the event on April’s site.

To whet your appetite, we’ve included a good starter recipe for your preservation projects this fall: Preserved Lemons.

Yield: 2 pint jars
Time: 20 minutes

2 cups kosher salt, more if needed
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup Herbes de Provence
8 organic lemons

Wash the lemons and slice their ends off. If they’re large, cut them into six wedges. If they’re small, cut them into four wedges. If they’re somewhere in between, wing it. In a large bowl add the salt, sugar and Herbes de Provence — this is your cure mixture. Add the lemon wedges and coat them well.

In a Mason jars or a ceramic vessel, add a bit of the cure mixture to the bottom, then add the lemon wedges, sprinkling the cure mixture in between each layer as you go. Squeeze one or two of the wedges over the top and fill the vessels to the brim with the remaining mixture. If you don’t have enough of the mixture left, just cover the top completely with a layer of salt.

Cover the vessels for four to five days, after which you’ll see that the mixture has created a brine. Make sure that the lemons are still submerged. You might need to add something to keep the lemons from rising to the surface, such as a small ceramic ramekin. (Or a ceramekin, as we like to call it.)

Place the vessels in a cool spot that stays below 65 degrees, and give the lemons a stir every once in a while. Let them cure for a least a month, but preferably for four months. Once they’ve cured, they can keep in the refrigerator up to one year as long as they stay submerged in the brine.

Images come from Susie Kauck, editor of Return to Sunday Supper and prop stylist for Paul’s book from Ten Speed Press, a division of Random House, from whence this recipe came.

INTERVIEW : NAOMI POMEROY OF BEAST - JULIA CHILD’S 100TH BIRTHDAY

At this point, neither Julia Child nor Naomi Pomeroy really need an introduction. Naomi’s Beast in Portland, Oregon, and the spectacular food she serves there, have catapulted her to a solid seat among culinary greats from every generation and culture. She is one of the most genuine, hard-working, creative, ambitious and inspiring people we know — a lot like Our Lady of the Ladle herself. On Julia’s 100th birthday, we were privileged to get a few words from Naomi (while prepping for tonight’s prix-fixe) about cucumbers, love and one of her icons.

Did Julia Child have an influence on you as a kid?

Totally. My mom sas raised in a Southern California household with a mom whose idea of dinner was unseasoned turkey and iceberg salad. In 1968, my mom moved to Corvallis to attend OSU. As an 18 year old, finally free from her mom’s weird ideas about food, my mother taught herself to cook. Much of this was achieved through her forays into Mastering the Art of French Cooking. By the time I was born my mom was an avid cook… Thanks Julia!! 

How did she bridge the feminized domestic arts with the male-dominated world of culinary arts?

Julia was always unapologetic. I like that. Dudes never apologize for their choices in the kitchen… She didn’t either — But she was soft, and full of heart. And that combo really made her (and her food) shine.

Julia’s romance with Paul Child seemed to be an enormous source of support and inspiration. How do partnerships fuel creativity and productiveness?

As people who cook for a living, we really need the support of people around us. We aren’t saving lives or anything… But sometimes our hours are similar to ER doctors! 

I don’t like to call chefs “artists” — but at the same time, we are vulnerable. We make things for people to consume right in front of us. That leaves us unshielded sometimes from what people think — and we are sensitive! I would guess for the majority of us, we really want to take care of people. It’s in our NATURE. So we sometimes take our little failures home with us… We need a listening ear when it comes to that. I recently got married, and my husband Kyle is great for this. I really love that I can talk about new ideas, or little issues, and he listens… Doesn’t advise really — just hears me. It really helps.

One thing about Julia Child is that she so clearly loved life. Do you think chefs are happier people?

I do think chefs are happier…usually. Sometimes we get too caught up in perfection and complexity though. I think that is why Julia makes such a great role model. She really showcased what is best about a GOOD chef. When something doesn’t go right, you just laugh, and turn to something else… It is a kitchen! We are COOKING and if we aren’t happy, we certainly SHOULD be. We are all so lucky to be doing what we love for work. 

What’s next for Beast? What should we stay tuned for?

I wait for the right opportunities — I don’t force things. Back in the Spring I thought I was going to move locations, but then a good agreement that was best for the business  couldn’t be reached… It’s OK. I always wait for what feels right.

I was just asked by Time magazine to cover a food-related trip for an upcoming piece that runs in September. I had a blast traveling in Corsica and studying the food there… Who knows? Travel writing or travel TV? Or a cookbook?? It’s all up in the air, but it’s all wonderful too.

Any recipes you want to share on this important day?

I say this — if you haven’t tried to sauté cucumbers…do! They are wonderful. I add some onion as well, and finish with a little squeeze of lemon juice or champagne vinegar and a tiny pinch of sugar… It’s like Julia’s, only a little adapted.

Peel or partially peel cucumbers, cut in half lengthwise and then into strips. Toss with vinegar, salt and sugar and let stand anywhere from thirty minutes to several hours. Drain and pat dry, and preheat oven to 375F. Toss in a baking dish with melted butter, pepper and scallions, as well as any fresh herbs like dill and basil that appeal to you and are in season. Set uncovered in the middle level of the oven for about an hour, tossing a few times, until tender, but with a suggestion of crispiness and texture. They will barely color during cooking.

Photos by Alicia Rose

INTERVIEW : CRAFT BREWERS SAM CALAGIONE & “DR.” BILL SYSAK

We love beer culture, so we’re bringing some of our brewer friends together for our first annual Craft Beer Weekend at Ace Hotel & Swim Club. The two-day celebration of microbrewers, hop heads, cask masters and malsters goes down August 3 and 4. You can get a bucket of craft beers and a bunch of other cool stuff with your room — call us and mention code BEER to book. And check out the beer menu — we’ll be posting a food pairing menu soon; for now we’re still obsessing over it with Bill Sysak…

We sat down with two godfathers of micro-brewing, “Dr.” Bill Sysak of Stone Brewing Co. and Sam Calagione, founder and president of Dogfish Head Brewery, to talk about what they do and the unique and radical culture of the craft brew industry.

Both of your sites have this really robust background about your brands. There aren’t a lot of major beer brands that care that much about the company culture also. It seems like both of you are part of this larger movement. How did you both get into brewing? What makes you feel so passionately about it? 

Sam : Stone Brewing Co. and Dogfish Head started around the same era in the mid-to-late 90s, and we’re kind of considered second generation breweries on the timeline of craft brewing. The industry is about thirty years young if you look at Sierra Nevada as the original start up craft brewery. The second-generation came around and had these awesome forefathers, but we decided to take another tact and brew very intensely flavorful, very personal beers designed to offend as many people as they are to excite. If a brewery like Dogfish or Stone makes twenty or thirty different beers, we know a person might hate four or five of them because they don’t calibrate well to that person’s palate, but we know they are probably going to fall in love with five or six of them too.

Dr. Bill : That first generation — they were coming off of macro-physiology. By the time we came around in the 90s, we were able to get as crazy as we wanted to be because there was already a palate set for basic beers, so people like Greg, our founder, and Sam are able to make these amazing beers that are so outside the normal bounds of possibility. Either you like it or you don’t, but definitely we get a lot of converts from doing that.

Bill, you’re a Certified Cicerone. Does that background come from outside or within brewing, and this particular culture and craft?

Dr. Bill : I was in a unique situation because my father got me into good, fresh beer when I was 15 — right at the time when the craft beer revolution was starting. I was kind of that first beer aficionado or beer geek. I built relationships with everybody as a civilian while I was working in the medical field because of my passion for beer. I became known as an expert in food pairing and cellaring beers, and always had a really good palate. When it was time for me to retire from the medical field, Greg jumped on the chance to have me come work for them and be their Cicerone — the equivalent of a wine sommelier. 

Sam, you bring an interesting background too because you actually have an English degree. You got into this when you were working at a bar that served microbrews, right?

Sam : Yes, in New York, not far from Ace Hotel actually. I fell in love with beer while working at a first-generation craft beer restaurant. The owner and I started home brewing in our kitchens and the hobby spun out of control. We opened Dogfish in ‘95. Our focus from day one was off-centered ales for off-centered people. We look at the entire culinary landscape for potential ingredients in our beer. If you look at the culinary world today and the locavore and artisanal movement, that’s what craft breweries have been doing since before it had a name. 

Just the fact that your passion is based around an intoxicant is probably a huge boost for the level of connectivity and creativity that’s possible around your work. It seems like when you’re out there promoting your products, connecting with your cohorts and your colleagues, everyone is drinking beer so everyone is happy…which is pretty cool. 

Sam : Exactly. We have a saying in this industry that the craft brewing community is 99% asshole free.

Dr. Bill : There’s a lot of comradery in craft brewing. We’re all riding the wave together. If somebody runs out of hops, they’re going to contact one of the other brewers to borrow some.

Do you feel that there is a larger value system among brewers that everyone wants to work toward together — a similar cultural or social aim? 

Dr. Bill : Definitely. One of the main goals is to get the gospel of craft beer spread out to all the people. There are 2,000 breweries in America today, but there’s still only a small percentage of people that have tasted craft beer and know what true flavor is all about. So it’s important to us to have a united front so that we can promote craft beer to the masses and give them the opportunity to decide for themselves.

Sam : I always say the craft beer drinker is blissfully promiscuous. So we all kind of band together. We know that if they are going to drink our beer, it’s because they are adventurous drinkers and we love that. It’s a pretty weird thing, and it really captivates the consumer because they see us working together in this very authentic, grassroots, natural way.

April Bloomfield is a busy woman — head chef at the Michelin-starred Spotted Pig and Breslin Bar & Dining Room, and the new John Dory Oyster Bar (on its second life). The latter two eateries flank Ace Hotel New York and are an integral part of the nightlife here. Ms. Bloomfield is the ultimate chef-cum-rock-star — an edge-pusher who as remained true to her roots all the way to the figurative and literal bank — and her fan base consists of both the squeamish and gastronomically hardy. We adore her, and are proud to be her neighbor and collaborator.

April’s new narrative cookbook, A Girl and Her Pig, over-brims with stories, beautiful drawings and photographs, and the recipes that have made her the culinary gem she is. Signed copies are now available on our online shop — grab one of our small batch of copies; it’s a good read whether you’re smearing the pages with ingredients or hunkering down for a tour around the mind of one of our most cherished (albeit transplanted) national treasures.

Negronis are a classic and we have enormous respect for classics. Like a beautiful old building that deserves a passionate suitor such as ourselves, the Negroni blossomed in the hands of our bartenders at Ace Hotel & Swim Club in Palm Springs. This was no clearer than when the gentlemen behind Rapha and Giro joined in creative matrimony over a fifth round of said classic in a corner booth at King’s Highway not so long ago. The lovechild of this union launched Friday — a very clever pair of shoes.