Caesar Salad, Summer Reading Bingo, Street Markets, Librarian Names & More: Endnotes 28 June

Every Friday, we celebrate the weekend — and all the reading and relaxing and daydreaming time ahead — with Melissa's favorite book- and travel-related links of the week. Why work when you can read fun stuff?!

This post is part of our Endnotes series.

The illustration above depicts the patio at Caesar’s Palace restaurant in Tijuana, Mexico — the birthplace of the Caesar Salad. Next Thursday, 04 July, is the 100th anniversary of the Caesar Salad’s invention. The now-ubiquitous combination of romaine lettuce, garlicky croutons, parmesan cheese, and a tangy umami dressing made with salty anchovies mashed into a homemade aioli was invented by Caesar Cardini, an Italian chef who landed in San Diego after World War I. You can read his story here. It’s a corker that features Prohibition, Independence Day celebrations, glamorous LA customers, maybe flying aces, and, potentially, a hangover.

• From CrimeReads: The Best Historical Fiction of 2024 (So Far). ‘18th-century revolutionaries, 19th-century surgeons, 20th-century spies, and more.’

• Tangentially related: NPR Staffers Pick Their Favorite Fiction Reads of 2024. (Or maybe you’d prefer the nonfiction list.)

• In today’s episode of The Library of Lost Time, I recommended an unusual cookbook about sandwiches. Need more sexy sandwich ideas? Here are 16 epic sandwiches from around the planet.

• Related: 57 Sandwiches That Define New York City. (Have you listened to our podcast episode New York City: NO! SLEEP! TILL BROOKLYN! yet?)

• Visiting a street market during your holiday can make you feel like a local. Two of our favorite travel adventurers share the magic of markets in Vietnam and Thailand — and this personal essay takes you into the heart of a Marrakesh market.

• Now is a great time to see how your summer reading stacks up against this Summer Reading Bingo Card from What To Read If.

• Treat yourself to this short story about a conversation between punctuation marks, including Comma, Period, Colon, Semicolon, Question Mark, Exclamation Mark, Ellipsis, Hyphen, En Dash, Em Dash, Parenthesis (a pair, P1 and P2), Quotation Marks (two pairs: Q1 and Q2 are double quotation marks; Q3 and Q4 are single quotation marks), Apostrophe, and a few others.

• What’s your Librarian Name? Mine is ‘Judy Stompburger.’

• Hmmm… I’m not sure what to make of Rebind, a new AI app that will ‘radically transform the entire way book lovers read books’. You choose a classic novel, then chat with an AI and watch videos embedded in the text. It’s like a big club without other people (?). Big names including John Banville, Roxane Gay, Margaret Atwood, Marlon James, and Lena Dunham have signed on to be part of it. Sign up for the app waiting list here.

• Well, these are beautiful: 7 Glass Mosaics Around the World That Take Design to New Heights.

• This is pretty adorable:

• I really enjoyed this excerpt from the new novel Service by Sarah Gilmartin. (Do you love books set in restaurants like I love books set in restaurants? Here’s a roundup of our podcast, recommended books, and other fun stuff to take you behind the scenes at restaurants.)

• Each week, Apollo Magazine shares ‘Four Things to See,’ a collection of four interesting objects from the world’s best museums. This collection of music-related art includes the Brontë sisters’ piano.

New Episode of The Library of Lost Time

In each mini-podcast episode, we discuss two books at the top of our TBR, then share a fun book- or travel-related distraction. Get all the episodes and books galore here.

In this episode, we get excited about two books: A Super Upsetting Cookbook about Sandwiches by Tyler Kord and Good Material by Dolly Alderton. Then Dave shares three great stories about India from his podcast research. [transcript]

Links

• A Super Upsetting Cookbook about Sandwiches by Tyler Kord

• Turkey and the Wolf: Flavor Trippin in New Orleans by Mason Hereford

• Deadly Sin crime series by Lawrence Sanders

• Good Material by Dolly Alderton

Distraction of the Week: Three Cool Things About India

• Meet The Indian Giant Squirrel That Looks Like A Dr. Seuss Concoction

• India’s election 2024: A logistical triumph across a vast polling network

• In Pictures: Kitchen that feeds 100,000 daily

• Golden Temple (Wikipedia)

• Video: How The World’s Largest Community Kitchen Feeds 100,000 Daily At Golden Temple

Parts of the Strong Sense of Place podcast are produced in udio. Some effects are provided by soundly.

Wishing you great books and awesome snacks.