Dan Packel

After many months of assiduously ignoring my responsibilities, I’m back on the religious dining beat for the NYC based web concern The Awl. Next up looks to be a visit to Queens’ Annam Brahma. I welcome suggestions for further opportunities to explore.

And not because it’s the first day of the baseball season here in Philadelphia, and my Phillies came from behind to defeat the Astros in the bottom of the 9th, with me in attendance.

No, two recent pieces of writing are now available online. I got scooped by Saveur for this piece on Philadelphia’s sandwiches, for the online magazine Real Eats (registration required), but I certainly enjoyed the research. And I talk both cheese steaks and South Indian food in my review of R.W. Apple’s Far Flung and Well Fed, for Alimentum.

I just finished reviewing the proofs for my article “Snacking with the Sons of the Soil,” forthcoming in Gastronomica in February. I’m very excited that this piece of reportage, about the Maharahstra-based, quasi-fascist political party MNS and their April 2010 food festival, will be out soon.

My eleven months in Mumbai are just about up. Just putting the final touches on a piece on Mumbai street food, and I’ll be back in Philadelphia in just five days!

I’ve returned from a lovely week in lush, palm-fringed Kerala to see that the New York Times has posted a few recent pieces on Mumbai. First, my brief take on the neighborhood of Juhu, fortified by an impressive slideshow by Kuni Takahashi. And second, where to get good Goan food in the city, published a few days ago. Were I writing the piece now, I’d try to slip a word in for Highway Gomantak. Speaking of seafood, I’ve got plenty of say about the fresh fish from Kerala’s backwaters and beaches, but it will have to wait. 

I’m told that my profile of Ankur Jain of Cerana Imports is now available in the September/October issue of Draft. Through Jain’s efforts, a variety of European and American craft beers are now available in India (even if exorbitant government taxes on imported alcohol make it impossible for me to drink them on a regular basis. I hope to get the PDF up here as soon as I get access to a copy of the magazine.

I’m already worrying about boxing up and shipping out the piles of books we’ve acquired over the last 8+ months. Here‘s where I got a good chunk of them.

My review of Samanth Subramanian’s excellent Following Fish is now up on Alimentum‘s website. Thanks to Eric Le May and the team at Alimentum for getting it up there with impressive promptness.

My latest for the NYT, on Bengali street food in Mumbai. Seven hours after the link went live, I’ve only managed to offend 2 out of 3 Bengali commenters. For a fuller take on the roll phenomenon in India, see what Vir Sanghvi, of the Hindustan Times, has to say. I did file my story before I saw his.

Perhaps I should’ve added that from my neighborhood in Andheri, it takes no less than 1.5 hours to get here.