Reading a recent piece in Vittles, I saw this phrase used above in the title of this post and I was reminded of the
“Tenser, Said The Tensor”
nonsense jingle used by the murderer Reich, to conceal his thoughts from the investigating telepath detective in Alfred Bester’s 1952 meisterwerk “The Demolished Man“
That linkage has pretty much no bearing on this piece at all though, but if you haven’t read this book, seek it out today. It’s well worth your time.
Vittles’ Jonathan Nunn then goes on to say that:
Enabling constraints are defined by Manning and Massumi in their book Caught in the Act as “rules that limit actions to enable novelty”.
So, less is more. And too many branches in the decision tree, too much choice, can freeze action.
The sameness of design and layout and materials and vibe seen in independent restaurants — no chain-stores these, or so is claimed — the homogeneity that appears cloned across towns and cities, all chasing the same chimera of “authenticity“, to seem real, hip, in the know when actually all that happens is that each one comes out looking, feeling, sounding (yeah, duplicate playlist hell!), as though they’re cookie-cutter 3D-printed, at some distant head office, drop-shipped to the next location and slotted into yet another high street, like Lego. You can walk into one of these places and suddenly not really have any clue where you are, nothing to show the country, the people, the culture, almost as though they’re actually, physically detached from their grounded geographic location, mini capsules, space-ships, allowing you to drop safely into yet another “authentic” location, now simply adding to the cycle of aesthetic ‘optimisation‘, driven by corporate owned — and mined — algorithms pushing a perceived need to rise to the top of social media searches.
Reality but the same reality. Everywhere. I really enjoy quirky, individual, even unique, but not when all are the same quirky, individual, unique.
Another quote from the Vittles article:
More than innate eccentricity, the real reason owner-operated businesses survive in Paris is its municipal policies of supporting small shops. According to The Local, 75 per cent of the 62,000 shops in Paris are independent and much of this is down to regulation: food shops, for instance, are protected in certain areas, with rent caps and strict controls over what type of businesses can open if one shuts down. Semaest, a semi-public planning company partially owned by the city, often buys up abandoned units and rents them at cut-price to revitalise neighbourhoods. The average square metre price of commercial space in Paris is not just a third cheaper than in London, but the actual spaces are smaller, too. It’s not uncommon for a restaurant in the trendy 11e to open with 10-20 seats, or with reduced opening hours (Le Rigmarole opens just for lunch) which then allows them to hone what they want to do, rather than appeal to everyone. When I describe a restaurant as feeling ‘Parisian’ what I usually mean is that it’s tiny, open for three hours a day and run by a lunatic. If there’s one thing that London could take from Paris, it’s the value of this smallness.
We were a nation of shop-keepers, but overwhelmingly, as Tory austerity oligarch-pleasing policies bite yet more substance and sustenance out of the almost veil-thin community body, the high streets devolve into Pound-shops, betting, charity, vape shops as invariably councils chase anyone who will pay their obscenely high business rates and can afford the lease costs for buildings owned by some anonymous (I was going to say out of town” but probably) off-shore, tax-evading hedge-fund. Anyone that is apart from those very same people who France (and other nominally socialist) countries actively encourage to start a small, local operation. There are said to be 30,000 restaurants in Hong Kong, and nearly all are family concerns…
Small isn’t bad. Not everything needs or wants to be the next Tesla (or Tescos).
Even if this chef-owner, who it’s claimed
“…got his restaurant off the ground for just £6,000”
and who has just opened a small-ish place in Battersea, then goes on to bemoan and list some of the very same issues that have made so many high-streets, wastelands of decay and emptiness which Tarell Mcintosh, AKA Chef Tee, talks about this in the interview:
“Locals are being priced out. I’ve lived in Battersea since I was 17 and I love the area but I can’t afford to do much here now – it’s just too expensive.”
“It’s important to me that people on lower incomes have access to good quality, affordable food. Gentrification in Battersea and nearby places like Brixton and Vauxhall is seeing our suppliers get squeezed out too.”
“The ULEZ charge is also causing problems.”…
…he was at least able to open for a reasonably accessible sum of money (and some pretty shit hot DIY work as well). Not an option open to many though. And that’s why we only get betting shops and bookies and vapes and boarded up shop-fronts and not those other places that we as a country, are prepared to invest love, time and, yes, money in. Let the Mayfair crowd stay in Mayfair, stay the fuck away from the real people and from the rest of London and the country, and leave us the fuck in peace. And if this country wasn’t so in thrall to their monied backers, we too could have nice things like they do in Paris. And we’d see less, desperate, attempts to be “the next big thing” leading to bland on bland.
Remember, “everything for everyone.”
Fear of pantry scarcity
And one, last, random question for you all? Do you too feel a sense of panic if you’re down to your last ½ dozen eggs or are running through the last bottle of soy sauce or have no dried meats in the store cupboard?
What are your particular triggers? And why do they trigger you? What childhood trauma do they invoke? (I ask the last question more than half jokingly but I’m equally sure that is/was the case for at least some of you and my apologies if you’re reading this and shuddering at the potential catastrophe looming)