Consider the Luxardo cherry.
While technically known as an exemplar of the maraschino or cocktail cherry, the Luxardo cherry is to the average cocktail cherry what the Japanese Toto Neorest smart toilet is to the average Porta-Potty. The price of this magnificent jump in quality is roughly $0.50 per cherry ($25 per bottle of ~50 cherries in the US; strangely they are less than half the price in London (GBP9 / jar). Ironically, maraschino comes from amarasca / amaro like the French amer, which means bitter — although the supermarket variety cherries are drenched in sugar syrup, and lit up like red neon as if they were cultivated in outer space. Luxardo cherries are reassuringly down to earth — tiny edible black orbs of traditional Italian luxury, they have been passed down over two centuries (sometime shortly after 1821, according to the history). Unlike most other cherries, the marasca syrup in which they are packed is delicious either in cocktails or even more spectacularly, on ice cream or a panna cotta — so $0.50 per cherry is an overestimate, because the value of the syrup is certainly not zero.
One of my recent life hacks is to fill an empty single serving jam jar (50g) with 4-5 Luxardo cherries and the associated syrup, and put it in my travel bag (wrapped in a Ziplock bag for leakage security). When I am presented with sparkling wine as an onboard welcome drink, or a plain panna cotta at dinner, I plop one of my uber-cherries into the previously blah creation, which transforms it into something inspiring. The other day I was in Manhattan, drinking Manhattans with a friend, but the BBQ place we chose had only sweet neon cherries in order to save costs, so my SOS cherry supply transported us into a world infused by the time-worn traditions of Ferrari, Illy, and Bruno Cucinelli.
Like many of life’s little luxuries, I think there is something Zen about contemplating these moments — partly the knowledge that somewhere in Italy there are people who care enough about quality to make these little wonders, and partly that I am part of a diverse group of people who appreciate and care enough to support these efforts, like a little piece of shared humanity.
Last week, a friend asked me about staying in the moment, and I replied – partly because I was writing this – that augmenting common occurrences with little gestures was one way of appreciating these moments, like saying grace, bon appetit, or いただきます (itadakimasu) before tucking into a meal.
I have other food hacks, most recently the fried shallot one — the Indonesians call it bawang goreng but it is used widely throughout Asia. I generally make it myself but it can be laborious and it is possible to purchase online — or better yet in a Singaporean food market, where a half kilo is only US$5. While occupying a different part of the flavor spectrum than the Luxardo cherry, the fried shallot shares a happy characteristic — the oil in which the shallots are fried is also rendered delicious, and can be used to flavor other dishes (like ramen, for instance). I have come to prefer rice with fried shallots over garlic fried rice. Shallots provide an agreeable savory crunch to omelets and sandwiches (try them in a BLT!), so I carry them around in a little plastic container, ready to sprinkle them over anything which might need a little crispy oniony goodness.
On the more obscure side is the joy of the shiso leaf, a fragrant Japanese leaf from the perilla family which adds color and a distinct flavor to everything from a Japanese whisky highball, to Asian wraps like the Korean ssam (although Koreans use the larger variant of the perilla leaves). In any proper Asian grocery, a packet of these leaves is about $2. They are harder to carry around in a backpack, however, so I usually only carry them when I know there’s a high probability use case around the corner. For $2, sometimes it’s fun to just get them and see what flavoring enigmas you might encounter over the next 12 hours.
The Joy of Tea
A few years back, coffee had become an uninspired routine for me, and for about a year, I would only drink coffee on the weekends, leaving the weekdays to explore the vast world of tea. Far more than the world of cocktail cherries, the spectrum of quality and variety in tea is truly awesome — no wonder entire Asian civilizations were subjugated in the name of obtaining this precious delicacy. From herbal concoctions to flavored European tea (Mariage Frères et al), to say nothing of the pantheon of Indian and Chinese teas, the world of tea is relatively inexpensive, highly varied, and feather light. I was in Tokyo on a bright crisp day in January, and found myself wandering around Omote-sando, where it occurred to me that I could drink Mariage Frères Marco Polo rather than the hotel-provided stuff for very little — I went to their little shop and bought 25 pouches for Y3000, or about US$0.80 per meditative experience.
At the same time, constraining my coffee intake also made me re-appreciate the periodic ritual of coffee again, so it was a double win-win for both coffee and tea.
An ode to soup
In much of Asia, but particularly in Japan and Korea, a basic soup is a regular part of a proper meal. Since it is a frequent ritual, the soup is usually simple and quick to prepare — a savory umami broth with a few ingredients to add color and texture. I think of it as a tribute to our water-based existence — a couple of mouthfuls of delicious liquid which often serves as a trigger for feeling grateful (and helping digest the meal).
Raging against thermodynamic entropy
Much of my life is spent in tropical climates, and I’ve always lamented the sad phenomenon of the ice cold drink in a glass, rapidly warming and creating puddles of condensation on an inadequate coaster. My basic philosophy is that, until I drink it, any liquid should remain firmly in the glass, not on the outside of the glass. Since the invention of the insulated tumbler (I like these), none of this is necessary, unless you find it absolutely necessary to have a transparent drinking vessel – the insulated tumblers will keep your drink quite cold, obviate any condensation, and therefore can be placed most anywhere without needing a coaster or creating watermarks or stimulating huffy looks from your watermark-averse host. For frozen drinks in particular, these tumblers keep your drink at optimal brain freeze induction temperature. Metal tumblers are also far harder to break than glasses, and are often less expensive than designer glassware. And yet for some reason, the world persists in using drippy, thermally inferior drinkware.
Tiny bubbles
Although the science of bubbles and cleaning seems to be mixed, I prefer my bubbles nearly microscopic, in both champagne and soap (but not ensemble). A few years back in Japan, I noted a trend towards hand soap which is characterized as having “whipped cream bubbles” where the bubbles were so fine that they did indeed emerge like whipped cream (like aerosol shaving cream) – it is quite satisfying to coat your hands in a full layer of white bubble cream, in the repeated ritual of personal sanitation.
I used to think there was something magical about the liquid soap formulations in Japan and diligently searched for whipped cream bubbles – but when I finished the bottle, and tried my own solution of soap and water, it turned out very similar microscopic bubbles, leading me to believe that the whipped cream effect is merely a function of a well engineered dispenser, rather than some special surfactant elixir. By reusing these well-engineered Japanese hand soap dispensers, I can buffer myself from the constant siege of invisible biohazards, protected by pillows of fragrant micro bubbles.
License to carry
The other day, a friend in Singapore mentioned that my backpack is a little like Doraemon’s pocket — that I pull all sorts of weirdly useful things out of it. I suppose that is true — my backpack is nearly always with me, and over time it has become the repository of little things which make life either more fun, or less difficult. But the consideration of “little” is important — I don’t carry around anything large or heavy unless I’m certain to use it, and everything in my Doraemon backpack is small/light. In fact the pack itself, from Hyperlite, only weighs 1.2 lbs empty.
The backstory to Doraemon’s pocket is that it is four-dimensional, which allows him to access time (and the cool tools from future). Although I cannot directly access the future, my pack resembles Doraemon’s because I’m referencing the past to make inferences about a probable future. But since my pocket cannot store large items in a micro-shrunken state like Doraemon (and because I’m not a fictional blue Japanese manga cat), my bag of fixes has a natural bias to be small, light, and inexpensive. I do have recurring dreams that my backpack gives me the ability to levitate silently and fly around, like a three dimensional Segway, but that’s more REM magic than engineering.
As one example, after dining on one too many wobbly tables, I ordered a packet of plastic shims from Amazon and I am usually armed with one of these 40 cent 10 gram hacks, to rage against vicissitudes of dynamic instability and the poor foundation that it provides for meaningful dialogue. To be able to unexpectedly correct a common issue like an unsturdy table can provide a flash of satisfaction.
When I’m in Asia, I’ve taken to carrying around a pair of personal chopsticks. For the most part, the disposable chopstick experience is not a great one, and they are environmentally wasteful (and probably a bigger issue than straws). At a mere 14g, and a full 79g including a plastic case and tip protector, my chopsticks are a perfect combination of a beautiful lacquer body, and slightly roughed slim tips. When I use them, they make me happy because the difference between disposables is palpable, and I’m reducing the number of trees being felled to make mediocre consumer products. I suppose my risk is that I forget to retrieve them, but my hypothesis is that the nicer your chopsticks, the less likely you are to forget them (famous last words).
Speaking of disposable chopsticks, one of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies (Tampopo) has a ramen master explaining to his hungry acolyte how one approaches a bowl of ramen, and the appropriate way of expressing affection for the gestalt of the offering, and why it’s critical to apologize to the three slices of roast pork. I think it would express far deeper affection to the ramen if serious lacquer chopsticks were used instead.
Among the lightest useful things I carry is a 2 gram DropStop, which ends the silly “towel around the bottle” and the need to twist the bottle after pouring to avoid lip drips — normally from wine, but essentially any bottle with a fat spill-prone lip. It is still puzzling to me why more restaurants (and people in general) don’t use them, unless they think the “towel and twist” ceremony makes the patron think they should tip more, even if it is made unnecessary by the insertion of a 2 gram piece of round plastic, that probably costs $0.05 each (in bulk).
Upon reflection, I’m addressing a subset of the heuristic equation I’ve been developing over the last few issues — considering the duration, usage frequency, and intensity of personal objects — here I am focused on the special case algorithm of what do you carry?
Usage probability can change — we used to carry cash because it was always necessary, but nowadays the use case has changed because we can pay in so many other ways; the use case for keys is somewhat similar, as mag cards and biometric keys proliferate. When we’re deciding what to carry, weight becomes a consideration, the heavier any one item, the higher the required usage probability — there’s no sense carrying around a heavy book if there’s only a small chance of reading it (but it might make sense to load it on your phone’s Kindle app, where it will weigh nothing at all, on the margin). Therefore, the “whether to carry” decision looks something like
weight x usage [probability / frequency] x impact intensity, relative to intended carrying capacity
At one extreme is the ubiquitous smartphone; its marginal weight and slim form factor makes it highly portable, its usage probability is 100% and frequency is very high because the devices are so multifunctional. The smartphone has enabled the transportation of and interaction with anything which is easily digitized – music, video, maps, correspondence, media in general. Impact intensity depends on use – alleviation of boredom at one end, and life-changing communications on the other.
At the other extreme, there is the US Presidential “nuclear football” – a 20 kg briefcase-sized piece of equipment, which, given the proper codes, could essentially end much of life on Earth. Therefore, it is heavily skewed toward impact intensity (wiping out the human race), and hopefully the usage probability is very very low; weight is incidental as long as it is portable and can follow the President and, since the Carter administration, the Vice-President (there are three nuclear footballs).
In deference to my airline friends, I should add that bulk can also be a consideration even if something is lightweight, since carrying space is finite — if you’re carrying a beach ball, it’s far better to carry it deflated. Impact intensity is subjective — if, like a key, it allows something that would otherwise be denied, the intensity is high; if it’s merely a ‘nice to have’ or there are ready substitutes (fleur de sel, as opposed to ordinary table salt), perhaps it can be left at home. But these factors need to be considered versus the onus of carrying the item.
To extend my weight rant a little — when packing for an (air) trip, there is a threshold weight consideration as well (referenced in the formula above as the ‘intended carrying capacity’). Carrying on, versus checking a bag or two is an entirely weight and risk laden problem. Some people deeply identify with carry-on only, and feel that checking a bag would be detrimental to their health and jet-setter self-image. But the decision to check a bag or two is quite liberating, because the standard of whether to bring something or not becomes far less about weight and more about the probability of having options and risk sensibility (should I carry an umbrella? Geiger counter? Iodine pills?). For longer trips with more situational variety, checking a bag or two seems like an appropriate compromise.
Defensive hacks
In my backpack, I have a little mesh pouch (total weight: about 8 oz) which is my primary repository of little hacks, although I’ve noticed that most of them are defensive in nature — in that they make situations “less bad” rather than “far better.” Items contained there include emergency cash, my second US passport, vaccination record, breath mist, a USB stick, flat reading glasses / pince-nez, disposable contact lenses and rewetting drops, lip balm, tweezers, electrolyte packs, ear plugs, and a pen. I should probably include a face mask, and a Band-Aid or two. In the “far better” or “amusing” category is a single serving of Vegemite; elsewhere in my pack, I have a mini digital thermometer (20g), for measuring serving temperatures of food (very useful for optimizing the moment to eat steaming dim sum).
Slippery slopes
The world can be a slippery place. Managing the spectrum between slippery and tacky is hard, largely because we have few tools to help us. I like to use cushions to prop up physical books while I’m reading, to optimize the distance and reading angle, but the books often slip from the pillow. Whenever I’d attempt to reach for my tea, the book would slide off the pillow, like some gag from a Charlie Chaplin movie. Originally, I wound (semi-tacky) rubber exercise bands around the pillow, making them non-slip (which worked, even if the poor pillow suffocated) — over time I’ve adopted a range of non-slip rubber mats, originally designed for use on car dashboards, but I’ve discovered many other uses for them (on airplane trays or kitchen counters, for instance).
Doraemon isn’t for everyone
My personality is definitely more on the side of the US Coast Guard’s motto: semper paratus – always prepared – and I freely acknowledge that this mindset isn’t for everyone. There is an admirable quality of just being able to figure things out, or deal with whatever comes one’s way, rather than obsessing over trying to manage the future with a growing arsenal of silly hacks.
To each his own – the balance between being prepared for future circumstances, to toughing it out when the appropriate tools are not at hand. The most common instance of this is the decision to carry an umbrella when weather is inclement but not raining – weighing the probabilities of rain and its likely intensity, the umbrella weight and hassle, vs the inconvenience of getting drenched while in transit.
Final words
I recently visited the apartment of a friend who, rather unexpectedly, had a priceless painting hanging in his living room (which would be far more at home at the Tate Museum with the artist’s other works). This was not at all a ‘little’ luxury, and yet its impact on me was ephemeral – as in ‘that’s unexpectedly cool’ – but not substantially more than being able to plop a Luxardo into a glass of sparkling wine. Certainly it was infinitely more valuable, but most of its value was what the market thought it was worth, rather than the impact it created.
Perhaps that’s what I’ve been searching for – little things which create unexpected impact. One of my friends used to send me postcards from around the world – they didn’t cost much but they were thoughtful and created a tangible uplift. Many of these little hacks are like a sprinkling of metaphysical umami on your life, enabling you to appreciate the moment, and take ordinary pleasures, as Spinal Tap might say, to 11.
I recently saw Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days, where Koji Yakusho (who also stars as a gangster in Tampopo) plays a rather Zen toilet cleaner in Tokyo, content with his collection of oldies on cassettes, a film camera for taking photos of tree leaves, and an uncomplicated outlook on life. He doesn’t spend much time on his smartphone (does he even have one?), he reads a variety of used books (another little luxury), and he’s living authentically in the moment, because his Buddhist baseline is modest.
ご清聴ありがとうございました (Thank you for listening to my humble thoughts).
I was struck by the 'soup' part of the post. Have you ever been to Romania? There are 2 kinds of soups: Chiorba (delicious and filling ranging from vegetable to meatballs called perisioare to, you name it) and soup which is mainly chicken soup that has noodles or cloud like dumplings to small pieces of potatoes. Yum. Can't cook any of them but love to eat them.