The Amateur Gourmet

Well how could I resist? Apple's newest iTunes allows you publish podcasts which you can create on Garageband. For those not in the know, Podcasts are like homespun radio shows. Usually they're music-based but why not a food based one? Enter moi. In this inaugural episode we tackle:
- Julie Powell's Op-Ed piece and Bruce Cole's rebuttal.
- Alaina's sandwich post (though now I see it wasn't Alaina who posted it, but Lia Bulaong!) Oops! Sorry 'bout that...
AND
- New York Magazine's Eat Cheap Issue.

So I'll post it here and then I'll set up a thing in iTunes for those who want to listen to it in iTunes. You'll probably be able to find me there under Amateur Gourmet once I set everything up. As for now, though, you can just click below and listen to the mp3! Oh and please be forgiving: this is my first one!

Listen to "Wednesday Wade-Through Podcast #1."

You know how the early episodes of "The Simpsons" are all grainy and the characters are drawn all weird and the voices aren't really set yet? Well think of last week's podcast that way and this week's like "Simpsons" Season 3. Because this podcast totally rocks. It's a theme episode--that theme being "coffee"--and it includes a telephone interview with Jonathan Rubenstein who owns New York's best coffee shop (named so in The Village Voice and New York Magazine several years in a row) Joe: The Art of Coffee. Jonathan was so nice and as you'll hear, the interview goes way in depth. The sound quality, by the way, is way improved because I switched from a crappy microphone to the complex process of using my video camera, dumping the file in iMovie, extracting the audio, loading it up in iTunes, converting to mp3 and then dragging that into Garageband. Fun fun fun!! Plus, after hours of research, I figured out the whole RSS/XML thing (at least I think I did) and submitted the feed to iTunes where, hopefully, it'll be up as soon as they approve it. Please, if you have the capacity, give this podcast a listen. I worked hard on it!

Listen to "Podcast #2: The Coffee Episode."

Ah, Paris! Ah, Podcast!

Today's podcast (sorry for the delay between podcasts, they take me a long time to put together!) sweeps us across the Atlantic to the laptop of Clotilde Dosoulier of the internationally renowned why-are-you-reading-my-blog-and-not-her-blog-first website Chocolate & Zucchini. Clotilde was super-nice and super patient with me as I stammered through this interview. My interview philosophy is "no notes, no preparation" so that the conversation flows naturally (if a bit chunkily). I think that happens here while we discuss Paris, Clotilde's city of residence. The podcast adds up to 30 minutes but it flies by rapidly. And I'm working with Typepad people on how to get this on to iTunes so stay tuned for that. As for now, simply click the link below and bon apetit! [Thanks again, Clotilde.]

Podcast #3: The Paris Episode.