The Thousands

Food is so hot right now. As well as the mainstream fodder of celebrity chefs and reality shows, the foodie vibe is strong amongst the artists and fashion-forward, translating to big sales in heirloom tomatoes, Le Creuset pans and weird cheese.

Condiment acknowledges and celebrates this, in itself a magazine by creative people about their relationship with food. Contained within its pages is Ricky Swallow‘s bowl collection, gathered from those awesome flea markets he frequents, Darren Sylvester‘s loving homage to potato chips, Amanda Maxwell‘s cute observational poems and ‘Vegetation Levitation’, a fun photo essay pairing snapshot style images with cleverly staged flying fruit formations. My favourite piece is by artist Ellen Birrell, who runs a lemon farm in California, collecting bizarre malformed fruit. Her writing is familiar and informative, making you feel that being a lemon farmer is something you could happily do.

That’s the charm of this little publication, in that it speaks with warmth and enthusiasm for food in a language that we can understand and relate to. Whether that is through collecting freaky lemons or ffiXXed‘s recipe for German Spatzle noodles, it’s a take on food that is both obscure and invigorating, no cravat included.