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Fine dining in your front room: from tea bags to ceramics, top restaurant essentials to transform meals at home

Fine dining in your front room: from tea bags to ceramics, top restaurant essentials to transform meals at home

Never mind the food, what about the vibe? Restaurateurs share tips and tricks that will bring a touch of restaurant magic to your table Restaurants are temples of aspiration. From sound, scent and ceramics to hand soap and elegant wine glasses, I’ve often wanted to recreate elements of my favourite restaurants at home. I’m unlikely to sous-vide celeriac or triple cook my chips, but I can elevate my plate of pasta with a drizzle of amazing olive oil, or invest in a cutlery set that gives even a midweek dinner a sense of occasion. As much as the cooking, it’s the little details that are, as celebrated chef Skye Gyngell puts it, “what you take away and what make you feel wonderful”. I spoke to restaurateurs across the UK about the little touches that make their restaurants distinctive – and easy ways to bring their magic into our homes. Continue reading...

Fewer one night stands, more AI lovers: the data behind generation Z’s sex lives

Fewer one night stands, more AI lovers: the data behind generation Z’s sex lives

Shaped by lockdown and two Trump presidencies, gen Z are grappling with a lot in love, dating and the bedroom The sex lives of gen Z are of great interest – to politicians, to parents, to influencers and dating app executives and to you, apparently. Are gen Z so lonely they are falling in love with AI robots? Are they forming polycules across the US? Are they having enough sex? Are they having sex at all? Gen Z is defined roughly as young Americans aged 13 to 28. This generation came of age with information about sex readily available to them, for better (the internet provides both sex education and community) and arguably for worse, too (in 2022, 54% of US teens reported first seeing online pornography at age 13 or younger). They are more likely to embrace non-traditional identities and are progressive on issues such as abortion rights and same-sex marriage – especially gen Z women. Continue reading...

New film adaptation of Camus’s L’Étranger opens old colonial wounds

New film adaptation of Camus’s L’Étranger opens old colonial wounds

François Ozon’s handling of classic novel draws both praise and criticism, including from the author’s daughter More than 80 years after it was published, Albert Camus’s L’Étranger remains one of the most widely read and fiercely contested French books in the world. Until now, few attempts have been made to adapt the novel, published in English as The Outsider, for television or cinema: it is considered problematic and divisive for its portrayal of France’s colonisation of Algeria. Continue reading...