Things have reached a pretty pass when even ultra-liberal Atlantic columnists are shocked and appalled by the expectations and behavior of student activists.
With world-altering research to support, graduates who assume positions of extraordinary power, and a $24.9 billion endowment to marshal for better or worse, Yale administrators face huge opportunity costs as they parcel out their days. Many hours must be spent looking after undergraduates, who experience problems as serious as clinical depression, substance abuse, eating disorders, and sexual assault. Administrators also help others, who struggle with financial stress or being the first in their families to attend college.
It is therefore remarkable that no fewer than 13 administrators took scarce time to compose, circulate, and co-sign a letter advising adult students on how to dress for Halloween, a cause that misguided campus activists mistake for a social-justice priority. …
This year, we seem afraid that college students are unable to decide how to dress themselves on Halloween,†she wrote. “I don’t wish to trivialize genuine concerns about cultural and personal representation, and other challenges to our lived experience in a plural community. I know that many decent people have proposed guidelines on Halloween costumes from a spirit of avoiding hurt and offense. I laud those goals, in theory, as most of us do. But in practice, I wonder if we should reflect more transparently, as a community, on the consequences of an institutional (bureaucratic and administrative) exercise of implied control over college students.â€
It’s hard to imagine a more deferential way to begin voicing her alternative view. And having shown her interlocutors that she respects them and shares their ends, she explained her misgivings about… telling college kids what to wear on Halloween. …
When I was in college, a position of this sort taken by a faculty member would likely have been regarded as a show of respect for all students and their ability to think for themselves. She added, “even if we could agree on how to avoid offense,†there may be something lost if administrators try to stamp out all offense-giving behavior. …
In her view, students would be better served if colleges showed more faith in their capacity to work things out themselves, which would help them to develop cognitive skills. “Nicholas says, if you don’t like a costume someone is wearing, look away, or tell them you are offended. Talk to each other. Free speech and the ability to tolerate offence are hallmarks of a free and open society,†she wrote. “But—again, speaking as a child development specialist—I think there might be something missing in our discourse about … free speech (including how we dress) on campus, and it is this: What does this debate about Halloween costumes say about our view of young adults, of their strength and judgment? In other words: Whose business is it to control the forms of costumes of young people? It’s not mine, I know that.â€
That’s the measured, thoughtful pre-Halloween email that caused Yale students to demand that Nicholas and Erika Christakis resign their roles at Silliman college. That’s how Nicholas Christakis came to stand in an emotionally charged crowd of Silliman students, where he attempted to respond to the fallout from the email his wife sent.
Watching footage of that meeting, a fundamental disagreement is revealed between professor and undergrads. Christakis believes that he has an obligation to listen to the views of the students, to reflect upon them, and to either respond that he is persuaded or to articulate why he has a different view. Put another way, he believes that one respects students by engaging them in earnest dialogue. But many of the students believe that his responsibility is to hear their demands for an apology and to issue it. They see anything short of a confession of wrongdoing as unacceptable. In their view, one respects students by validating their subjective feelings.
Notice that the student position allows no room for civil disagreement.
Given this set of assumptions, perhaps it is no surprise that the students behave like bullies even as they see themselves as victims.
Silliman Associate Master Nicholas Christakis told to “shut up” by screaming student.
Katy Waldman, Yale ’10, writes for Slate, is a recent graduate, and is obviously no conservative, but even she was shocked.
I was shocked to watch students treat their professors and administrators with such disrespect. But horrified emotional responses aside, it’s troubling to see the Christakises scapegoated for defending the crucial liberal tradition of free speech. That’s not to dismiss the pain of students of color; I’m sure Yale proves far less hospitable to them than to the wealthy white scions it was founded to serve. Nor should anyone mourn the days of good old college fun, when wearing a racist Halloween costume was considered a harmless bit of white wing-spreading. But in censuring the Christakises for wanting to create “an intellectual space,†students are vociferously exercising the very rights—to speak out against people and practices they find objectionable—that the Christakises seem to want to protect.
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A number of current students at Yale did not like her article one bit.
An unidentified male individual is apparently mopping away chalked slogans and inscriptions pertaining to the Great-Halloween-Costumes-Which-Could-Potentially-Threaten-Students’-Safe-Spaces controversy. A female student, presumably a “person of color”, confronts him and demands to know what he is doing.
He (inaudibly) replies that he is cleaning/removing chalk inscriptions which he considers “slanderous messages.”
(interlude involving milk and laughing)
Unidentified Male defends Associate Masters, Erika and Nicholas Christakis, and Young Female Person of Color replies: “Do you know that there are Silliman freshmen who are afraid of sleeping in their own beds?”
Unidentified Male expresses skepticism of that one, and Young Female Person of Color rejoinders:
“You have no idea how they feel because you a white male with privilege! You don’t know what it’s like to be a woman of color on this campus.”
Derwin Aikens, Yale ’16, Environmental Studies, Pierson Freshman Counselor, Dukes Men, Whiffenpoofs, posted in Overheard at Yale on Facebook:
I’m so tired of having to prove to people how this was never a debate about free speech. People are angry. People are asking faculty members to be removed from positions of power. People are threatening others, spitting on others (allegedly), and yelling at others because many people fundamentally don’t understand. Many of those actions are unproductive and maybe even wrong, but it’s because people are angry and tired of not being heard. This was never a discussion of free speech. That should have never been brought to the table. Dean Howard’s email was asking students to be culturally sensitive, to be aware of how your costumes were affecting those around you. And for some reason Christakis was made uncomfortable. She tried to regain her comfort by making this a discussion about free speech, but that was never the issue. The IAC was never asking students to censor themselves. They were asking students to critically engage with their costume choices and be sensitive to the ways in which it impacted those around them. Students are mad because Christakis found something wrong with that and abused her power as Associate Master to publicly announce her discomfort and justified it using free speech. Thus we now have this debate of respect vs. free speech, but it was never about that. Students are angry not because of free speech, but because cultural sensitivity made Christakis UNCOMFORTABLE. And there in lies the problem.
We need to change the conversation to one that is productive. Because we need to address why cultural sensitivity made her and perhaps many others on campus uncomfortable. Because I’m so sick of the debate forcing people to prove that cultural sensitivity and respect is somehow directly infringing upon free speech. We shouldn’t have to prove that, because it isn’t true. If you don’t understand this, please please please come talk to me because I’m so sick of this free speech debate. It’s bullshit and a total and utter misinterpretation of students anger. Listen up and do better, Yale.
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Jencey Paz, Yale ’17, Psychology and Ecology & Evoluntionary Biology, Silliman Master’s Aide published an editorial titled “Hurt at Home” in the Yale Herald, but has obviously had it removed subsequently, after it was quoted with negative commentary on several on-line sites (example). Currently available via Google cache.
As a Silimander, I feel that my home is being threatened. Last week, Erika Christakis, the associate master of Silliman College, sent an email to the Silliman community that called an earlier entreaty for Yalies to be more sensitive about culturally appropriating Halloween costumes a threat to free speech. In the aftermath of the email, I saw my community divide. She did not just start a political discourse as she intended. She marginalized many students of color in what is supposed to be their home. But more disappointing than the original email has been the response of Christakis and her husband, Silliman Master Nicholas Christakis. They have failed to acknowledge the hurt and pain that such a large part of our community feel. They have again and again shown that they are committed to an ideal of free speech, not to the Silliman community.
Today, when a group of us, organized originally by the Black Student Alliance at Yale, spoke with Christakis in the Silliman Courtyard, his response once again disappointed many of us. When students tried to tell him about their painful personal experiences as students of color on campus, he responded by making more arguments for free speech. It’s unacceptable when the Master of your college is dismissive of your experiences. The Silliman Master’s role is not only to provide intellectual stimulation, but also to make Silliman a safe space that all students can come home to. His responsibility is to make it a place where your experiences are a valid concern to the administration and where you can feel free to talk with them about your pain without worrying that the conversation will turn into an argument every single time. We are supposed to feel encouraged to go to our Master and Associate Master with our concerns and feel that our opinions will be respected and heard.
But, in his ten weeks as a leader of the college, Master Christakis has not fostered this sense of community. He seems to lack the ability, quite frankly, to put aside his opinions long enough to listen to the very real hurt that the community feels. He doesn’t get it. And I don’t want to debate. I want to talk about my pain.
My dad is a really stubborn man. We debate all the time, and I understand the value of hearing differing opinions. But there have been times when I have come to my father crying, when I was emotionally upset, and he heard me regardless of whether or not he agreed with me. He taught me that there is a time for debate, and there is a time for just hearing and acknowledging someone’s pain.
I have had to watch my friends defend their right to this institution. This email and the subsequent reaction to it have interrupted their lives. I have friends who are not going to class, who are not doing their homework, who are losing sleep, who are skipping meals, and who are having breakdowns. I feel drained. And through it all, Christakis has shown that he does not consider us a priority.
Christakis attended the forum on Erika’s email at the Afro-American Cultural Center on Wed., Nov. 4, where students were vulnerable and shared deeply personal stories. After leaving the event early, Christakis tweeted an article on his personal account about the importance of free speech. Then, he retweeted his tweet using the Silliman Twitter handle. This is a clear and flagrant violation. No one should use the Silliman Twitter as a personal platform. The residential college Twitters are a place to share information relevant to everyone in the community; no one consented to having Christakis’ personal view published in a manner that indicated that the community was behind him. The event was indicative of a bigger issue: Christakis is using Silliman college as his intellectual sparring ground.
Further, Christakis has yet to truly acknowledge to the entire Silliman community that he has hurt people. The closest he has gotten to this is sending out an open invitation to brunch at his house to further discuss the issue. Essentially, it was an invitation to debate more. But we don’t want to debate more. We want to be able to go home at night in a place where we feel welcome and wanted.
Christakis’ actions have not been aimed at healing a divided community. Instead, they continue to frame the issue in an “us against them†split. Christakis needs to stop instigating more debate. He needs to stop trying to argue with people who are hurting, regardless of his personal opinions. Being the Master of Silliman is a position of power. To use it to marginalize so much of the student body is deplorable.
Today, when many of us, mostly students of color and Sillimanders, confronted Nicholas Christakis in the Silliman Courtyard, he said he was sorry that we were feeling pain. But is he really? I don’t think he understands what many Sillimanders are going through, nor has he tried.
Christakis hasn’t checked in on any of us. He hasn’t given us any indication that he is going to or wants to heal the community. If you know I’m in pain and you aren’t doing anything to try to help me, then how can you be sorry? Christakis is the Master of Silliman College, it is his job to take care of us, and he is failing.
The Future of Free Speech: Threats in Higher Education and Beyond. U.S. Senator Ben Sasse will deliver the evening keynote address. Other speakers will include Professor Charles Hill, Dr. Geoffrey Kabaservice, Roger Kimball, Professor Jytte Klausen,Greg Lukianoff, Anne Neal, Dr. James Piereson,Professor Bradley A. Smith, James Taranto, Professor Noël Valis, Kevin D. Williamson, and Nathaniel Zelinsky.
Nicholas Christakis, current Associate Master of Silliman College, is Yale ’84 and has an M.D. from Harvard and a Ph.D. from Penn. He is a sociologist specializing in the study of social media. He and his wife Erica were co-Masters of Pforzheimer House, one of Harvard’s twelve residential houses 2009-2013.
Watch the female student tell Christakis to “Be quiet!” and then lecture him on how he should be doing his job as college master.
With race-baiters calling for his head, Christakis wrote the following email featuring a good bit of grovelling.
Dear Silliman students,
“Over the past week, we have spent many hours talking with students of color, and in particular to women students, and we realize now that the email I (Erika) sent, while well-intended and coming from a place of deep conviction, did not acknowledge how extraordinarily hard it is to be a person of color at Yale. We meant to express our confidence that you have far more personal agency than you may realize, and we see proof in our conviction in the tremendous expression at Yale this week. But we understand that it was hurtful to you, and we are truly sorry. We understand that many students feel voiceless in diverse ways and we want you to know that we hear you and we will support you.
“We hear the anguish of many of our students of color and it has deeply moved us. Seeing that we have contributed to this pain by articulating certain beliefs about the formulation of a fair society is a very bitter pill for those in our Yale community, like us, who see speech as a tool for social justice. Nevertheless, we recognize that many students have seen mockery and arrogance in this claim. Your feelings urgently demand respect, and we offer it most sincerely here.
“It is clear that the events of this past week have escalated, and we also write to reassure you of our commitment to each and every student at Silliman. Throughout the week, we have wanted to share our thoughts, but have been advised throughout to delay. But we feel that the events demand an immediate response and we have wanted badly to offer one. It is incredibly hard to create an omnibus response that will speak to everyone. But we find it too painful to imagine crafting separate messages to different constituencies when we believe, at our core, that in times of crisis we are one Yale. As Nicholas said to the group in the courtyard, we believe we are united by our common humanity and can use that commonality to understand each other.
“In the coming days, we will send you a longer meditation on the ideas, events, topics, and experiences we have shared in the last few days, including a more thorough examination of the contents and rationale for Erika’s email and our specific views on free speech, which many have asked to hear more about. We will also work to find spaces for all community members to channel their feelings into ideas that others (both allies and even enemies) might learn from.
“For now, however, we warmly invite all Silliman students who would like to talk about Erika’s email concerning free speech and Halloween costumes, and related campus events, for lunch on Sunday November 8 at 12:00. All Silliman students are welcome, regardless of their views on the topic. Please RSVP, if you can, to Nicholas and Sergio, so we can order sufficient food, but don’t let the lack of an RSVP be a barrier to joining us if you decide at the last minute.
“We hear all of you. Thank you for the privilege of working and learning with you.
Warmly, and also sorrowfully,
Nicholas and Erika”
Erica Christakis is a Harvard graduate with three Masters degrees, specializing in early childhood education.
Inadvertent comedy department: (above) Former master of (the soon to be re-named) Calhoun College & Edmund S. Morgan Professor of African American Studies, now the first black Dean of Yale College, Jonathan Holloway found himself confronted yesterday on the cross campus, in front of Yale’s Sterling Library by hundreds of beneficiaries of Affirmative Action (just like himself) demanding “additional black faculty, racial sensitivity training for freshmen and the dismissal of administrators viewed as racially inattentive.”
Indignation over microaggressions at Yale rose to the boiling point this week because Silliman College Associate Master Erica Christakis responded to an admonitory pre-Halloween email from the Intercultural Affairs Council — a group of administrators from the cultural centers, Chaplain’s Office and other campus organizations — sent to the undergraduate student body warning against wearing Halloween costumes which could be interpreted as belittling or offensive: no sombreros, no blackface, no turbans.
The Oldest College Daily reports that Christakis responded with an email of her own, which
defended students’ rights to wear potentially offensive costumes as an expression of free speech, arguing that the ability to tolerate affront is one of the hallmarks of a free and open society. Her email compared adults selecting costumes to children playing dress up, and she asserted that imagination should be encouraged and not constrained.
“Is there no room anymore for a child or young person to be a little bit obnoxious … a little bit inappropriate or provocative or, yes, offensive?†Christakis, who assumed the position of associate master of Silliman this fall, wrote. “American universities were once a safe space not only for maturation but also for a certain regressive, or even transgressive, experience; increasingly, it seems, they have become places of censure and prohibition.â€
A Silliman student, Ryan Wilson ’17, drafted a letter in response, ultimately signed by “740 undergraduates, graduate students, alumni, faculty and even students from other universities… telling Christakis that her ‘offensive’ email invalidates the voices of minority students on campus. The letter, posted Friday night, state[d] that Christakis misrepresented the Intercultural Affairs Committee’s call for sensitivity as ‘censure’.”
After confronting Dean Holloway, a portion of the crowd went after Associate Master Erica Christakis’ husband:
A heated crowd of students encircled Nicholas Christakis after 3 p.m. and accused him of racism and insensitivity, with many in attendance demanding an apology for the email statement, which admonished the censure of Halloween costumes deemed culturally appropriating. They also criticized Erika Christakis’ behavior during an open forum hosted at the Afro-American Cultural House Wednesday night — in particular, her attempt to leave the room before speaking or answering questions directed toward her.
“I apologize for causing pain, but I am not sorry for the statement,†Nicholas Christakis told the crowd. “I stand behind free speech. I defend the right for people to speak their minds.â€
The gathering quickly became tense and confrontational after his response. Several students screamed at Christakis and called him “disgusting.â€
The suffering of Yale students of color at the sight of certain Halloween costumes was evidently quite considerable.
Students at Thursday’s protest said the e-mail ignored the way people of color experience such insensitive characterizations, and they recounted how students have faced threats of physical violence when they have questioned their classmates’ costume choices.
“There was so much coded language in that e-mail that is just disrespectful,†said Ewurama Okai, a junior.
Several students in Silliman said they cannot bear to live in the college anymore. “They can’t stay in the master’s house,†one student said.
Thursday evening, students were drafting a formal letter calling for the removal of Christakis and his wife from their roles in Silliman. …
Some students said they believe the problem is broader, in that many Yale faculty members are unequipped to talk to black students.
Isaiah Genece, a junior, said he has never had a black professor at Yale. Nearly a dozen black students described the experience of being the sole black person in a class, and the unequal responsibilities foisted on them to speak on behalf of their race.
The university’s commitment to faculty diversity has come under heightened scrutiny since Elizabeth Alexander, a prominent black poet and essayist, announced her plans to leave Yale for Columbia. This week the university announced a $50 million, five-year initiative to enhance the diversity of the faculty.
Another student, Dianne Lake, tied anger over the Halloween e-mail to recent debate about the title “master†used for the heads of the school’s residential colleges, asking: “Why do Yale students call these administrators master? The world is watching.â€
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50 years of racially-based favoritism have led to what? Certainly not to genuine equality of intellectual maturity, independence, and self respect. Not to gratitude and appreciation either. All the special recruiting, the very-heavy-thumb-on-the-scales Affirmative Action admissions, the invention and establishment of cultural identity academic departments and majors, all the specially-motivated faculty and administrative appointments, the university-provided-and-funded cultural houses, all that is not enough.
Student representatives of privileged and protected groups want more privilege, more protection, and feel entitled to demand that the University Administration wave a magic wand and change reality so that Yale’s illustrious faculty (mostly selected on the basis of real achievement) will feature still more conspicuous representation of their own group. Meanwhile, the Yale Administration ought to get busy establishing a totalitarian regime enforcing a punitive system of speech and thought control calculated to ensure that no member of a protected group ever experiences an affront (however subjective).
The Association of American Universities (AAU), a nationally recognized research organization, arranged last Spring to have a Campus Climate Survey on Sexual Assault and Sexual Misconduct taken by undergraduate and graduate and professional students at 27 colleges and universities.
The results at Yale were more spectacular than merely impressive. The survey’s results apparently demonstrate that “By senior year, 34.6 percent of female undergraduates reported experiencing nonconsensual penetration or sexual touching by force or incapacitation.” These are sexual assaults that meet criminal standards.
“Among female undergraduates, 28.1 percent experienced this type of assault since entering Yale University and 14.3 percent experienced this type of assault during the current school year.”
So roughly 5% of German women were successfully sexually assaulted in 1945 by a hostile invading army of primitives bent upon revenge, while in 2015 at Yale almost three times as many (14.3% ) of the young ladies suffer the same fate worse than death. Goodness gracious!
Mory’s started out as a neighborhood New Haven bar on Temple Street, not far from campus, frequented by Yale students in the late 19th century. In 1912, Mory’s was scheduled to close and be demolished, but the affluent Yale men of that era refused to give it up. They simply purchased the bar and moved the whole building, kit and caboodle, to a new location on York Street, even closer to campus, and arranged to have it operated as a private club.
Before WWII, Mory’s was exclusive and expensive and membership was restricted to wealthy (and non-Jewish) Yale men. As time passed, however, Mory’s became more democratic. First every male undergraduate could join, then every Yale faculty member & employee, then females, now God only knows.
In my day, Mory’s was still the preferred drinking place for undergraduate singing groups and societies, but it was already too expensive to be a real undergraduate institution. Mory’s really made its money serving lunches and dinner to Yale bureaucrats and New Haven bigshots. The Mory’s of the late 1960s was already unionized, and one fine day its management announced that Mory’s no longer cared to stay open to 11:30 PM. They began closing earlier, after dinner service ended, so undergraduate clubs were no longer able to adjourn to Mory’s at the conclusion of evening meetings for a shared toasting cup and a few beers.
Mory’s (in my view, deservedly) went broke in 2008, and closed indefinitely. The Yale Alumni Magazine searched its soul over whether such an (imaginarily) elite and reactionary institution ought ever to be re-opened. But, the Yale Administration, in the final analysis, really did need a traditional sort of place to eat lunch and entertain, so a fund-raising effort was made and the old whited sepulchre saved and re-opened.
Mory’s continues to close early, but it does remain an exemplar of old-fashioned WASP elite culture in one respect: its menu. In my day, and even today, Mory’s retains essentially the same old fashioned simple and stodgy menu of yore, featuring such offerings as Welsh Rarebit, French Dip Sandwiches, and Rhode Island Clam Chowder, characteristic of the genuinely elite WASP club.
Elite WASPs like that kind of cuisine, and they abhor change*.
David Ross ’92, now an English professor at Chapel Hill, retains a particular affection for, of all things, Baker Soup, a menu item apparently unique to Mory’s, and he has devoted considerable energy and research into duplicating the secret recipe. Mr. Ross’s resulting article, I’m told, appeared yesterday in some newspaper in North Carolina, but he graciously agreed to allow me to share it with my readers here.
My eight years in New Haven, Connecticut—four as an undergraduate and another four as a newspaper reporter—ended in a hail of bullets and a falling body. The former redecorated my apartment lobby, the latter plummeted past my eighth-floor balcony at 3 a.m. New Haven—at least during the early 90s—was that kind of town.
I don’t miss the sirens, the dirty snow or the fake gothic. I do miss Mory’s, the legendary dining club situated in a clapboarded, warren-roomed manse incongruously tucked between two epitomes of the modern mindset: the Yale graduate school and a rock club called Toad’s Place.
Mory’s is to New Haven what Antoine’s is to New Orleans—a redoubt of bygone sensibility. You go there to eat, but even more to ponder the fork- and knife-carved words in the old wood and to pretend that it’s 1912, the year Mory’s opened at its present location.
As you order pommes de terre souffles and bread pudding at Antoine’s, so you order—unwaveringly and ritually—the Baker Soup and Welsh rarebit at Mory’s. The Mediterranean dieter who orders the seafood risotto for $27 misapprehends everything.
What is this “Baker Soup� Nobody knows. Superficially, it’s a curry-flavored cream soup of vaguely ochre hue. The operative ingredients seem to be carrot, celery, onion and tomato, though this is a controversial speculation.
A year ago, feeling oddly homesick for the film noir dankness of New Haven and remembering the life-infusing counter-dynamic of the Baker Soup, I set myself the task of engineering a recipe based on twenty-year-old memories.
I devised a pumpkin-apple soup to which I naturally added a splash of Calvados in homage to my Francophile hero A.J. Liebling. Though luscious, my soup was not the soup. The color was right, but there was too much richness, sweetness and complexity. And my 2-hp Vitamix produced a super-silky potage plainly over-beholden to technology. Baker Soup, in my recollection, is homier and earthier: a peasant rather than a Parisian soup.
I put the question to a Yale listserv. There was an animated response: philosophies unfurled, chemistries clashed, recipes flew. There was a certain amount of nonsense, but one Baker Soup devotee claimed to have a friend who had cooked at Mory’s back in the day and had divulged the outline.
This devotee wrote: “It’s a cream of tomato and curry soup, starting with fresh tomatoes and chicken stock and thickened with bread. The secret ingredient is carrot. The current Mory’s incarnation uses a little too much carrot, a little too much garlic, not enough curry powder. And it’s too smooth. The result is a slightly more elegant, but somehow less satisfying dish.â€
Building on these intelligent hints, I conjured a plausible facsimile. Here, then, are two recipes—mine and his—both warming, one classic.
Pumpkin-Apple Soup with Curry and Calvados (serves 4)
2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
½ large yellow onion (200 grams), preferably Vidalia, sliced
½ large yellow onion (200 grams), preferably Vidalia
2–3 medium stalks celery (150 grams)
3 cloves garlic
4 Tbsp. unsalted butter
½ cup dry vermouth
1 Tbsp. curry powder
1 tsp. ground ginger
4 cups unsalted chicken stock
1 bay leaf
1 ½ cups fresh breadcrumbs (roughly food-processed French baguette)
¼ cup heavy cream
1 tsp. kosher salt (or to taste)
Parboil the tomatoes (to release the skins), 1 minute. Peel, seed and dice the cooled tomatoes. Dice the carrots, onion and celery. Finely mince the garlic. Melt the butter in a stock pot. Add the carrots, onion, and celery. Sweat until softened, 15 minutes. Add the vermouth and reduce by half. Add the garlic, curry powder and ground ginger, stirring to combine. Add the tomatoes, chicken stock and bay leaf. Simmer at medium-low temperature for 20 minutes. Add the breadcrumbs and continue to simmer, 5 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and roughly puree (be sure to retain some texture). Return the soup to the pot. Finish with the cream and salt (in quarter-teaspoon increments, tasting as you add). Garnish with parsley, chives or croutons.
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Notes:
“Curry powders†differ enormously. To avoid winding up with an excessively exotic or assertive soup, I recommend a mundane supermarket brand like McCormick.
The quality of your soup will depend on the quality of your stock. Do not be tempted by salted and MSG-laden stocks. A deep-souled homemade stock is ideal.
* Old Joke
How Many WASPs does it take to change a light bulb?
Answer: 5. One to change the bulb, and four to stand around reminiscing about how great the old light bulb used to be.
Linonia & Brothers-In-Unity Reading Room in Sterling Library. A small library, inside Sterling, stocked with non-course-related reading material and very comfortable leather chairs. Its name comes from two early Literary & Debating Societies.
The Daily Prep (in multiple postings, just scroll down) tours Yale’s Beinecke Library, the surrounding Hewitt Quadrangle and Wolseley Hall, then goes over to Sterling Memorial Library. A friend of mine used to observe that life after Yale is one constant struggle to live as well as you did when you were a Yale undergraduate, in which nearly all of us fail.
