CURRENT ISSUE

June 2013

Features

The Mind on Fire

A million or so years ago, the amazing evolution of the human brain was sparked by a breakthrough that people everywhere still enjoy every day: cooking

Jerry Adler

Burning Desire

Chiliheads crave the heat that hurts so good, a pleasure-pain riddle science is solving. But nothing compares to the gutwrenching agony of the legendary superhot that spices life in remote India

Mary Roach

10 Epiphanies

Sometimes a meal is just a meal. Other times, a single bite can change everything

Mimi Sheraton

Rocket Fuel

For astronauts headed to the moon, NASA dreamed up meals that tried to mimic earth food

Brett Martin

You know what foods you like. But why? That’s always been one of the toughest questions in perception research. Now psychologists and others, from Ivy League labs to the U.S. Army, are serving up fresh answers

Tom Vanderbilt

Yeasts of the Southern Wild

A star baker in New Orleans, the city of king cake and buttermilk drops, is about to deliver his sweet treats to Harlem

Roy Blount Jr.

“Pineapple”

A new poem by Billy Collins

Billy Collins

Two Kids in a Candy Store

How Philadelphia confectioners Eric and Ryan Berley are giving new life to America’s oldest sweet shop

Franz Lidz

The American Table

What’s it like to have dinner with food writers Michael Pollan and Ruth Reichl as they discuss American food culture? Something like this. (Well, without the food.)

Ruth Reichl