They even resemble Antarctica's mysterious icequakes.

In your average lab, pouring a bowl of cereal may be a violation of protocol. But at the University of Sydney, researchers Itai Einav and François Guillard have found good reason to bring breakfast fare to the lab bench.

Studying or simulating natural phenomena from within a laboratory can be difficult. "We don't have room for a 100-meter dam in our laboratories," says Dr. Einav, a professor of geomechanics. Instead, the researchers use puffed rice cereal as a surrogate material for naturally-occurring dry snow and rocks—all of which fall under the category of brittle, porous media.

“That’s the scientific name,” says Dr. Einav, “but I call it crunchy material.” Puffed rice is a good stand-in, since, like snow and rock, cereal breaks under pressure and degrades in fluid.

This isn’t the scientists’ first rodeo with Rice Krispies, which, if you didn’t know, are called Rice Bubbles in Australia. (During a previous study, Dr. Einav tells me, he referred to his American colleague as Mr. Rice Krispies, who reciprocated by calling him Mr. Rice Bubbles.) But until this point, the researchers had worked primarily with dry cereal, which is helpful when it comes to modeling dry snow or rock crumbling under pressure. But some collapse events involve water—such as those that occur in ice shelves, sinkholes, and rockfill dams when they're exposed to large amounts of liquid and high pressure. Studying these is challenging, because they happen incredibly slowly and at such large scale.

That’s where the milk comes in. Adding it to cereal, the researchers found, could simulate these collapses in a sped-up, scaled-down way.

To create the collapse, the researchers poured the cereal into a vertical tube perched atop a granular filter. They applied a constant amount of pressure at the top of the tube, and added milk to the bottom. What happened next was a series of snaps, crackles, and collapses, which the researchers charmingly dubbed “ricequakes.”

During each milk-and-pressure induced reaction, the researchers witnessed several quakes, with the delay before each one growing longer over time. They also noted that each tiny quake was accompanied by an audible popping noise, which, according to Dr. Einav, aurally resembles “a slowing metronome.”

According to Dr. Einav, what’s happening can be explained quite simply. He compares the Krispies apparatus to a train, situated vertically, that comes into contact with liquid at the bottom. The first car that hits the liquid degrades quickly, and crashes. Once it does, the liquid rises upward, weakening the next train car or cereal layer, eventually causing it to collapse under the pressure at the top (albeit more slowly than the first). Eventually, Dr. Einav says, many trains sitting above the liquid base will crash—with each collapse taking progressively longer.

From this simulation, the scientists have been able to create a mathematical equation that can explain when, and why, the ricequakes happen. Though Dr. Einav is quick to say that using models to make real-world predictions is risky, he’s speculated that it might (at least partially) explain some natural phenomena, such as the recurring tidal icequakes of Antarctica. “There are about two daily, each with a magnitude of 7.0, but they’ve slowed down over the years,” he says. “People have explained this in many other ways, many of them likely correct, but they look a lot like the ricequake phenomenon.”

“The way I see it, we now understand the physics. Now other people can use it.”

In part, those other people will be geologists or engineers, who may develop technologies that can, for instance, predict dam collapses. But the other people who can use this research, Dr. Einav points out, could be anyone. This incredibly complex mathematical modeling was mapped out through a five-dollar experiment (excluding the cost of the optic microscope, which, according to Dr. Einav, is among the most expensive microscopes in the world). “We should be giving this to kids to replicate at home,” he says.

Sure, physics can be obscure at times. But Dr. Einav and Dr. Guillard remind us that it can also be extremely accessible. Perhaps all it takes is good, crunchy material to make something like the physics behind icequakes—and ricequakes—a little easier to digest.

We want to see your shameful stacks of unread books.

Last week, after months of procrastination, I finally bought a copy of Grady Hendrix’s book Paperbacks from Hell, a loving examination of lurid pulp book covers from the 1970s and '80s. I was jazzed to see it on the shelf at my local bookstore, and instantly snapped it up. Then, still feeling excited, I took it home and... placed it directly on my ever-growing “to-read” stack. Huh. I firmly believe I'll read Hendrix's book one of these days, but if I'm being honest with myself, I’m also probably going to add a couple more books to the stack before I do.

Welcome to the concept of “tsundoku.”

Loosely translated as the practice of piling up books you might never read, the Japanese word tsundoku seems to be everywhere right now. In recent months, The New York Times, the BBC, Forbes, and plenty of others have reported on the phenomenon. As lovers of books and libraries of all kinds, we here at Atlas Obscura can certainly relate.

An informal survey of Atlas Obscura staff reveals that some of us stack new books at the bottom of the pile; some of us maintain a one-in-one-out policy to try and manage the size of our unread stacks; and at least one of us (me) regularly reorders our pile of potential reads, in a futile attempt to make the ever-expanding collection look like it has some rhyme or reason. But enough about us: we want to hear about your tsundoku habits.

Fill out the form below to tell us about your own tsundoku, and how you intend to conquer it (if at all)! Then email an Instagram-ready picture of your unread book pile to eric@atlasobscura.com, with the subject line, “Tsundoku.” We’ll share our favorite responses in an upcoming article. Don’t let anyone make you feel guilty for buying more books than you can read. Let your tsundoku shine!

Slab City might be the "last free place," but that freedom requires work.

In Slab City, the public library has no due dates and no library cards. The books are organized by section, but not alphabetized. In this anarchist squatter town in California's Sonoran Desert, established on the empty foundations of a military camp created 1940s, the library runs on donations and good will, and if you want to borrow a book, go ahead.

“I decided to honor the anarchist library rules,” says Cornelius Vango, an "anarchist librarian and career tramp." “I didn’t want people to feel any reason not to take a book. A lot of people are passing through and will never be coming back.”

The current incarnation of the library came to life about four years ago, when Vango moved in. “I had been coming to Slab City for years, and I had never heard of the library,” they say. It had been founded by a woman who went by Rosalie, a librarian by trade, who died in 2003. Her grave is just outside the library. The year before Vango took on the project, a few people had tried to revive it, but the next season the library was in worse shape than before. People had taken the good books, but no one wanted add new ones because the place wasn’t being cared for. Encouraged by others in town, Vango started rebuilding through salvage and donations. Today the library has thousands of books, divided into fiction and nonfiction sections.

“We’re out in the desert, and there are no building codes," they say. "I can live how I want, and I can make the library how I want to."

No one’s ever written a full history of Slab City; it’d be impossible. In a new book Slab City: Dispatches from the Last Free Place, architectural scholar Charlie Hailey gathers some fragments to begin to piece together this past. A survey in 1902 that parceled the land into one of California’s places for “free public common schools.” The establishment of the distinctive concrete slabs, in May 1942, as foundations for a Marines training base. A survey of RVs and travel trailers that started in 1980 and went through 1997, with a peak population of 872 rigs in January 1992.

Hailey, who is a licensed architect and teaches at the University of Florida, has made a study of camps, or any places that muddy the lines of temporary and permanent settlement. Slab City, he found, is unique in the way it taps into three key aspects of camps—autonomy, necessity, and control (or, put another way, desire, need, and power). Slab City’s been called the “last free place,” but that doesn’t make it an easy place to live. “Freedom is something you really have to work at,” Hailey says. “And the people who are living there are putting themselves in a situation where they really have to work at it.”

Even though it is mercurial, there’s been plenty written about Slab City and plenty of photos taken of its residents. "Slabbers," as they call themselves, also tell their own stories. On Vango’s YouTube page, you can watch a mini-doc “by a Slabber for Slabbers,” take a tour of the library, see what it takes to survive the brutal desert summers, or peek in on live-streamed bar sessions.

In the new book, Hailey and his collaborator, photographer Donovan Wylie, focus on the architecture of the place: the town’s layout, its boundaries, its infrastructure, and the sites people built within the constraints of an anarchist desert city. Building materials are mostly limited to salvage and the desert climate is harsh, but Hailey sees the making of places like this as an important expression of freedom. “They can build whatever they choose to build,” he says.

In the book, Hailey and Wylie visit Vango’s library. “There’s no door because the library never closes,” they note. But the library also can’t close, in a sense. According to the rules of Slabs, says Vango, “You need to occupy a space for it to be yours. If you don’t occupy it, people can come in and take your shit.” If Vango left the library for the summer, for instance, when the desert’s so hot that the population of Slab City drops dramatically, the place would be looted.

This is one of the contradictions of Slab City. There’s freedom, but it has an edge. “In a certain sense, it’s hidden,” says Hailey. “It’s really remote. But it’s also a place of exposure. Everything is exposed there.”

But it’s not a lawless place, exactly. “A lot of people come to Slab City and think they can act however they want without consequence,” says Vango. “It’s a community, and you need to respect people like you would anywhere else. The library is not just the library, it’s also my home. Ask before you try to take pictures. You wouldn’t walk into someone’s yard and start messing with their stuff. You have to respect the space here.”

That being said, drop by. “Everyone’s welcome. Don’t have expectations. Just enjoy your time here,” says Vango. “We’re really chill and friendly. And we really like ice donations.”

"The ghost was me!" says Giuseppe Negri, who grew up at Villa de Vecchi.

In the foothills of Cortenova, Italy, the mansion known as Villa de Vecchi sits crumbling, covered in graffiti. It dates back to the 1850s, when it was built to serve as a summer residence for Count Felix de Vecchi, the nobleman and decorated war hero. The count and his family ultimately met tragic ends, or so the story goes, but it wasn't until the 20th century that the property solidified its reputation as a "Ghost Mansion," (it's also sometimes referred to as the "Red House" or "The House of Witches").

In the 1920s, the occultist Aleister Crowley allegedly spent a few nights at Villa de Vecchi, leading to widespread rumors of ritualistic orgies and animal (and perhaps even human?) sacrifices. By the 1960s, the entire property was left permanently uninhabited.

Giuseppe Negri's family were caretakers of the property for multiple generations. As he explains to Atlas Obscura in the video above, Negri and his brother-in-law sometimes dressed up as ghosts at night to scare off trespassers, which may help explain why rumors of paranormal activity at the mansion persist to this day.

A Guide to Heavenly Cuisine

Reviving the Triforium.

In the winter of 1975, the Triforium had its debut performance in downtown Los Angeles. The artist Joseph Young, a muralist and sculptor, had designed the six-story tower as a "polyphonoptic" instrument, covered in 1,494 colored glass prisms that would light up in response to sound.

But the Triforium never quite worked as he or the city, which commissioned the work, intended. Its primitive, custom-designed computer couldn’t execute Young’s intentions; the sound came out wrong, and the lights rarely synced as they should have. Expensive and over-budget, from its debut, “it was a political pariah,” says Tom Carroll, who hosts a YouTube show called Tom Explores Los Angeles. Fixing the tower’s technical issues, keeping the lights in working condition—all that would have taken more money. Instead, the Triforium, mocked, derided, unappreciated, was left to slowly decline.

But there have always been those who loved the Triforium and believed in Young’s vision. For many years, Carroll, along with Claire Evans and Jona Bechtolt, musicians who built and run 5 Every Day, an app for fascinating things to do in L.A., had been dreaming of hosting performances at the space, a gesture to what might have been. In 2015, they threw a 40th birthday party for the Triforium, complete with a professionally made cake featuring the sculpture’s image. At this event, they discovered they had tapped into a current of passion for this underdog piece of art.

“People really wanted to see it turned on,” says Evans.

On Friday, it will be. In 2016, the Triforium Project—composed of this trio, along with non-profit allies—won an LA2050 grant to start to restore it, and they have spent the past two years working with the city to do just that, with the aim of finally showing the public what Young meant it to be. Over the course of three Fridays in October and early November 2018, musicians will perform with the Triforium, which is being rigged so that it will light up in response to sound.

This is not a full restoration; that would take a million dollars, the team says. But they have had access to the original notes, programming documentation, and computer system components that Young used to create the Triforium. Back in the 1970s, a computer used 8-bit tape, in binary code—picture a roll of paper tape with holes cut into it. Working with legacy computer experts to manually transcode tapes and recreate the program, the Triforium Friday team now has an emulator that replicates the original and will translate sound into light in real time.

The wiring for the lighting system, though, is 40 years old and encased in concrete pylons. Given the decay of time and the risk of turning it on, the team is using custom-built LED triangles that sit atop each hand-blown glass prism to light it up. Each LED has an individual controller connected to the computer system; the lighting system acts as a kind of “exoskeleton” for the original sculpture.

When creating a line-up for the performances, the Triforium Friday team sought people who who represent a range of sounds—everything from opera and string quartets to ambient music and professional whistling. Lining up acts, they say, was the easiest part of the project.

“We’re artists ourselves and have played every kind of venue,” says Bechtolt. They knew if they were asked to perform with the Triforium they would say yes, immediately. “People are going to be excited to play on an instrument that’s entirely unique,” he says.

In the days leading up to the launch, Carroll, Bechtolt, and Evans have been working around the clock as midwives for the Triforium’s rebirth. All day long, people in cherry-pickers have been installing the LED exoskeleton. But if everything goes according to plan, on Friday, October 19, the Triforium will light up with sound, working, perhaps for the first time, as originally intended.

“I’ve always been fascinated by yesterday’s visions of the future,” Evans says. “Young was a utopian thinker and idealist. He thought art and music, light and sound, would be mediated into one art form, thanks to technology. I feel a responsibility as a member of his future to be as cool and as civically engaged as he imagined.”

A special aspen grove needs the chance to regenerate.

These are unpredictable times for Earth’s biggest organisms. A 90-acre fungus in Michigan has been growing and now, researchers say, a grove of 47,000 genetically identical trees in Utah has been shrinking.

That would be Pando, the Trembling Giant of Fishlake National Forest. Because all of its trees are genetic clones, it is considered a single organism, and at nearly 7,000 tons is Earth’s most massive living thing. "Pando" is Latin for “I spread,” but maybe it doesn't any more. As The New York Times explains, new saplings don't appear to be replacing older trees as they die off, thanks in large part to the mule deer, elk, and cattle that have been steadily eating away at the "forest of one tree." Aerial photos in a new PLOS One study show how the forest appears to be retreating from the inside as older trees die off.

The researchers diced the forest into three sections to diagnose its problems. One was openly accessible to animals. Another was cordoned off. The third was fenced off and, in some parts, boosted with shrub removal and other methods of encouraging arboreal growth. They found that the forest was capable of regeneration, and that only keeping out the herbivores could allow this to happen.

Not surprisingly, this is all our fault. The building of campgrounds and cabins that attract wildlife, and the banishment of carnivores such as wolves, have made the region a playground for animals such as mule deer. Fencing off more than 100 acres of woods would be both impractical and unsightly, so lead author Paul C. Rogers of Utah State University told Science that he supports strategically reducing (i.e., hunting or culling) the local mule deer population.

There’s more at stake here than a natural wonder. Aspen is a keystone species; it is critical to the health and integrity of the entire ecosystem. Losing Pando's quaking aspen could lead to an even more destructive ecological shakeup.

Petrified wave ripples can tell us about the weather that dinosaurs saw.

South Hadley and Holyoke, Massachusetts, are famous for their tracks. Around 200 million years ago, when the Connecticut River Valley was full of swamps and shallow, muddy lakeshores, dinosaurs tromped through and left footprints in the muck, which were then sealed off and preserved. Today, at Dinosaur Footprints Reservation, sandwiched between two highways and railway, visitors can spot hundreds of these imprints in the sandstone.

Around these fossils, made by three-toed feet with sharp claws, the ground tells other stories, too. If you look closely, you’ll see that the rock is rippled. These are shallow seabeds, petrified. To the experts who know how to read them, they tell a vivid tale about the prehistoric world—right down to what the weather was like when a dinosaur went out for a stroll.

That’s why Taylor Perron, a geologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, recently took his students there for a visit. Perron studies erosion and landscapes, and finds detailed stories in bands of sand.

These ancient formations are known as wave ripples, and are just like the ones that can be found on a sandy seashore today (but different from the ripples formed by currents or wind). Wave ripples grow as passing surface waves deposit sand on ridges and carve depressions between them. These sedimentary formations usually max out at an inch or two in height before the sand begins to slide in little avalanches, or are wiped out by other waves.

It might seem implausible that a wave ripple could last an hour in such a dynamic environment, let alone a millennium. “They’re so delicate,” Perron says. “If you go up to one in the water at the beach and you just touch it with a toe, you can make a big hole in the ripple; you can wipe it right out.” The ripples are almost always short-lived, but the ones that manage to hang around do so because of storms or exposure. A muddy river that overflows and spills wet sediment on the shore could blanket the sand and “form a kind of armor over the ripples beneath,” Perron says. They can also survive by being exposed above the water’s surface—say, by an earthquake or receding tide—where they can dry and solidify in place. Petrified ripples are a sedimentary snapshot of the moment that they were buried.

Researchers know that water depth and wave size affects the size and spacing of wave ripples. Though they’re often rather linear and parallel, they can split and reconnect to form a variety of puzzling patterns. Scientists know much less about the specific conditions that create these, or what they can tell us. During a sabbatical at MIT in 2010, Paul Myrow, a geologist at Colorado College, showed Perron some puzzling photographs of preserved wave ripples from the Cambrian in Newfoundland, and the Proterozoic in both Inner Mongolia and the Apache Group in Arizona, among other places and vintages. The images show ripples in scores of these different patterns, known as “defects.” Some look like hourglasses, others evoke tuning forks. “We couldn’t explain them,” Perron says. “We didn’t know how they formed, and we didn’t know what they meant.”

They had the idea that they might be able to decode the patterns by reverse-engineering them. As the team describes in a new paper in the journal Geology, they set up 23-foot-long experimental tank in a lab at MIT. They attached a paddle to one end that allowed them to create controlled waves that traveled the length of the tank. At the other end was a mat of rubberized horsehair to absorb the waves so they wouldn't bounce back. Between the horsehair and paddle was a flat expanse of sand. The researchers could then track how changes in the speed and motion of the paddle changed the resulting ripples.

When the paddle was swished through a narrow range of motion, the ripples formed hourglass patterns. When the waves were even smaller and faster, “secondary crests” appeared on each side of existing ripples. A wider range of motion yielded zig-zag patterns. The researchers suggest that strong storms could probably create hourglass shapes or secondary crests offshore, while closer in, a falling tide with constant wind could form zigzags. Tracking these shapes through the geological record, Perron says, could help researchers identify significant storms or fluctuations at a literally granular level. “If you see these types of defects in nature, we argue that the seabed was undergoing some kind of change in weather conditions, tides, or something else that affected water depth or waves, probably over the course of hours or days,” Perron told MIT News. “For instance, if you’re seeing lots of secondary crests, you can tell there was a pretty big change in the waves as opposed to a smaller change, which might give you hourglasses instead.”

Looking at the ripples can help researchers fill in a picture of that environment at a specific moment in time—even hundreds of millions of years ago. At his field-trip site in Massachusetts, Perron says, the ripple patterns aren’t too complicated. There are occasional tuning-fork-like splits, which seem to be correlated with periods of consistent waves and water depth. Judging by the shape and spacing of the ripples, Perron says, it was probably a pretty comfortable day when the dinosaurs left those tracks—not too windy, no pounding storm.

In addition to functioning as an type of ancient almanac, ripples can, alongside tracks, say something about dinosaur behavior. In a 2015 paper in the Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History, Patrick Getty, then a visiting geoscientist at the University of Connecticut, pointed to the orientation of ripples and tracks as evidence that the animals were skirting the shoreline instead of moving in or out of the water.

Perron doesn’t expect that the average visitor checking out the dino prints in Massachusetts will be as bowled over by the little crests and valleys, or see their value to a trained scientific eye. “Dinosaur footprints are pretty tough competition,” he says. But because the ripples are easy to see, well-preserved, and convex, people do notice them, says Josh Knox, a stewardship manager of the Trustees of Reservations, the nonprofit organization that looks after the site. This summer, artist Will Sillin installed a mural on a wall near the tracks and ripples, which depicts dinosaurs ambling along a shoreline hatched with ripples—a visual echo of the preserved tracks and ripples just below it.

The tracks are the stars that bring out the audience, but the ripples—which sometimes occur in layers, stacked atop each other like a geological flipbook—provide the backdrop to a scene 200 million years in the making. “Maybe we should rename the reservation Trace Ripple Fossil Reservation,” Knox jokes. “I don’t know if it’s as catchy.”

And does it matter if we had the date a little wrong for thousands of years?

In the year 79, a mighty eruption from Mount Vesuvius snuffed out life in Pompeii. But when, exactly? Was it in the waning days of summer, or the first blush of fall?

For ages, the thought has been that the volcano blew in August of that year, a date drawn from a transcription of a letter penned by the Pliny the Younger a quarter-century after the fact. Pliny wrote that the eruption happened “nonum kal Septembres,” or nine days before the beginning of September. That places the eruption on August 24. Later, some scholars questioned this date, pointing out that the site was littered with ancient autumnal staples, such as walnuts and grapes recently pressed into wine.

Archaeologists working at the site recently came across a scribble that squares with the notion that the devastating ash rained down later than Pliny reported. For this intel, they have a big meal to thank.

On the wall of a house, the archaeologists came across a few lines of charcoal graffiti, reading: “XVI K Nov in[d]ulsit pro masumis esurit[ions].”

The latter portion roughly translates as, “he over-indulged in food,” which is relatable but slightly less relevant than the date. The key is “XVI K Nov,” which indicates the 16th day before the beginning of November (that is, October 17). Since charcoal is quick to smudge or vanish, the team at Parco Archeologico di Pompei estimates that it must have been written no more than a week before the eruption. That would place the disaster somewhere around October 24.

Historical accounts are rife with errors big and small—which, hopefully, are corrected as additional research trickles in and biases are stripped away. Thousands of years later, do a few weeks make a difference? “Many scholars don't see the two-month difference in dates as terribly important in the two millennia scheme of things, but as a bioarchaeologist, I do,” Kristina Killgrove, an assistant teaching professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, wrote in Forbes.

That’s because, when an entire population was wiped out in one fell swoop, the mortality site became a panoramic snapshot of public health. For researchers who study pathogens and disease, Killgrove continued, a couple months can make a big difference between a healthier population and a sicker one. “Since many diseases are seasonal, or at least peak in certain seasons (like the current flu season), a difference of two months—from late summer to early fall—is incredibly important,” Killgrove continued. Thousands of years after the disaster, fresh information could help researchers bring the past into clearer focus.

What happened when you finally tasted something you'd previously been repulsed by?

Exploration isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes, in order to experience new things, you have to face down some long-held fears. For a lot of people, this is especially true when it comes to food.

I’m a fairly adventurous eater, but my greatest food fear has long been durian. All of my near-miss experiences with the notorious fruit (passing it in a market, watching braver gourmands than I partake) had sent me running. I know that durian is eaten all over the world, and is especially popular in many Asian countries. From Singapore to Hong Kong to Thailand, durian is simply not that remarkable. But that pungent smell and dramatic reputation really had me convinced that it was horrid. To me, it smells like a rotting corpse, and even when you manage to get past the threatening spiked shell, the edible flesh looks like a bleached human liver. If David Cronenberg invented a fruit, this would be it.

But thanks to some enthusiastic prodding from my coworkers, and in the spirit of Halloween, I finally dealt with my fear head on, and ate some durian.

After failing to swallow the first bite (the fruit's much ballyhooed odor more than lives up to the hype), I kept down the second, though just barely. There's a sweetness to the custardy-flesh, but I found it buried under an unrelenting flavor of trash rotting on a humid summer day.

While durian had me fighting back waves of nausea, a number of my gathered coworkers happily dug in, taking huge bites. More of them than not, even those also trying it for the first time, were really enjoying it. One person said it tasted like “sweet onions,” while another thought it had a texture "somewhere between well-done eggs and custard." It was fascinating to watch such opposite reactions arise from the exact same experience.

In the end, while I didn’t much enjoy fresh durian, I’m happy to have gotten over my fear of it. I’ve come to a better understanding of a fruit that much of the world enjoys, and opened myself up to the possibility of trying things like durian candy (it's entirely possible that durian might taste better to me when prepared). It might sound a little cheesy, but it’s always nice to be reminded that trying something new really can expand your world.

That's my story. Now we want to hear about yours! Fill out the form below to tell us the story of how you overcame your greatest food fear. We’ll share our favorite answers in an upcoming article. 'Tis the season to celebrate getting over our irrational fears, together.

In Lapland, chefs and residents hunt and gather to make bear soup, lingonberry syrup, and reindeer.

The wild region of Lapland, in Finland, is located so far north that it experiences nearly endless summer sunlight, which locals refer to as the “Midnight Sun.” But when summer ends, the the sun soon sets just a few hours after it rises. This unique, Arctic Circle climate produces flora and fauna found in few other places. For generations, residents of Lappi, as the Finnish call the area, have spent the summer and early fall hunting, butchering, and freezing moose and reindeer, as well as collecting as many berries, herbs, and mushrooms as possible.

Lapland’s capital, Rovaniemi, has a population of around 60,000 and multiple supermarkets, which residents could visit in lieu of storing away everything they need for the winter. But with their backyards and nearby forests offering abundant, high-quality ingredients, and grocery stores lacking beloved staples such as moose tongue and charging high prices for berries, many prefer to spend their time outdoors, preparing for winter.

Hunting With Chef Kimmo Kähkönen

At 4 a.m. on a rainy weekday morning, Kimmo Kähkönen, dressed head to toe in neon-orange hunting gear, releases a GPS-equipped hunting dog into the forest. Seated beside a bonfire on the forest’s outskirts, he follows the dog’s progress through an application on his daughter’s iPad. We’re at a campsite where Kähkönen often meets other members of his hunting club to enjoy snacks—grilled sausages, homemade Finnish bread with cheese, and coffee in a kuska, a Finnish wooden cup—while the dogs track moose and bear.

This kind of cooperation is typical in Lapland. Kähkönen belongs to Lapin Keittiömestarit r.y, an organization of some 50 chefs devoted to preserving Arctic cuisine in Finland by sharing tips on hunting, gathering, and preserving food. His hunting club shares ATVs (for transporting game) and dogs, each of which is trained to hunt a specific type of prey.

While Kähkönen is executive chef at the upscale Ravintola Monte Rosa restaurant, he often takes a month off solely to hunt. Following Finnish law, he trained and passed a rigorous test before receiving a permit at the age of nine and a weapons permit at age 15. This year, the Finnish Wildlife Agency gave him a permit to hunt two adult moose, two moose calves, and a bear in September.

After two hours at camp, Kähkönen sees on the iPad that the dog has stopped moving. Thanks to the dog’s bark recorder, he also knows it’s being loud—the dog’s instinctive response to the moose slowing down. He enters the forest, following the barks, and after three effortful hours, he alerts us to come with the sound of the gunshot.

Using his daughter’s iPad, we find Kähkönen already preparing the moose to load onto an ATV. Selling the meat to stores and restaurants requires a trip to the veterinarian, for her seal of approval. But as this is his first kill of the season, Kähkönen plans to use this meat, all 1,000 portions of it, to share with his hunting club members and his family.

Gathering With Chef Matti Eemeli Seitamo

Before he became an executive chef at Arctic Boulevard, where he prepares tasting menus of Arctic cuisine, Matti Eemeli Seitamo learned from his grandmother how to gather berries and mushrooms and preserve them for winter.

About 30 minutes outside the city center, we walk into a part of the forest where he knows there are still mushrooms and berries this late in the season. Most locals know what is good to pick and what isn’t. Without even opening a mushroom, Seitamo knows how to avoid ones crawling with worms, and he easily spots a poisonous variety. Like Kähkönen, Seitamo is quiet and reserved. But he seems excited to be gathering ingredients, and relaxed by this time outside of the kitchen. We spend six hours picking berries and mushrooms before driving back.

In the kitchen the next day, Seitamo brushes off the dirt and washes our two buckets of mushrooms. He prepares lingonberry syrup by mixing fresh berries with a generous portion of sugar. Next, he starts the mushroom-pickling process by sealing them in a bag with vinegar, sugar, water, salt, mustard seeds, rosemary, and bay leaf. The fermenting took days back when he used jars. Now, vacuum-sealing the mushrooms makes the process almost instant. As he pickles, Seitamo reminisces about how his grandmother pickled mushrooms and berries and left food outside in the cold. Although they’ve been replaced by refrigerators, many apartments and homes still have outdoor potato-storage areas.

Seitamo and Kähkönen are friends, distant relatives, and collaborators in the kitchen. Soon, Kähkönen arrives with a tray of homegrown Lappish potatoes and a pot of boiled moose tongue from yesterday’s hunt. The two work harmoniously, one preparing vegetables while the other slices and smokes the moose tongue. They plate the tongue slices with Lappish potato salad, pickled mushrooms, and lingonberry syrup. For the entree, Seitamo and Kähkönen cook moose filet in their charcoal oven, a common Finnish cooking method. If the weather were better, they’d do this in the forest, the way they and other locals have cooked their whole lives.

The chefs are excited to share this meal with me. They didn’t think the hunt would succeed this early in moose-hunting season, and they’re proud to share food they completely gathered themselves. Over the coming months, they’ll keep gathering and hunting to ensure their restaurant fridges are equipped for tourist season in the winter.

Reindeer Herder Irene Kangasniemi

When Irene Kangasniemi shows me her freezers in early September, the berry one is full with raspberries, lingonberries, rovenberries, bilberries, and cloudberries, with just enough room available for her winter cranberry collection. Her fish one is half full, since her husband just returned from a fishing expedition with white and perch fish. Her meat freezers contain only a few bags of moose and reindeer meat, vacuum-sealed and labeled in marker. In October, though, Kangasniemi and other members of the Reindeer Herder Association will slaughter a portion of their herd, and she’ll fill these last two of her five freezers.

Kangasniemi is an avid cook, interior designer, and reindeer herder who lives mostly off the land. She estimates that 90 percent of her food comes from the forest—she buys only coffee, salt, butter, and a few other staples at the store. Her husband Ari built their home.

“We don’t hunt for sport, but for food and survival,” says Kangasniemi. Dressed in Finnish clothing and Chanel glasses, she explains that her husband fishes across the Arctic, her relatives hunt, and she spends six months a year collecting food for her family. Sometimes she gathers berries at midnight, since it’s no different than being outside in the afternoon during summer’s longest days.

Currently, she has around 45 kilos of cloudberries and bilberries frozen in Tupperware, a fraction of which she’ll make into juice and jam. Berries are an important vitamin source, since access to vegetables is rare. When I ask if they eat greens, Kangasniemi smirks and replies, “Excuse me, we don’t eat anything green since they don’t grow here.”

The family’s most important asset, though, is the herd. Kangasniemi won’t say how many reindeer they own, because that’s “like telling someone how much money you have.” The herd is semi-wild, and taken care of by a nomadic herder who travels with them.

“Killing animals for food is our life,” she says. “Buying meat at the grocery store is difficult and weird. I have my own reindeer. I only eat beef when I am at a restaurant.”

Kangasniemi takes out a vintage Arctic cuisine cookbook, Lapin Klokia. She shows me recipes of bear claw, reindeer pâté en croûte, and reindeer-milk ice cream, which was once made and stored in the stomach of reindeer. Vegetables are scarce; game is abundant.

She’s proud of these foods, but she worries that climate change will erode these traditions. An unusually warm summer affected the reindeer’s migration, as they travel to find and eat lichen, which is particularly susceptible to climate change. It’s also led to berries rotting in the forest more quickly. She fears that she’ll need to rely more on stores, even though, like most locals, she questions the point of purchasing berries and other ingredients that she can gather for free while enjoying nature.

In the market for a roller coaster? Here's your chance.

In June, after 47 years of laughter and screams, the Heritage Square Amusement Park in Golden, Colorado had its final ride. On Friday, October 25, its entire contents—from a Ferris wheel, to a roller coaster, to the dizzying Tilt-a-Whirl—are being auctioned off to the public on-site.

A 30-minute drive from Denver, Heritage Square was a Gold Rush-themed, free-admission family destination complete with artisan shops, a wedding chapel, a music hall, and the second alpine slide ever built in North America. (That’s a long chute on the side of a hill with wheeled carts sliding down it.) The park’s architecture was inspired by Storybrook design, a craggy fairytale style that incorporates playful distortions and forced perspective to make downsized models look like real buildings.

According to Norton Auctioneers’ brochure, bidders at next week’s sale of a “COMPLETE AMUSEMENT PARK,” can buy rides built as far back as 1963, along with a 1980 “space shuttle,” a 1993 spinning teacup ride, and nine swan paddle boats—eight white, one black. And in true arcade game fashion, it’s wise to have a solid wad of cash to play, as the auction prefers cash paid in full on the day of. But don’t worry: buyers of the park’s largest items will have additional time to transport their casual new Ferris wheel away in something other than a sedan.

If you’d like a piece of the park but can’t quite incorporate a swan boat or two into your lifestyle, the auction also boasts the sale of a chili cheese dispenser, soft-serve machines, metal gazebos, cash registers, round (or square) trash cans, and a 36-hole mini golf set up for your backyard.

For those who grew up visiting the park, the purchase of a genuine Heritage Square trash can may evoke fond memories. Denver native Cindy Leibman remembers the rocky, sepia-toned vistas surrounding the park. “My favorite thing in the ‘80s was watching fireworks from the hillside above Heritage Square,” she says. “You could hike pretty close to the slide and see fireworks over the whole city.”

Jon Robbins, another Denverite who spent a childhood within Heritage Square’s city limits, says the park’s intentionally vintage prospector theme was somewhat frustrating for a kid: “I remember hating the old-timey pictures my family would force me to do. They’re popular in a lot of places throughout America, but those pictures are a constant reminder of Heritage Square, for better or for worse.” Conversely, the Alpine Slide, which winds haphazardly through hills that once hid gold, seems to be a unanimous crowd favorite. “The Alpine Slide sticks in my memory the most,” says Robbins. “I loved it so much. I remember every drive up the I-70 I could see the tracks zig-zag across the mountain face and I couldn’t wait to get on the terribly slow and old ski lift that took you to the top.”

Over the years, various parts of Heritage Square closed in waves: 2015 marked the end of the Alpine Slide and the Old West-themed town just beyond it; next, Miner’s Maze and the village church were moved to a new location; and on June 30 of this year, the amusement park attractions stopped running. Once the rides and other fixtures are sold off, says Alan Bader, the amusement park’s operator of 20 years, “the history of Heritage Square will be kept alive by the memories and the pictures that cannot be taken away.”

Atlas Obscura readers share the destinations they just can't quit.

Welcome back! Recently, we asked Atlas Obscura readers to tell us about the places they can't stay away from. These are the destinations you keep returning to whenever you have the chance, despite the obvious appeal of using that time to go somewhere new. We wanted to hear about why some places continue to call to you over and over, and you came back with some truly incredible, inspirational stories.

Cities, islands, and mountains have all become travel touchstones for many of our readers. One of you has been visiting the same crumbling dam every time you see your family, and several of you wrote eloquently about the natural wonders of Yellowstone National Park.

A selection of some of our other favorite responses can be found below. If you don't already have a place like this in your life, these stories might just inspire you to keep looking.

Yellowstone National Park

“Being in Yellowstone National Park (YNP) is a religious experience. I don't believe in deities but I do believe in the power of nature to refresh and comfort. YNP bubbles with water—hot and cold—and it runs in gurgling channels and rocky streams, out of seething springs and gushing geysers; chuckling, roaring, and crashing down off the Continental Divide into big rivers that drain the backbone of the West. Water is everywhere in the park and it sparkles and scintillates. [...] The entire Park lives and breathes, rising, falling and shaking as the magma beneath moves into the country rock. I go to this place every autumn, to watch the russet grasses move in the wind, to hear the elk call across the moonlit miles, to smell the fragrant steam rising from the springs, to feel the spray from an erupting geyser and to feel close to the Earth in a way that is impossible anywhere else. No, I don't believe in deities, but Yellowstone is my church, where I go to worship the elements of Earth, Water, Air, and Fire.” — Cindy Rose, Wyoming

Daunt Books

London, England

“I always feel safe and relaxed whenever I go there. It keeps expanding its book collection.” — Manar Altammar, Kuwait City, Kuwait

Berkeley Springs State Park

Berkeley Springs, West Virginia

“It's an in-between point between where I live and my parent's home. I stop there to take a break from driving. In the summer I dip my feet in the spring water. All year, I walk up the stairs to view the castle on the hill and look down at the park. I fill up my water bottles with spring water.” — Elizabeth, Culpeper, Virginia

Cumberland Falls

Kentucky

"The power of the water. The beauty of the Earth. Not only is the area breathtakingly beautiful, but it is a wonderful teaching tool. There are countless examples of erosion and how powerless we are in the face of time. There is also a great little gift shop with fun trinkets. My first time there I was around 7 years old. I thought it looked like a giant chocolate milk waterfall. Now, as an adult, I take my two daughters.” —Tiffany West, Somerset, Kentucky

The Dolomites

Northeastern Italy

“The most stunning (literally weeping-it’s-so-unbelievably-breathtaking) mountain landscapes, the sheer amount of possible activities, including hiking on the countless trails of varying difficulty; rowing a boat on Lago di Braies; paragliding from one of the lookout points; window shopping in one of the many small pedestrian-only towns; or just sitting outside at a mountainside restaurant with a glass of wine and incredible regional food. I would move there in a second.” — Kevin, New York City, New York

Martha’s Vineyard

Massachusetts

“The air feels different there. I can relax on Martha’s Vineyard in a way that I can't in other places. I love how dynamic the ocean is. It’s ever present, but always changing. I love the relaxed, excited, gearing-up-for-summer vibe when we visit (we like to go in late June before the traffic gets crazy). I love to visit the places there that are special to me, remember other times I’ve visited, and imagine future trips as well. My heart is there!” — Amy Wyman, New Hampshire

Frederik Meijer Gardens

Grand Rapids, Michigan

“Sometimes I go more for the plants, sometimes more for the art. Amazing special exhibits and events. Although it is always changing, I never fail to come away with a sense of peace and happiness.” — Julie Parker, Howell, Michigan

Block Island

Rhode Island

“I keep going back to Block Island for its natural beauty, its simplicity, its friendly sense of community, and most importantly, for the nostalgia. Block Island was the location of my family's summer vacation for years when I was a child/young teen, so going back to Block Island always feels like going home. From the moment I step foot on the island, I'm reminded of simpler, very happy times. What I like most about Block Island is that it barely changes. It is virtually untouched by commercialism and the same families return year after year, frequenting the same locally-owned shops and restaurants that have been open for decades. The most change I've seen is to the beaches, especially Mansion Beach, where erosion has become obvious.” — Julie M., New Haven, Connecticut

Tokyo

Japan

“There is something about Tokyo that is different from other large cities in the world like London, Paris, New York, or Seoul. No matter how many times you go there, there will always be something new to discover, yet you can keep going back to the same familiar places. Why do I keep going back? Tokyo to me has an effect no other city has. It can give me the feeling of falling in love for the first time, over and over and over again.” — Andrew, Toronto, Canada

Sky Meadow

Danby, Vermont

“I grew up a little ways down the hill in a house my parents sold this summer. It’s a beautiful spot, peaceful and calm, and you can see FOREVER. I would go there when I was upset or needed a break or even in good times, when I just needed a moment of quiet. There's a little house I always dreamed of owning, and about 15 years ago they built a bigger one (that I still think looks out of place, and I despise it). It’s a reminder that things change and that I literally can't ever go 'home' again, but home is still there.” — Caitlin, Denver, Colorado

An Old Dam at the Mouth of Lake Coeur d'Alene

Idaho

“When I would go visit my folks at Pend Oreille Lake, I would need to get away. So I explored around and found this place. The next year I came back was when my mother died. I would walk the trails and think about our family's lives together and how change was inevitable. Last time I saw it, they had equipment there to possibly remove it.” — Cherry Rice, Ketchikan, Alaska

Good Harbor Bay Beach

Cedar, Michigan

"I have been visiting Good Harbor Bay Beach in Sleeping Bear Dunes for over 30 years. I love it because every time I go there, it’s the same, anchored by massive dunes and wide-open skies, yet it’s also different, changing with the daylight, the seasons, the years. From my bedroom window at home in Chicago, I can see 27 other peoples’ backyards. On the beach at Good Harbor, I see only sand, sky, water, and trees. It’s a place to explore, reflect, and just breath.” — Kate Murphy, Chicago, Illinois

Sanlúcar de Barrameda

Spain

“It’s a very special town. It’s the location of the start and end of the first circumnavigation of the world, and a wine is produced here which can only be made in this tiny town. This town stood up to Franco. The shrimp in the tidal river estuary are genetically unique from shrimp anywhere else in the world. It’s also next to Europe’s largest national park. Sanlúcar observes a three-hour siesta each day, is unapologetically Andalucian, and has a socialist spirit of resistance!” — Annette Fisher, Lilongwe, Malawi

Antikythera

Greece

"I keep returning because it is breathtakingly, wildly beautiful and it's the only place in the whole world where I feel completely safe. Nobody locks their doors, cars are left with the key in the ignition. If you drop or lose something, you are sure to find it later in the one shop in the village, because someone will have brought it in. The locals have become like family to me, and the moments at the tiny harbor each time I arrive or leave are precious, because everyone who can will come to greet me, or see me off. Coming from a family of immigrants, I find this sense of belonging deeply comforting, especially as the locals are immigrants themselves, all originally hailing from Crete in the 19th century. There is a sense of sadness and urgency too, as it is undeniably a dying community. So unlike other destinations, you don't have the feeling that you can 'go another time' and not find the community changed. Nature is reclaiming the landscape, and the locals are outmatched. Evidence of ancient life lies silently in the hard, resilient soil, birds fly above as they have done for thousands of years. I cannot resist the pull every spring and autumn, however hard I try sometimes. It is the only place where my soul can breathe easily.” — Angie Athanassiades, Athens, Greece

Capitol Reef National Park

Utah

“I don’t know. It feeds my soul somehow. It’s vast, stark, quiet, stunningly beautiful high desert.” — Debra Crosby, Austin, Texas

Glacier National Park

Montana

“My family is from the Blackfeet Reservation which is right next to the park. I have been traveling there since I was a small child. To me it is home, and I feel my ancestors when there. I am forever in awe of the sheer beauty of the place, and how small and insignificant I feel when there. Everywhere you look is another natural wonder. It has changed over the years with the loss of many of the glaciers, but it's still the most beautiful place in the world.” — Mickey Kunnary, Helena, Montana

Mackinac Island

Michigan

"There's something about being surrounded by water that is peaceful and calm. Sure, there are throngs of tourists, but off the beaten path there is magic and serene beauty on the miles and miles of trails. Every time I go, I discover something new and different that I'd not noticed before. On an island where motor vehicles are not allowed, the gentle clip-clop of the horse hooves brings unimaginable tranquility to help ease a stressed soul.” — Claudia, Michigan

British Museum

London

“Years ago I accidentally got into one of the British Museum's cellars, and there, on an old, dilapidated, wheeled trundle and looking very forlorn, was this wonderful statue of a lion. He looked so sad! I stopped and chatted with him for a while, told him how handsome he was, and took many photos (hard copy, since this was before iPhones), until I was discovered and shooed out by a guard. Not long after, the British Museum undertook the remodel and installation of the rotunda. The museum was closed for what seemed like forever. But eventually it reopened. I returned to London and of course my first stop was the British Museum. I ran up to the guard at the main entrance, pulled out a photo and asked breathlessly, ‘Have you seen this lion?’ With true British cool, he replied, ‘Yes, madam. If you will go through that door into the rotunda and look to your left, you will see him.’ And there he was, not on a lowly trundle anymore, but on a magnificent plinth, looking very regal. I've been back many times since (and will be returning this November, in fact) and each time I greet him and photograph him.” — Sandra Sizer, Boston, Massachusetts

Mineral King

California

“We found it by accident and fell in love. We spent our honeymoon there and have gone there every year for 21 years. You take a one-lane road up 24 miles to about 8,000 feet, and it takes two hours to drive those 24 miles. When you get there, it's absolute heaven. Hardly any people, no stop lights, no internet, and until recently, no electricity! You're surrounded by giant sequoias and redwoods, glaciers, mountain streams, and wildlife. It's the only place in the world where I can actually nap!” — Jennifer Jesperson, North Hollywood, California

Tucson

Arizona

“The desert, mountains, and saguaros speak to my spirit, refreshing my mind and body. I feel cleansed after exploring Tucson and the surrounding areas. The sky at night is as enormous and breathtaking as any place I have yet to travel.” — Victoria Whitman, Oakland, California

The Cotswolds

United Kingdom

“The quaintness is breathtaking. Thatched roof cottages, cobblestone streets, market squares, wearing ‘wellies,’ walking the Cotswold Way, bangers and mash, bubble and squeak, fish and chips.. The list, and the draw, is endless!” — Ivan, Scottsdale, Arizona

The Flatiron Building

New York City

“I'm (irrationally?) obsessed with the Flatiron Building. I always go there when I'm in New York City and do a 'laying on of the hands,' which gives me strength until the next time I'm there.” — Frank Francisconi, New London, Connecticut

Hanauma Bay

Oʻahu, Hawaii

"I feel very lucky in the fact that I have been visiting Hawaii since I was 5. But I first visited Hanauma Bay with my family when I was about 11 years old. It was white sand, and glorious snorkeling with sea turtles, and a vibrant fish population which looked like tiny neon colors floating all around you as you swam in the water. The sky and ocean seemed to meet there in that magical place. In the years since, the crowds have gotten considerably larger and more touristy. But I have always seen it idealized in my mind. This transcendent place, filled with color and beauty which made the beaches back home seem almost sad. And as I traveled to more distant locations in my adulthood, I can agree that there are beaches just as beautiful and less crowded. However, I think places like these are like falling in love. It becomes a part of you and all the others after this are compared to it, and they fall short because nothing can come close enough to your heart. I keep coming back to this place 20+ years later because I simply fell in love with it, and it feels like home.” — Veronica Ng, Palo Alto, California

The Spaulding Library

Athens, Pennsylvania

“I could walk to the library when I was a kid, and my mom (an English teacher at the local high school) didn't restrict my reading, so I could truly adventure when I was there. On the second floor was a museum of sorts, with ceremonial Iroquois leathers and headdress, and there was a dumbwaiter that moved books between floors. The facade had huge stone columns, and it was THE grandest building in town. I travel for work to an area several hours north, but I drive rather than fly just so I can stop in every year or two.” — Lee Anne, Vienna, Virginia

The Riverboat Graveyard

Dawson City, Yukon Territory

“It is, for me, a peaceful and reflective place. Although it is mostly in ruins, they whisper stories if you care to listen. And if you can find yourself in some remote nook, it is as though the mists of time part for a seemingly infinite split second. One time I even spent a night on the deck of one of the sleeping giants. I can't say I slept, but I feel I had one of those life-shifting moments, what with the combination of the history at my back and the unrestricted flow of the cosmos overhead. Intense, extremely personal, and otherwise indescribable!” — Doug Frechette, Wetaskiwin, Alberta

Calicut

India

“Everything about the place makes one feel warm and comforted. It has the beach where my dad taught me how to swim. Other than that amazing memory, there's this restaurant that I visit every time, where they give patrons warm water and heated plates prior to serving the food, and holding those warm plates makes one feel ultra cozy. Like the favored grandchild at Christmas! The winding mud paths and overhanging branches of trees and the slow pace of life never fail to evoke a pensive state of mind. It's a perfect place for dreamers and writers and philosophers. I'm not even from a beach town, but no matter where you're from, coming here can feel like coming home." — Karen R., India

The fried fish was introduced by Jews fleeing religious persecution.

The powerful pairing of fish and chips has long been considered a British staple. Dubbed “the undisputed national dish of Great Britain” by the National Federation of Fish Friers, it’s been enjoyed on the island for over a century, with an estimated 35,000 chip shops in business by 1935. During World War II, Winston Churchill exempted the beloved dish from rationing. Today, “Fish & Chip Friday” is a weekly ritual for Brits ringing in the weekend.

Fish and chips's origin story, however, is a bit more complex than this nationalist sentiment might imply.

As told by Simon Majumdar in his podcast, Eat My Globe, it all began outside of the U.K., hundreds of years ago. From the 8th to the 12th century, Jews, Muslims, and Christians lived in relative peace in Portugal, known as Al-Andalus under Moorish rule. Sephardic Jews, who likely comprised around 20 percent of the population, were relatively well-respected and held positions in the high court. For this reason, the area became somewhat of a haven for those fleeing the Spanish Inquisition. However, in 1496, after the end of Moorish rule, King Manuel I married Isabel of Spain, who was not so aligned with the idea of religious freedom. Her ultimatum: Their betrothal would mean the expulsion of Jews from Portugal. Manuel I mandated that all Jews be baptized, or otherwise expelled.

While many fled, some Jews stayed, and either converted to Christianity or pretended to do so. Marranos, also referred to as “Crypto-Jews,” continued to practice Judaism in secret. But when Portugal fell under Spanish rule, the Inquisition targeted individuals with Jewish lineage, threatening anyone claiming to be a Converso. As religious violence worsened, many fled Portugal and resettled in England, bringing with them culinary treasures founded in Sephardic cuisine—including fish.

Peshkado frito (in Andalusian dialect, pescaíto frito) was one of them. The dish of white fish, typically cod or haddock, fried in a thin coat of flour, was a favorite particularly among Portuguese Marranos, who fried it on Friday nights to prepare for the Sabbath, as the Mosaic laws prohibited cooking. Allegedly, the batter preserved the fish so it could be eaten cold, and without sacrificing too much flavor, the following day.

It was a hit. Fish prepared “in the Jewish manner” was sold on the streets of London on any given day. And at the end of the week, eating fish on Friday was a part of religious observance for Jews and Christians alike—as "fish fasting" to avoid consuming warm-blooded animals has been a part of the Catholic tradition for centuries.

But the Friday-night tradition was likely chipless until the late-19th century. The general popularity of the potato bloomed late in Europe, and it wasn’t until the late 1800s that the tuber was accepted, due especially to the promotional efforts of a French scientist. Though there are several theories of how the potato came to England—and how it became the “chip” we know and love today—one historical account credits a tripe vendor by the name of Mrs. "Granny" Duce with selling the first fried cut potatoes to the public.

There are also competing theories about who created the pairing of, as Churchill called them, “good companions.” Most trace it back to the early 1860s, when Joseph Malins, a Jewish immigrant, opened up a fish and chips shop in London. Others point to John Lee, a man living outside of Manchester, who ran a “chipped potato” restaurant that sold the beloved pairing.

Whether the winning combo was first slapped together by John or Joseph or someone else entirely, it soon became everybody’s dish. British natives and immigrants alike began slathering their cod in batter and frying up husky chips. Industrialization in the 19th and early 20th centuries launched the fish dish to even greater heights, as it became a favorite for factory and mill workers in London and beyond. And while its religious connotations are hidden today, many admirers remain devoted to the beloved international, national dish.

A new book collects fantastic literary geographies.

One of life’s great treats, for a lover of books (especially fantasy books), is to open a cover to find a map secreted inside and filled with the details of a land about to be discovered. A writer’s map hints at a fully imagined world, and at the beginning of a book, it’s a promise. In the middle of a book, it’s a touchstone and a guide. And at the end, it’s a reminder of all the places the story has taken you.

A new book, The Writer’s Map, contains dozens of the magical maps writers have drawn or that have been made by others to illustrate the places they’ve created. “All maps are products of human imagination,” writes Huw Lewis-Jones, the book’s editor. “For some writers making a map is absolutely central to the craft of shaping and telling their tale.”

The book includes the map from Thomas More’s Utopia, which when published in 1516 contained the first fantasy map in a work of fiction, as far as anyone can tell. The book also has the maps that were the objects of obsession of many a fantasy-filled childhood: Middle Earth, the mysterious Narnia, the Hundred Acre Wood, the roads Milo explores in The Phantom Tollbooth.

But there are more private treasures here, too: J.R.R. Tolkien’s own sketch of Mordor, on graph paper; C.S. Lewis’s sketches; unpublished maps from the notebooks of David Mitchell, who uses them to help imagine the worlds of his books, such as The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet; Jack Kerouac’s own route in On the Road (a fantasy of a different kind, no less obsessed over).

Among these maps, the one for Treasure Island is a landmark, “one of the most iconic literary maps of all,” Lewis-Jones writes. It comes up more than once in the book's essays, which are written by authors and mapmakers. Robert Louis Stevenson first sketched the map in 1881 as a distraction for his stepson, and a red X marks the spot where the treasure was buried.

That map ignited a cartographic instinct in generations of writers. This is a common experience for map-loving writers—one book’s map begets another. In one essay, Cressida Cowell, the author of How to Train Your Dragon, writes of being inspired by maps drawn by the Brontës as children, “in tiny, beautiful books that were in themselves a fascination, for the writing was as small as if created by mice.”

For many writers, mapmaking is a practical endeavor that pulls them into their own work. “I always draw my way into stories,” writes Abi Elphinstone, the author of the Dreamsnatcher books. “I begin every story I write by drawing a map because it is only when my characters start moving from place to place that a plot unfolds.” Mitchell doesn’t print maps in his books, but he needs them to get through the writing. “If I’m describing a character’s ascent of a mountain, I need to know what he or she will find on the way up,” he writes. But also: Making maps is fun.

Philip Pullman (author of the His Dark Materials books): “Writing is a matter of sullen toil. Drawing is pure joy. Drawing a map to go with a story is messing around, with the added fun of coloring in.”

Mitchell: “As long as I was busy dreaming of topography, I didn’t have to get my hands dirty with the mechanics of plot and character.”

Elphinstone: “It is one of the most liberating and exciting parts of storytelling.”

Mapping does have difficulties. Frances Hardinge, a British children's book writer, explains the problem of having described in her writing an island with an outline that “resembled a bird-headed biped with long fingers.” Her first attempts at mapping the place just looked wrong. “For the record, drawing something that looks like both bird-human hybrid and a plausible landmass is a lot harder than you might think,” she writes.

Sometimes, Hardinge writes, the worlds she dreams up are “unmappable.” But even such stories create maps in readers’ heads. “Imaginary places can offer us new kinds of discovery,” writes Lewis-Jones. A map helps shape a reader's or a writer's idea of a fictional place, but ultimately its boundaries are limited only by their joint imaginations.

What we know (and what we don't) about the Jehol Biota.

When something dies, nature ensures that its remains won’t stay intact. Microbes eat away at the soft tissue, and wind, rain, rivers, oceans, and scavengers shuffle around the hard segments of the corpse. As eons pass by, these skeletal segments may become fossilized, but they remain broken jigsaw pieces of a puzzle that often cannot be entirely pieced back together.

But around 130 to 120 million years ago, in what is now northeastern China, nature behaved rather differently. It was then, during the early Cretaceous, that a series of cataclysmic events took place, ensuring that a vast collection of plants and animals, including plenty of dinosaurs, were left in much the same state they were in when they were alive.

These often fully or at least partly joined-up fossilized skeletons looked like they had been frozen in time. Many of them still retained soft tissues, from muscles to skin. The remarkable state of preservation at this location, officially known as the Jehol Biota, led to some researchers and journalists to dub the site the “Chinese Pompeii.”

However, the true story behind this fossiliferous trove, which spans 10 million years, is more complex than this striking moniker would lead you to believe. Even today, experts still aren’t completely sure what produced one of the most important paleontological sites on Earth.

Historical records are vague about the date when these important fossil beds were first discovered. But we do know that during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, they caught the attention of a few fossil collectors.

It was, however, a series of major papers, including several published in Nature and Science in the 1990s, that garnered the site wider attention from the scientific world. The papers carefully described the contents of the rock layers, and revealed a number of amazing fossils. The layers have since been found to contain thousands of individual species, including fishes, frogs, turtles, birds, non-avian dinosaurs, pterosaurs, salamanders, plants, mammals, insects, and more.

Thanks to geological clues left within the fossil beds, it was established that these organisms lived in a lush, temperate, jungle-like or heavily forested area by a series of lakes. This extremely biodiverse environment may have disappeared into the annals of geological history, but these rock layers offer paleontologists a glimpse of what used to be.

This collection of life revolutionized paleontology. Dinosaur hunters, in particular, were thrilled: The plethora of feathers and bone structures clearly supported the building consensus that birds evolved from older dinosaurs. Not only that, but preserved melanosomes—organelles that produce pigments—allowed scientists to work out what color dinosaurian feathers were for the very first time.

“The feathered dinosaurs are, hands down, the most important dinosaur fossils found during my lifetime,” says Steve Brusatte, a vertebrate paleontologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Edinburgh. “And that's all because of the exquisite preservation—having not only bones, but feathers, and gorgeously detailed feathers at that.”

He describes Zhenyuanlong suni, a new raptor that he helped identify in 2015, as his “all-time favorite,” the most beautiful fossil he has ever had the privilege to study. Its chocolate-brown bones prominently stand out from the surrounding rock, as do the halo of feathers found across the body, including the quill feathers on the wing-like arms. “When you look at this dinosaur, you see a bird,” he says.

For those fascinated by the Jehol Biota, the question, of course, is how in the world were these fossils so well preserved? Preservation largely comes down to the environment in which the animals or plants died, and that information can be teased out of the sediments in which the fossils are encased.

It was discovered that much of the Yixian and Jiufotang Formations—two of the three rock formations containing the Jehol Biota—were lakebed deposits. Clearly, many of the animals were entombed at the bottom of prehistoric lakes.

Strangely, there were plenty of terrestrial animals found within these lakebeds, suggesting that powerful forces brought these outsiders to their final resting places. As it happens, these lakebed layers are interspersed with volcanic deposits, indicating that volcanic activity was a prominent feature of the region.

Some researchers suspected lahars could be the killers. These are volcanic mudflows: When pre-deposited volcanic ash and debris are rained on, they can move considerable distances as rapid, cold, concrete-like slurries that pick up everything else they run into, including dinosaurs. Others pointed to the coiled-up poses of some creatures, and suggested that toxic volcanic gases, perhaps released from the lakes, suffocated the animals. They were then buried at a later date by fine ash.

Then, in 2014, a blockbuster paper turned up in Nature Communications with a bold idea: What if pyroclastic flows were to blame? These mixtures of ash, lava chunks, and gas, generated by varying types of explosive volcanic activity, can be 700°C (1,300°F) and move at speeds of 80 kilometers (50 miles) per hour.

A team led by Baoyu Jiang, a professor of paleontology and stratigraphy at Nanjing University, looked at 14 fossils taken from the ancient lakebed rock layers of the Jehol beds. The researchers found that plenty of the sediments containing fossils were rich in volcanic components, likely representing the animals’ burial in volcanic ash.

They also noted that there appeared to be black streaks on the bones of these animals, as well as intricate cracks. To them, this indicated that the animals had been charred. In fact, they write that this damage was “comparable to features from victims at Pompeii and nearby archaeological sites caught in PDCs from the 79 AD eruption of Mt. Vesuvius.”

PDCs (pyroclastic density currents) take several forms, but the most common type is pyroclastic flows. Pyroclastic surges, also common, are slightly cooler, gassier versions of flows.

The effects of encountering both are usually the same. Anyone hit by these will experience extreme heat shock, leading to rapid organ failure. Their muscles will suddenly contract, putting them in curled up positions known as pugilistic poses. Water in the body will rapidly boil, including in the brain, which can cause the skull to explode. Those not impacted by the heat would asphyxiate due to the cocktail of unleashed toxic gases and clouds of ash. Death is often quick, but gruesome.

Jiang’s team suspects that these lethal flows killed the animals. At the same time, the researchers suggest that the fine-grained volcanic ash formed molds around their remains, encapsulating them and shielding them from scavengers and normal processes of decay. This theory seeks to explain the deaths and preservation quality, but how did so many different types of animals—from birds to salamanders, pterosaurs to dinosaurs—all end up in the lakes? The answer, they suggest, is that the pyroclastic flows were widespread enough to sweep up not just life living alongside the lake, but life far from its edges.

Their theory, which they tentatively apply to much of the terrestrial Jehol Biota, seemed to elegantly solve several mysteries. A separate team, however, suspected this was a little too good to be true. Writing a year later in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, a different group of researchers, including Mike Benton, professor of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Bristol, took a closer look at one section of the Yixian Formation and came to a very different conclusion.

Named after the closest village, the Lujiatun Unit features particularly exceptional fossil preservation. Volcanic material dominates the unit, not lake-borne sediments. This team’s field and laboratory assessment indicated that the unit was in fact the upper part of a floodplain. The sediments here were certainly provided by volcanic eruption features—including lahars, pyroclastic flows, and ash fallout—but intense rainfall generated flooding that moved them around after they were initially deposited.

These multiple, colossal, gloopy, sheet-like floods were able to transport and preserve—and possibly kill—the creatures found trapped and fossilized inside the unit. There isn’t necessarily any evidence that volcanic eruptions, or pyroclastic flows, were directly involved here in the fossilization process here.

Sure, it’s likely that a handful of deaths in the area back then would be linked to volcanic events, from PDCs to lahars. Lujiatun is also just one unit, and so cannot be directly compared to the other fossil-rich lakebed units looked at by Jiang’s team in the 2014 paper. Indeed, Jiang says that he stands by his study’s conclusions: He doesn’t doubt that the Lujiatun Unit represents volcanic debris flows, but that’s quite different from the lakebed deposits that they focused on.

In any case, the 2015 study underscores the importance of very carefully examining the sediment record at each site throughout the Jehol rock layers—a necessity before any sweeping statements about ancient Pompeii-style apocalypses can be made.

“I don’t think the Pompeii-like model is rejected, but we would certainly argue it is unlikely for a couple of reasons,” Benton says. He notes that there’s no convincing evidence in his team’s paper or any other that shows the specimens in any of the layers were scorched by hot ash. If they were, it’s hard to explain why so much organic material of even delicate creatures, such as insects, remained intact. At the same time, the victims of the real Pompeii were indeed buried and preserved, but they weren’t transported.

Pierre-Olivier Antoine, a paleontologist at the University of Montpellier, says both papers can’t be generalized to fit the entire site. Lujiatun can’t be said to represent what always happened throughout the 10 million year time period, and neither can the lakebed deposits.

He is nevertheless “more comfortable” with the 2015 study, which implicates a “wider array of volcano-related events” rather than a solitary type of killer. Asphyxiation through volcanic gas, charring from hot ash, transport from pyroclastic density currents, and flood-driven sediment flows could all be involved.

As of 2018, the question of preservation remains open for debate. The specifics remain uncertain, but as Brusatte notes, “it all seems to be down to the volcanoes.” These creatures, going about their everyday business, were quickly killed and preserved in much the way the humans of that ancient Roman metropolis were, he says.

“It wasn't exactly a Pompeii-style scenario,” he says, “but it wasn't too far off.”

There's a bunch of gross stuff, besides human bodies, hiding under graveyards.

In the central cemetery of Marau, a small city in southern Brazil, squat mausoleums are crowded together like a mess of toy blocks. From the cobbled walks, the cemetery looks clean and well kept. But a couple of years ago, when a team of researchers visited, they noticed a crack in the wall of one of the tombs. Inside was a relatively new corpse, and it was leaking.

A human body is made mostly of water, carbon, and salts, containing calcium, potassium, iron, and other compounds familiar from the back of a vitamin bottle. When a person dies and their body starts to decompose, it transforms into a salty liquid—known as “necroleachate”—made up of about three-fifths water and two-fifths salts and organic compounds. Every 15 or 16 pounds of body weight produces a gallon of leachate, which has a distinct, fishy smell.

In cemeteries, this liquid of decomposition seeps into the ground and, especially in sandy or gravelly soil, can mix with the groundwater below. In Brazil, where it’s hot and humid and torrential, the risks of this happening are particularly high. “I consider cemeteries one of the biggest contamination problems,” says Alcindo Neckel, a geographer at Brazil’s Faculdade Meridional, who led the study of the Marau cemetery.

For millennia, groups of people have set aside special places to inter their dead, but as the world’s population has grown, so have the problems with concentrating dead bodies in this way. “Cemeteries can be regarded as special kinds of landfills,” the World Health Organization wrote in a 1998 report, and, like any landfill, they come with pollution risks. There have been few comprehensive studies of their environmental hazards, but in some cases—a cemetery that keeps flooding, for instance—the dangers of contamination are clear. With cemeteries sometimes converted into parks and playgrounds, or surrounded by dense development, environmental scientists are increasingly trying to understand the real dangers hidden in cemetery grounds.

In any place where we bury bodies, the soil will be different from the surrounding land, and those underground signatures can last for hundreds, even thousands, of years. Some researchers have a name for cemetery soils—“necrosols”—and they can carry higher concentrations of nutrients than the surrounding areas. Far more alarming are the microbes that soil can contain.

Back in the 19th century, there were at least a few documented cases of cemeteries contaminating urban water supplies. Cholera often slipped from dead bodies into drinking water, and in Berlin in the 1860s, people who lived near cemeteries were at higher risk of contracting typhoid fever. In Paris, the water near cemeteries might have tasted sweet and had that fishy, infected smell.

Modern cemeteries are full of all sorts of other potential contaminants. Every year in the United States, more than 100,000 tons of steel—“enough to rebuild the Golden Gate Bridge,” as a reporter for Modern Farmer noted—are buried in cemeteries, along with wood preservatives, paints, medical devices with radioactive components, zinc, silver, bronze, hip replacements, breast implants, and all the other detritus of human life that we take with us to the grave. Embalming fluids, which once included arsenic, are gradually mixed into the dirt. The formaldehyde used today is a carcinogen. Corpses secrete toxic compounds called putrescine and cadaverine, which are responsible for the off-putting smell of decomposition. Cemeteries are heavily landscaped, too, which means a lot of fertilizer. The varnishes of coffins, the clothing people are buried in, the make-up on their faces—it’s all filled with compounds that, concentrated heavily in one place, can become a hazard.

While human bodies decompose in about a decade, some of these pollutants linger for much longer. Traces of metals, for instance, can persist for many years. "It dilutes over time,” says Matthys Dippenaar, a hydrogeologist at the University of Pretoria, who has been leading a project on the environmental hazards of cemeteries. “But it never disappears.”

The way that cemeteries are sited and designed can exacerbate these issues, his project found. Graves can act like a sieve, providing channels for rain or floodwater to flow into the ground, directly through the highest concentrations of contaminants. Or the presence of a cemetery can lead to erosion, which sloughs the buried pollutants off into nearby water sources. Often cemeteries are located in flood-prone areas, close to wells, or in sensitive places, because as a form land use and compared to activities like housing and industry, Dippenaar says, “a cemetery is often wrongly considered to be the lowest risk."

From a public health perspective, the contamination that poses the highest risk is the pathogens. “Historically, people have assumed if you put formaldehyde in the body, then you know the pathogens would die off,” says microbiologist Eunice Ubomba-Jaswa, a water resources quality manager at the South African Water Research Commission, and one of Dippenaar’s collaborators. But studies have found all sorts of microbes thriving in cemetery soil: E. coli, salmonella, C. perfringens (a common cause of foodborne illness), and B. anthracis (which, as its name suggests, carries anthrax). In laboratory simulations of cemetery conditions, Ubomba-Jaswa was surprised to find that E. coli survived the biocide that was supposed to kill them off. In one study, their team found E. coli, including the more dangerous, drug-resistant strains, in water samples from three different cemeteries.

Before we panic about the toxic waste sites in our midst, it's important to remember that in most cases, there is no immediate danger or cause for alarm. But this research shows that cemeteries can be reservoirs for many things that we don't want to live around. And the problem could get worse in the case of a serious disease outbreak, in which the infectious agents could simply cycle through cemeteries and back into the living population.

“It’s a very low probability of a very high risk,” says Dippenaar.

Researchers who study these issues, including Neckel, Dippenaar, and Ubomba-Jaswa, often come to the conclusion that burial is simply an unsustainable way to deal with dead bodies, in the long term. For a cemetery to be naturally secure, “you need the prime land, not the worst land,” says Dippenaar.

It’s not totally obvious what the best alternative is for an environmentally conscious death. Cremation, for instance, has its own environmental impact. But there are plenty of ideas floating around—from vertical cemeteries to mushroom death suits to freezing a body and shaking it to dust.

“The way we live has changed so rapidly, but how we die and how we look at burial has remained quite static over a long period of time,” says Ubomba-Jaswa. "We are changing our lifestyles, with respect to how we live, and that should keep up with how we die.”

For now, anyway.

Enough human beings have walked on the Moon at this point that it’s almost the “visiting the Empire State Building” of space exploration (that's 12, if you're keeping track). But for as many living people who have taken a walk on that far away rock, there is only one dead man who's ever been put to rest there.

To date, the late scientist Eugene Shoemaker is still the only person whose remains have been sent to the Moon. Even casual stargazers are likely to recognize Shoemaker’s name from the famed Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 (which had broken into fragments) that impacted Jupiter in 1994. The comet, which Shoemaker discovered with his wife Carolyn, alongside David Levy, was remarkable because it marked the first time humans were able to witness a first-hand planetary collision. The crash got so much press attention that a small town in Wyoming set up an intergalactic landing strip to welcome any potential refugees from Jupiter, and Shoemaker became a household name.

Shoemaker enjoyed a celebrated career combining his main discipline of geology with more astronomical applications, helping to create the field of planetary science. He studied a number of craters here on Earth, and in the early 1960s, he founded the Astrogeology Research Program within the United States Geological Survey. Shoemaker used his knowledge to train a number of Apollo mission astronauts about what they could expect to find on the surface of the Moon, in terms of terrain.

His fascinating life came to an abrupt end on July 18, 1997, when he died in a car crash while exploring a meteor crater in Australia. But even in death, as it turned out, his journey was far from over.

Enter Celestis, the only company that has—so far—ever successfully conducted memorial spaceflights. “Our first launch was in April of 1997 out of the Canary Islands,” says Charles Chafer, CEO and cofounder of Celestis. “We flew 24 people on what we call the ‘Founder’s Flight.’ Some well-known folks like Timothy Leary and Gene Roddenberry. Also some space-geek folks, like Gerard K. O'Neill, but mostly normal folks.”

Celestis works by securing any extra room on space launches that are already occurring, and sending ashes up as a secondary payload. “I think the term of art these days is ‘rideshare,’” says Chafer. So, if a rocket is set to head into space, and there is a little wiggle room in terms of space and weight, Celestis tries to fill that with remains. Generally, whatever piece of equipment the memorial payload is attached to ends up in Earth's orbit. “Our payload is always attached to something, whether that’s a spacecraft or a spent rocket stage. Things that are small enough that at the end of their orbital lifetime, they burn up completely on reentry,” says Chafer. “Sort of an ashes-to-ashes moment.”

But with Shoemaker it was a little different. A close colleague of Shoemaker’s, Carolyn Porco, had decided to try to finally get the deceased scientist, who had wanted to be an astronaut in life but was disqualified for medical reasons, to the Moon. Luckily, NASA also liked the idea of honoring Shoemaker by getting his ashes all the way to the lunar surface, and they called Celestis. “I got a phone call. A good friend of mine was the chief of staff and legislative liaison for NASA, Ed Heffernan,” says Chafer.

Heffernan asked Chafer if Celestis could work with them to find a way to get some of Shoemaker’s remains to the Moon’s surface, because NASA wasn’t really in the business of burying people. Chafer was interested of course, but he wanted to make sure that this groundbreaking burial would set a precedent for future off-world memorials. “I said, ‘I want it to be a contract that is purchased from us.’ Now, we charged virtually nothing,” says Chafer. “I think we charged them the cost of the capsule that we sent out to Arizona.” Chafer said the capsule cost around $600.

On January 6, 1998, NASA’s Lunar Prospector blasted off for the south pole of the Moon, looking for ice, and carrying an ounce of Shoemaker’s ashes. According to a memorial website set-up by Porco, the ashes were carried in a polycarbonate capsule provided by Celestis. It had been wrapped in a piece of brass foil, laser-etched with his name and life dates over an image of the Hale-Bopp Comet; an image of Arizona’s Meteor Crater, where he had trained the Apollo astronauts; and a quote from Romeo and Juliet. On July 31, 1999, the mission ended when NASA deliberately crashed the craft on the surface of the moon, taking Shoemaker with it, and making him the first and only person to be buried off-world.

It’s taken decades for Celestis to pull off their now 15 missions (not all of which made it to orbit). Luna 1, which is what they called the mission to transport Shoemaker’s remains, is still the only one that has landed remains on a different celestial body.

But according to Chafer, it won’t be the last. “I think we are entering an age of abundance in terms of commercial access to space.” The largest hindrance to space burial is finding a rocket to take even a small amount of remains out into space, but with the rise of independent programs such as SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin,* the number of opportunities to fly those secondary payloads is increasing, meaning that more people will have the opportunity be sent into the cosmos.

Accordingly, a number of competitors have sprung up in recent years offering similar services, though Celestis remains the only company to have actually accomplished a space burial, as of October 2018. But the competition doesn’t bother Chafer. “If there weren’t competition, I’d be worried about the market,” he says. And the market definitely seems to be there, attracting what he calls “geeks, new agers, adventurers, and people who want the biggest send-off ever.” Upcoming planned missions include a lunar burial, and a mission that will attempt to send some remains into deep space.

Eugene Shoemaker might not be all alone on the Moon for very much longer.

* Correction: In a previous version of this article the company Blue Origin was said to be affiliated with Amazon. This has been changed to reflect that it is an independent venture by Jeff Bezos.

This story, which has been updated with minor edits, originally ran on October 24, 2017.

Holy cheeses, wines, and cakes abound.

When it comes to making delicious treats, monks and nuns are no slouches. When we asked Atlas Obscura readers to tell us about their favorite foods made in religious institutions, more than 100 responses poured in. Our readers have feasted on sweets and beer with age-old histories during study-abroad adventures, honeymoons, and family trips. People also wrote in to endorse cherished monastery foods made in their own communities—many of which have shorter histories, but are no less beloved. Both old favorites and new made it into our global monastery foods map.

Throughout the dozens of responses, one common thread was an appreciation for the peaceful atmosphere at these convents and monasteries. At many institutions, the proceeds from sales of sweet or boozy treats funds monastery upkeep and community programs. So, without any guilt, enjoy this heavenly feast provided by the readers of Atlas Obscura.

Pumpkin Bread

The Monastery of the Angels, Los Angeles, California

"The Monastery of the Angels makes the most delicious pumpkin bread. Dense and moist, it's 'ta die for.' They also sell peanut brittle and hand-dipped chocolates. The monastery is really located in Hollywood, just off of very busy Franklin Avenue. It's a sweet place with a chapel for prayer and a gift shop. A lovely respite from the Hollywood craziness. — Leslee Harman, Burbank, California

"The pumpkin bread from the Monastery of the Angels here in Los Angeles is legendary. It's not the pumpkin bread that your grandmother used to make. It's way better." — Joanne, Long Beach, California

Montserrat Monastery Liqueurs

Santa Maria de Montserrat Abbey, Catalonia, Spain

"The monks of Montserrat Monastery in Spain make a liqueur called Aromes de Montserrat liqueur and Licor Ratafia de Montserrat. This was so delicious and sweet, like an elixir, and apparently can't be sent to the United States. It's made with different herbs and spices, like lavender, cinnamon and cloves, etc. We discovered it in 1981 and carried a cask in our suitcase, but never were able to taste it again." — Barbara Ezell, Chicago, Illinois

"One of my coworkers brought back 'airplane bottles' of Montserrat Monastery liqueur as souvenirs. I got the 'herbal' flavored one, and assumed it would taste medicinal. It actually tasted exactly like banana bread! I immediately hopped online to try to buy some more, but as it turns out, the monastery doesn't ship to the United States. I was disappointed, but it seemed appropriate. I'm sure the monks would agree that the best things in life aren't easy to attain!" — Erica S., Herndon, Virginia

Licor Valvanera

Monastery of Our Lady of Valvanera, Anguiano, Spain

"Licor Valvanera is made by Benedictine monks and is very good. I had the pleasure of trying it for the first time in the early 1980s at the monastery, in the company of one of the monks responsible for making it. He refused to divulge anything about the recipe, except to admit it included 'grasses.'" — Jorge Fors, Coral Gables, Florida

Zinnaer Klosterbruder Kräuterlikör

Zinna Abbey, Jüterbog, Germany

"I tried Zinnaer Klosterbruder Kräuterlikör, a bittersweet herbal liqueur at 35 percent alcohol. Zinnaer Klosterbruder originated from the Zinna Abbey, a former Cistercian monastery founded in 1170. The distillate dates back to 1759, when it was produced by innkeeper Johann Christian Falckenthal in nearby Luckenwalde from the recipe of a monk of the Zinna Abbey. As a purveyor of schnapps, and perhaps a bit heartbroken at the time, I was compelled to try the Zinnaer Klosterbruder Kräuterlikör. It has a complex taste, about as distant to a traditional German fruit schnapps as one can get. The recipe includes a number of unspecified herbs, and the story of its origin tells of a man who created the elixir in an act of desperation to sever his broken heart." — Mike Taylor

Candied Almonds

Convento de las Clarisas de San Diego, Alcalá de Henares, Spain

"Almendras garrapiñadas made in Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, Spain at the Convento de las Clarisas. The sweet candy almonds from the convent were one of the best parts of studying abroad in Madrid. My classmates and I would buy some on our way to the university and snack on them in class. You could never buy a box and save it for later; we always ate the whole box in one go." — Megan, St. Cloud, Minnesota

Our Lady of Lourdes French Meat Pies

Our Lady of Lourdes, Minneapolis, Minnesota

"Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, has been making French meat pies since the late 1800s. Made with pork tenderloin, they are sold as well as served to the less fortunate at church dinners. An old, yummy, French-Minnesota tradition." — Amy, Arizona

Buckfast Tonic Wine

Buckfast Abbey, Devon, England

"Buckfast is a drink high in alcohol and caffeine that was originally made by English monks. But, (per Wikipedia), it's 'now made under a license granted by the monastery.' It's strongly associated with loutish, drunken behavior in Scotland, which makes it simultaneously controversial and somewhat ridiculous. Both of these things make Buckfast interesting, given its historical association with some presumably polite and well-meaning monks down in Devon. I loved it when I tried it, more for its effects than its flavor." — Len Epp, Victoria, British Columbia

Trappist Mango Products

Our Lady of the Philippines Trappist Abbey, Guimaras, Philippines

"Dried mangoes, mango biscocho, mango preserves, mango bars. All made from mangoes harvested from the monastery lands and those grown only in the island of Guimaras. Importation of any mango product outside the island is strictly prohibited. This is to protect the island's mangoes from genetic degradation and disease." — Nina Candelario, Visayas, Philippines

Earth-Aged Cheese

Santuario della Madonna del Sangue, Re, Italy

"We were touring the northern Italian countryside by convertible, traversing the switch-back roads up the forested hill when we came upon a small, medieval town at the top of the mountain, high above the clouds. As we entered the town proper, we noticed monks in their habits pulling large wheels (three to four feet in diameter) from the earth in an almost rhythmic toil. We parked at the cloister, wandering about until we found a small storefront with local folks working alongside the monks lifting and cutting the large wheels of cheese on thick, worn cutting tables. The cheese, as we were told, was made from cow’s milk, and the taste was akin to a hard-rind gruyere. It was rich, nutty, with deep earthen notes, and delicious. We purchased a small piece of the wedge⏤a whole wedge being two-feet long, and heavy⏤and then walked through to the basilica." — Michael J.D. Gerrior, Washington D.C.

Red Walnut Buns

City of 10,000 Buddhas, Ukiah, California

"Red walnut buns at the City of 10,000 Buddhas in Ukiah, California. It was the most delicious walnut bun ever. The walnuts came from the trees on the grounds of the temple. The temple was a former insane asylum. Now it’s a peaceful place." — Eveline, Alameda, California

Whoopie Pie Stout

Friars' Brewhouse Tap Room, Bucksport, Maine

"This is a tiny brotherhood of three Franciscan friars, who began as bakers, but added brewing to their production. With a small (two- or three-barrel) system, they don’t produce 1/1000th of the beer that big Trappist monasteries in Belgium brew, but each small batch is measured and milled, mashed and sparged, bottled and labeled by Friar Donald Paul and his two brothers. Brother Donald, who is a descendant of St. Arnold of Metz, the patron saint of beer, makes an especially popular and delicious Whoopie Pie Stout." — Anonymous, Portland, Maine

Cheesecake

Nuns of New Skete, Cambridge, New York

"The cheesecake is so rich and creamy! They ship the cheesecakes all over. Delicious! The property is gorgeous, and retreats are held there year round. There are also monks at the monastery that raise world-renowned German shepherd dogs." — Debra Komar, Verona, New Jersey

"The cheesecakes just melt in your mouth. So rich, so creamy. They also come in a variety of flavors, including alcoholic ones." — Allen Nakagawa, San Francisco, California

"A bite of their cheesecakes (which come in a variety of flavors) will make your eyes roll back into your head!" — Brendan Gerrity, Costa Mesa, California

Kentucky Bourbon Fruitcake

The Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky

"My father-in-law gives one of these fruitcakes to each of his children at Christmas. Nobody in my family, except me, would eat it. Until I got my boys to try some. Now we fight over it. My father-in-law started send fudge for my wife. She and the boys fight over that. This is really, really good stuff." — Gregory Leiby, Greer, South Carolina

"The Abbey of Gethsemani is in rural Kentucky, not too far from Louisville or Lexington. I have never been a fruitcake person, but the Kentucky Bourbon Fruitcake is the only kind that I have truly enjoyed. The community was established in 1848, and I often think how peaceful their lives must be. You can visit and stay if you want some solace." — Scott Toncray, Franklin, Tennessee

"I'd never eaten fruitcake before, possibly due to the its bad reputation. So I was a little leery when it was served. It turned out to be sweet, but not overly, and firm-textured, but not hard-as-a-rock and unctuous, as I had feared. That said, a little goes a long way, so I ate just a few small pieces—and have lived to tell the tale." — David Korn, Columbus, Ohio

Cookies

Convent of St. Isabel la Real, Granada, Spain

"The cookies at the Convent of St. Isabel la Real in Granada, Spain, are incredible, specifically the ones with chocolate in the middle. Granada was beautiful, but seriously, who knew convents have cookies! They were fantastic and had such an interesting process for getting them. [Note: Since the nuns are cloistered, cookies are purchased via a turntable.] So secretive, yet out in the open." — Louise Rose Rothschild, Washington D.C.

Cheese

Abbey of St-Benoit-du-Lac, Eastern Townships, Quebec

"St. Augustine Cheese from Abbey of Saint-Benoît-du-Lac! This is a beautiful abbey in the Eastern Townships of Québec. It is well known for its variety of scrumptious cheeses, wine, and preserves, and the beautiful architecture of the building itself. It is a wonderful experience to walk the grounds, especially with the fall foliage in full flame. It is the perfect mental vacation with a bonus of delicious foods to take home." — Lynda Bathory, Montreal, Quebec

"Nestled in the idyllic Eastern Township of Québec, the Fromagerie de L’Abbaye Saint-Benoît is the only cheese dairy in North America that is run by Benedictine monks. The first cheese created at the Abbey in 1943 was the famed blue Ermite cheese, which is still a celebrated cheese. Aged longer than Ermite, Bleu Bénédictin has a melt-in-the-mouth center and pleasant aftertaste. It retains its natural rind, giving it a wild mushroom aroma and woody flavors. It is absolutely yummy! As a certified sommelier, I love this with a light fruity wine (Gamay grape) like Beaujolais, or a fruity, light lager beer like a Belgian wheat beer." — Brian Preston, Portland, Ontario, Canada

Andechs Monastery Beer and German Cuisine

Andechs Monastery, Bavaria, Germany

"My Dad and I rode bicycles from Lake Starnberg in Bavaria to the Andechs Monastery to try the beer, which the monks have been brewing for hundreds of years. We were amazed when we finally got to the hilltop where the brewery-monastery is found: crowds of locals in lederhosen downing beer by the liter. My Dad drank two liters himself. The beer was wonderful, especially the light summer style weissbier. And the views of the mountains was spectacular. However, besides learning the wonderful history of Andechs, we learned another important lesson that day. If you ride bikes up a Bavarian mountainside to enjoy some beer, it’s especially important to wear a bike helmet. Especially on the way back down!" — Richard Loftus, M.D., Rancho Mirage, California

"The hilltop Andechs Monastery above the Ammersee in Bavaria brews the most wonderful beer, from deliciously malty Hell, a classic Bavarian lager, to richer Bock beers. The beautiful Benedictine monastery also serves typical German cuisine, including a memorable pork knuckle, served rather gruffly. 'Take!' says the barman, as he plonks the food and frothing beer down." — Andrew MacDowall, Paris, France

Pepper Jelly

Holy Wisdom Monastery, Middleton, Wisconsin

"Pepper jelly, made from a variety of peppers from their garden. A unique mix of sweet and hot. I helped grow and pick the peppers on a six-month internship there!" — Diane Ray, Madison, Wisconsin

Mountain Maid Ube Jam

Good Shepherd Convent, Baguio, the Philippines

"It is delicious. The demand is so great that purchases are limited to one bottle per customer." — Juan Luis Faustmann, the Philippines

Sénanque Liqueur

Abbaye de Sénanque, Vaucluse, France

"After visiting the Abbey about 30 years ago, a small shop at the entrance was selling monk-produced items, amongst them a deep green liqueur in liter bottles: Macération de sauge. Meant as a health-reinforcing digestif, it turned out later at my campsite to be a thick, pungent, grassy sage potion that was difficult to get down. Thinking Chartreuse, I had innocently expected something ... well, heavenly. But I think I ended up pouring out the last half of the bottle. My digestive tract would no doubt get along fine without it. The taste of it is nevertheless ingrained in my memories of that spiritual and beautiful Cistercian place." — Bill, Geneva, Switzerland

Kloster Ettal Liqueur

Ettal Abbey, Ettal, Germany

"The green variety is especially appealing: herbal and aromatic. My current wife and I began our relationship after drinking it together on our first date. We call it the 'love elixir.'" —Thomas Hay, Hartsdale, New York

Lérins Abbey Wine

Lérins Abbey, Île Saint-Honorat, France

"Wine cultivated by the monks of Île Saint-Honorat, part of the Lérins islands off the coast of Cannes, France. The monks are from the Lérins Abbey, and they actually own the island. The abbey is where St. Patrick studied to be a monk. Its sister island, Île Sainte-Marguerite, is where the infamous Man in the Iron Mask was imprisoned." — Halley Rose, California

Jam and Abbey Cake

Holy Transfiguration Skete, Keweenaw County

"Abbey cake. It is an amazing fruitcake with a bourbon punch in the face. The quality of ingredients, the skill with which it was made, the peace of the place, the kindness and generosity, and humor and humility of the monks all come through in that cake. Truly wonderful." — Anthony Greenburg, Lansing, Michigan

"Abbey cake made by the monks at the Society of St. John in the Keweenaw Peninsula of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It was a cheesecloth-wrapped, bourbon-soaked reward at the end of a long mountain bike ride. I still think about this cake 20 years later and 10 years into my gluten-free purgatory." — Kristen Lehner, Chicago, Illinois

"Wild berry jam made by the monks of Poorrock Abbey, near Jacob's Falls in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The monks operate a small shop called the Jampot. Everyone refers to them as the Jampot monks. They collect berries and fruit for the jam, and sell homemade breads and pastries. To get to the Jampot, follow M26 north along the Keweenaw Peninsula and the shore of Lake Superior. The domes and spires of the Byzantine Catholic monastery are just visible through the trees, and the monks greet everyone with a smile." — Elizabeth, Drammen, Norway

Cookies and Liqueur

Monastery of Santa Escolástica and the Monastery of Singeverga, Porto, Portugal

"Portugal is a haven for convent pastry. Most of our heritage pastry and desserts came from old convent recipes. Dozens could be named, but the most well-known example is the Portuguese custard pastry, pastel de nata. Presently, most of the convents and monasteries that produced sweets are no longer active, making room for commercial parties. But that isn’t the case of two convents in the north of Portugal. They are both located in the city of Santo Tirso, Porto, and are in fact very close to each other. The first, the Monastery of Santa Escolástica, is inhabited by around 20 enclosed nuns who dedicate their time to producing and selling the best homemade cookies (sablé, coconut, almond) I’ve ever tried. A few miles away is the Monastery of Singeverga, where monks produce and age a spice-laden, aromatic liqueur named Licor de Singeverga." — Bruno Carvalho, Porto, Portugal

Olive Oil

Dominican Sisters of Mission San Jose, Fremont, California

"The nuns make and sell olive oil from the old stand of olive trees on the grounds of Mission San Jose in Fremont, California. It is a very flavorful olive oil that has been made for many decades." — Ernie, Fremont, California

Responses have been edited and condensed for clarity and length.

You know, in case being dead turns out to make you hungry.

Cultures all over the world observe practices that involve leaving food or drink at the graves of loved ones. Specific traditions differ, but it's often the case that mourners will leave comestibles that the deceased particularly enjoyed in life, or that held some special significance to them. We're kicking off Grave Week here at Atlas Obscura, so take a moment to flirt with your own mortality with us—what food or drink would you want people to leave at your grave?

To help inspire you, consider these famous examples: Outside the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, there’s a headstone (pictured above) for a squirrel monkey named Miss Baker, one of the earliest primates to go to space and return alive. To this day, people still place bananas on her grave to honor her space-race sacrifices. And for the better part of a century, a mysterious person (or persons) has left an unfinished bottle of cognac each year at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe in Baltimore. Personally, I think I'd like my loved ones to leave soup at my grave. Any kind would do. Not only do I eat soup on a far-too-regular basis, but I also like the symbolism of bringing warm soup to a cold graveyard.

Whether it’s a special drink that you haven't been able to get enough of in life, or a particular dish that you think would make a fitting offering to your eternal spirit, we want to hear about it! Fill out the form below and tell us what food or drink you’d like left on your grave (and why!), and we’ll publish our favorite answers in an upcoming article. Just because you're dead doesn’t mean you have to go hungry.