Last night's Darwin Dinner (not the Darwin Awards, mind you) at the Aspen Design Summit was a delicious respite and somewhat needed escape from the head-wall banging of heavy concepts peppered with global, social, sustainable, etc.

The four course meal was coordinated by the lovely Peter Hoffman, chef from NYC's Savoy, and Niles Eldredge, master storyteller and resident Darwin expert, who lead us on a journey through Darwin's travels in South America (he accidentally ate the species he was trying to find) and the evolution of dining (raw to grilled to cured to steamed). Eldredge told stories from Darwin's journals while Hoffman explained the menu--which to the delight and disgust of our tablemates included whole roasted squabs, heads, claws and all.

Eldredge curated the Darwin exhibition at the American Natural History Museum--which we hear is a must-see--but says he's been so inspired by this Summit that he's set to write a book about the evolution of simple objects. He personally owns one pretty interesting case study--he has the world's largest collection of coronets.

Ann Willoughby (who we've been design conference-stalking) scooped up all the squab heads she could manage with plans to take them back to Kansas City.

Core77 has a report and squab imagery.