Archives for November 2009
Happy Thanksgiving/Turkey-Call Rap
Via TWC.
Give Thanks to the Gourd
If you live in New England, you gotta try Hood’s Pumpkin Eggnog. Tastes like my pumpkin custard before it becomes ice cream. And only 180 calories per serving!
The Williams-Sonoma Pumpkin Spice Quick Bread is seriously good.
And this Turkey Day, why not serve curried pumpkin soup?
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.
Photo courtesy of A Trip Down South.
This Week in Bacon
Mmm Mmm Mmmvelopes. The geniuses over at J&D’s (makers of bacon salt) have brought us the newest bacon-flavored goodness: bacon-flavored envelopes, aka mmmvelopes. It’s practical and delicious – great for people who love bacon, and hate licking envelopes (in other words, 93% of the meat-eating population). Here’s what the mmmvelope creators had to say:
Technology has given us a lot lately. The car. TV. X-rays. The refrigerator. The Internet. Heck, we even cured polio. But what have our envelopes tasted like for the last 4,000 years? Armpit, that’s what.
Really, people? If we can’t overcome this kind of minor technical challenge, it’s only a matter of time until some super-advanced race of aliens with lasers, spaceships and a delicious federal mail system comes down and colonizes the world. And nobody wants that (except for the aliens, of course).
So, after thousands of years and kajillions of horrible tasting envelopes licked, we’re happy to report that J&D’s Bacon-Flavored Mmmvelopes™ are here to save the day. No longer will envelopes taste like the underside of your car. You can enjoy the taste of delicious bacon instead.
That’s right, bacon. It’s not real bacon, mind you, so you won’t have to start storing your envelopes in the refrigerator. But it really does taste like bacon. Which is what you really wanted in the first place, isn’t it?
And it only took us 4,000 years to get there. Eat that, alien invaders.
Well, after all that, I just have one question. Who uses envelopes anymore?
Vegan Bin Laden Chocolate for the Troops
Nice gesture or a terrible kind of cruelty all its own?:
A chocolatier and longtime People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals supporter is making the special vegan chocolates for the troops after reading about how difficult it was to get chocolate in Afghanistan. The so-called “bin Laden bites” give the troops the chance to bite his head off, a news release from PETA said.
In addition to supporting the troops and protesting the Sept. 11 attacks, PETA said it also wanted to use the chocolates to protest bin Laden’s torture and killing of animals during and in the days following the World Trade Center attacks, when their guardians were killed, leaving the animals to die of dehydration, starvation or exposure to toxic fumes.
Switchin’ Bait
Down on the bayou, shrimp fishermen are picketing local processors who the shrimpers believe are “price-fixing [and] mislabeling imported shrimp as ‘domestic’”:
“Reboxing imports is probably happening, though I don’t have proof,” said Danny Babin, a shrimp processor from Houma, La., who represents processors on a recently empaneled state task force aimed at improving the shrimp industry. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Office of Law Enforcement has been investigating the practice and said “indictments are expected in the near future,” but declined further comment.
Meanwhile a feature in the November ish of Men’s Health described the dirty and often unrefrigerated process in which foreign shrimp are cultivated and handled:
The bacterial menace was highlighted in 2005, when Mississippi State University researchers bought a variety of frozen, ready-to-eat shrimp products that were imported from four different countries. They found 162 different species of bacteria, including E. coli, Salmonella, Staphylococcus, and Vibrio. Many had become resistant to one or more antibiotics.
I don’t lose sleep over dirty food but certainly I will choose — and pay more for — a fresher and cleaner alternative if it’s available. I’d be happy to buy Gulf shrimp. My problem is I can’t find them here in Connecticut, only the ubiquitous Asian tiger prawns.
Fight the power, Louisiana shrimpers, but methinks you’re barking up the wrong tree. However they’ve done it (I’m going to guess through agreements with chain grocery stores), the Asian imports seem to have a corner on the market, at least in New England. My advice: Form your own co-operatives to bypass the processors and negotiate directly with those same chain stores. Nothing can be easier than marketing a clean, green, domestic product in modern America — especially to wealthy Yankees who’ve gone into Whole Foods lately and seen what they charge for arugula.
How Many Calories in the Whole Vending Machine?
Buried deep within the version of the health care bill passed by the House, a provision to require calorie counts on your drive-through board and vending machine buttons:
The provision—Section 2572—requires retail food establishments “part of a chain with 20 or more locations” to list calorie counts “on the menu board including a drive-through board,” as is currently required in New York City and other localities.
A “vending machine operator shall provide a sign in close proximity to each article of food or the selection button” that includes similar data.
Like a letter writer to a bad advice column, Congress can’t resist catchy yet strained acronyms. So the provision in the health care bill combines Sen. Tom Carper’s LEAN Act—Labeling Education and Nutrition—with the MEAL Act—Menu Education and Labeling—sponsored by Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).
Perhaps the Senate will build in an exception for mechanical food service on the Hill, though. After all, no one wants to read the nutrition labels on their hot dog vending machine.
More on menu labeling here.
Via Marshall Smith.
Where Soy Milk Really Comes From
Head Chef and Chief Economist
Daniel Patterson is the chef and co-owner of Coi, a restaurant that San Franscisco foodies love to love. He’s opening a new place in Oakland. In an otherwise non-political interview about his new joint, he hashes out what it’s like to run a restaurant in the ultra-regulated city by the bay and explains how S.F. city supervisors are ruining the upscale neighborhood restaurant.
SFoodie: Would you ever open a restaurant like Coi in Oakland?
Patterson: It would be hard to open a restaurant like Coi in San Francisco today. When Coi’s gone I would be really surprised to see another one like it.Because the economics of fine dining don’t make sense anymore?
I’m sure Thomas Keller could always make it work here. I have 10 people in the kitchen, about a one-to-two ratio of staff to diners. San Francisco has become a very difficult place to have any restaurant, because of the policies that the Board of Supervisors put in place. They didn’t anticipate what would happen with things like the minimum wage increases, with no tip credit. What happens when the minimum wage is $12? Or $15? Product costs keep rising, especially for things like pastured meats and organic vegetables. Rents are still pretty steep. The restaurant model that we all knew no longer exists—the Supervisors took it and crumpled it into a little ball.For us [at Coi], we’re a little bit more protected. I can’t complain — we’ve done fine all through the downturn. I’ve been so grateful and a little bit surprised at how strong the local support has been. But I’m more concerned about neighborhood places, which are the heart and soul of our dining scene. What happens when they all have to charge $30 for a chicken dish? Can they all afford to keep using the best ingredients? Or to have enough staff? There’s going to have to be a fundamental rethinking of how restaurants in San Francisco are run. In the meantime, we’re operating in a no-man’s-land, and I don’t see a clear path out of it.
Via Jason Gollan.
What’s Buzzing in the World of Beer?
Maine lawmakers already looking to amend new law permitting stores to hold beer and wine tastings. Seems one provision in the law–wouldn’t you know it, but it’s “for the children”–has forced store owners “to cover [the] front and back door windows with black and drape a sheet across the large storefront windows” anytime they want to do a tasting. [Bangor Daily News]
One man’s guns for beer program backfires. [Crossville Chronicle]
Texas says you can give away beer, you just can’t tell people you’re going to give it away beforehand. Or something. [Clocking In]
Oh, the humanity! This beer’s “quite putrid”! Lowenbrau from the Hindenburg disaster up for auction. (As an aside, is it really a “disaster” when a Nazi airship covered by swastikas blows up?) [BBC]
Sam Adams brews up a beer with 27% alcohol. Available for a mere $150 per bottle. [Houston Chronicle]
This Week in Bacon
There is really no limit to what you can do with bacon. This much is clear. The latest in creative bacon ideas: bacon candles. Imagine sitting down to a romantic dinner with the aroma of burning bacon fat filling the room. Well, now you don’t have to imagine that anymore:
Rather than oh-so-predictable bacon vodka and bacon chocolate, Rick Gresh, the chef at David Burke’s Primehouse in Chicago, is serving guests bacon candles. The votives are made of rendered bacon fat and a vegetable-based wick, and as they melt, are poured over dry-aged steaks and rare scallops to impart a rich, smoked aroma.
What a wonderful idea — a great way to get a taste of bacon in your scallops or steak, without overwhelming the main dish. Just don’t be tempted to treat the bacon votive like a shot . . . liquid bacon. Mmmmmm.
Orson Welles Outtakes: He Drank No Wine Before Its All The Time
Quick Bites
Sometimes the headline says it all: “Man dressed as Breathalyzer suspected of drunk driving.” [Oxford Press]
There’s more than one way to kill a clam. I prefer frying to oxygen deprivation. [Reno Gazette-Journal]
The Redskins sell beer at FedEx Field in the… men’s room. [YouTube]
Menu labeling requirements folded into healthcare bill. [Furious Seasons]
Lyin’ about lions. Famous African man-eaters in late 1800s only killed and ate an almost kitten-like 35 people, not the long-alleged 135. [MSNBC]
Secretes of the Worcestershire sauce recipe revealed. [Daily Mail]
