With food and oil prices zooming into the stratosphere, we're likely to see a lot more small, neighborhood-scale farms like the ones featured in this Wall Street Journal report. Who said that the suburbs were just for growing lawns?

Posted by at 10:49 AM | Permalink

For those of you who are fans of Michael Pollan and his latest book, "In Defense of Food, this online interview is the next best thing to sitting down with him yourself. It comes courtesy of our filmmaking friends at Cooking Up A Story. Enjoy and be thinking about how you can "defend food" in your own family and community.

Posted by at 2:17 PM | Permalink

By Barbara Damrosch, published Thursday, February 14, 2007 in The Washington Post

Nature's gifts come in fancy wrapping. "Look at me!" the tomato shouts. "I'm red, I'm sweet, I'm juicy." The banana makes no less flashy a pitch: "Check out my E-Z-Peel skin!" It's a marketing strategy designed to lure creatures to eat fruits and thereby disperse their seeds.

You wouldn't think these goodies needed help selling themselves to us, but advertising by the ultra-processed food industry is a big distraction. Even recent boosts from science, trumpeting the nutritional value of fruits, vegetables and whole grains, seem to derail nature's mission. No sooner do we learn that a plant food is a package rich in disease-fighting antioxidants than somebody tries to take that complex package apart. Witness the beta carotene debacle of the '90s. On the strength that beta carotene, found especially in bright orange foods, might protect us from diseases such as cancer, suddenly beta carotene supplements were hot-selling items. Then studies found that the supplements might cause cancer instead. The conclusion: Get your beta carotene from carrots.

That's the central message of Michael Pollan's latest book, "In Defense of Food." In his usual clear, hit-the-nail-on-the-head style, Pollan traces our country's sorry journey to a less healthful diet, and he offers good, simple solutions -- the most noteworthy of which is to "eat food." Real food, that is, not a collection of cheap, dubious makeshifts assembled in a lab. Basic to his argument is the idea of food synergy, that a food "is more than the sum of its nutrient parts."

The trend toward medicalizing vegetables (breeding them to be higher in the flavonoid of the month) is perhaps better intentioned than turning food into pills, but to my mind it still smacks of what Pollan calls "nutritionism." Is it necessary to pack extra lycopene into a tomato and more carotene into a carrot, or vice versa? If you eat a diet rich in lots of different fruits and vegetables, grown organically and picked fresh, you will get all the nutrients you need.

One of Pollan's maxims is to choose food at the edges of the supermarket if you must shop there at all. The center aisles are a swirling nucleus of ever-changing fake foods with unpronounceable ingredients. Pick up something from the outer walls instead: an honest red cabbage or a fat beet. Then break through those walls to the fields and gardens beyond.

Granted, February is not the garden's best season, but in my pantry there are red paste tomatoes that I put up in summer, pink applesauce I made in fall, and even, in the cold greenhouse, a few last sweet winter carrots. And that's what I'll serve my valentine.

Article copyright of Barbara Damrosch. Reprinted with permission.

Posted by at 11:08 AM | Permalink

Urban and suburban chickens have a buzz about them these days that hasn't been seen in several generations. It makes sense that if people are looking to shorten the distance between field and fork, some of them will also want to shorten the distance between fork and omelet. This "fair and balanced" video presents the two sides of the backyard chicken debate as it is playing out in Missoula, Montana and in many other parts of the US.

Posted by at 5:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Cooking lessons will be made compulsory for youths at British schools starting in September as a way to counter obesity, the government announced. Boys and girls ages 11 and 14 will have to attend the classes and will learn to cook eight classic healthful British favorites, including roast chicken and shepherd’s pie. Education Secretary Ed Balls, who made the announcement, has asked the public to suggest other dishes students could be taught to cook. According to a government-commissioned study last year, in 25 years half of all Britons will be obese if current eating trends are not halted.

Source: Agence France Press

Posted by at 2:13 PM | Permalink

By Barbara Damrosch, published Thursday, December 6, 2007 in The Washington Post

Christmas shopping may require all the dollars, stamina and good humor you can muster, but it's nothing compared to food shopping. For that you need an advanced degree in educated consumerism. Just last week the mail brought me more lessons in food responsibility than I could possibly digest before lunchtime.

First to arrive was the Utne Reader with a report compiled by the Environmental Working Group that ranked fruits and vegetables by the amount of pesticide residue found on them by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration.

The "dirty dozen" we'd best avoid are, in order of risk: peaches, apples, sweet bell peppers, celery, nectarines, strawberries, cherries, lettuce, imported grapes, pears, spinach and potatoes. The safest six are onions, avocados, frozen corn, pineapples, mangoes and frozen peas.

The group's FoodNews Web site gives detailed data (96.6 percent of peach samples were tainted; one bell pepper sample had 11 pesticides on it).

The solution is simple: Buy organic. But here's the tougher question: Why do they allow residue at all? That would require a larger study.

Next came a poster from the Chefs Collaborative, urging us to buy from farms that sustain the environment -- those that give livestock free range; gather mushrooms only from stable populations; preserve native riparian (streamside) plants; guard soil, air and water against pollution; and "value and protect large predators like bears and mountain lions." Most of this is unknowable unless the farm is right down the road.

And now here's Ode magazine with the top 20 organic, sustainable products for 2008. Two of them I already have: a Sun Frost low-energy fridge, which I love, and Prince Charles's Duchy Originals Oaten Biscuits. But how do the 20 stack up against the Chefs Collaborative's admirably complex chart?

I happen to think Prince Charles, long a champion of organic farming, is one of the world's most underestimated public figures, and his biscuits are top drawer. But I can only assume he protects his riparian flora. Do the guys who grow Honest Tea value bears? Who knows?

The only lesson I ever seem to learn from all of this information boils down to a few words: Grow your own, cook your own and check out the farmer down the road. There are a few levels of complexity I could add to that, but you already have so much to read.

Article copyright of Barbara Damrosch. Reprinted with permission.
Photo credit: D'Arcy Norman

Posted by at 1:16 PM | Permalink

To say that local foods are being attacked would be too strong a word, but there's definitely a challenge under way. Two recent articles about them in the New York Times suggest that we're heading into a new phase of the local foods revolution, a phase where there'll be more questions about the ramifications of more people eating locally-based diets.

The two Times articles say essentially the same thing in different ways: just because a food is more local doesn't make it more sustainable. The first appeared in the business section and cites new, yet incomplete research being conducted in California that is expected to show that some industrially grown produce may have a smaller carbon footprint than its local counterpart. The second appeared in the opinion pages and was, frankly, more annoying in its smug tone and its choice of examples (bananas and potato chips).

Annoying or not, these articles are hopeful in that they show that local foods are continuing to move toward the center of the media's plate. To read KGI's response, see the letter to the editor linked and pasted below. As you'll see, we have our own view of what's next for the local foods movement (hint: it's about to get "localer").

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/16/business/16backpage.html

To the Editor:

The writer is founding director of Kitchen Gardeners International, a nonprofit network of home gardeners.

Posted by at 10:56 AM | Permalink

Here's a neat idea and yet another neat video from "Cooking Up A Story": urban fruit gleaning. And it features the work of a neat volunteer-led initiative in Portland, Oregon called "The Portland Fruit Tree Project." Check it out and start bringing together a gleaning corp in your area...the fresh fruits, jams, jellies and ciders are waiting for you.

Posted by at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

What do you get when you cross "Super Size Me" with the "The Omnivore's Dilemma"?

King Corn, or at least that's the type of hybrid success that the documentary's makers are hoping for as the film hits the big screen this week.

King Corn is about two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation.

In the film, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis, best friends from college on the east coast, move to the heartland to learn where their food comes from. With the help of friendly neighbors, genetically modified seeds, and powerful herbicides, they plant and grow a bumper crop of America’s most-productive, most-subsidized grain on one acre of Iowa soil. But when they try to follow their pile of corn into the food system, what they find raises troubling questions about how we eat—and how we farm.

The small-budget, independent film has received much favorable press including a write-up in today's New York Times dining section which is not a bad way to start.

The big question that many movie-goers will be asking themselves is whether it's ok to eat popcorn and drink corn-sweetened soda while watching the film.

Related articles:
-Disecting Dinner
-Michael Pollan's 9-Step Program for America

Posted by at 8:58 AM | Permalink

By Andrew Sneider, published 12 September 2007 in the Seattle-Post Intelligencer

When it comes to eating fruits, vegetables and grain, bigger is not better for you.

A report issued this week examined several recent studies by food scientists, nutritionists, growers and plant breeders. It found clear evidence that as the produce we eat gets larger, its vitamins, minerals and beneficial chemical compounds significantly diminish, as do taste and aroma.

Growing bigger tomatoes and ears of corn leads to a bigger yield for the producer, but the trade-off is the lower nutritional value.

Some say the gutting of the nutritional value of what we eat could affect public health, particularly in poorer countries. "There is no sinister villain behind this," said Chuck Benbrook, chief scientist for the Organic Center, which commissioned the report. "Increasing the amount of food grown per acre, by itself, is a good thing.

"The problem is that until recently, no one ever checked to see what was happening to the nutritional value of these much larger tomatoes, bigger grapefruit and the rest of the crops.

Continue reading "Fruits and vegetables growing bigger, not better" »

Posted by at 12:43 PM | Permalink

Story excerpted from a report by by Joseph Shapiro for National Public Radio

When Hitler's armies and Axis powers occupied Greece during World War II, they pretty much stripped Greece of its food, which was sent to German soldiers on battle fronts across Europe.

By the end of the war, at least a quarter of a million Greek men, women and children had died from starvation.

Just three years after the war, American scientists arrived on the Greek island of Crete to help rebuild. The wartime survivors still scraped by on the tiniest portions of food, so the scientists were amazed by what they saw.

Scientists found the people of Crete in excellent health even after the war, explained Dr. Anthony Kafatos of the University of Crete's School of Medicine. He said that after the war, there was no malnutrition.

"The families here in Crete, they produced everything they wanted at home," Kafatos said. "And they had no supermarkets, no electricity, no refrigerator. So they had only seasonal foods."

But now, that kind of homegrown eating is vanishing.

Continue reading "Whither the Mediterranean Diet?" »

Posted by at 9:48 AM | Permalink

The sudden and mysterious disappearance of honeybees in the United States over the past year may be due to a virus, according to a new research paper by an international team of scientists.

The pathogen, called Israeli acute paralysis virus, was detected in almost all bee hives tested during a survey of hives afflicted by what has become known as colony collapse disorder. The pathogen is rarely found in healthy hives.

The discovery will likely help put to rest rampant speculation about the source of the strange collapse in U.S. bee populations.

Any threat to bee numbers could affect the global food supply. An estimated $2-billion worth of crops in Canada depend on honeybees for pollination, and about $15-billion in the United States, where the collapse has already led to difficulties in pollinating crops.

The researchers also found the virus on live bees imported into the United States from Australia, and in royal jelly samples from China. Royal jelly is the food bees produce for queens, but it is also sold as a health food for humans.

The discovery of the virus has raised speculation that the United States inadvertently allowed it into the country through the import of Australian bees. This was allowed in 2004, at the urging of the agricultural industry, to boost the number of hives available for pollinating high-value crops such as almonds. The import of the bees coincided with the first reports of unusual problems in bee colonies.

News source: The Globe and Mail
Photo credit: Frogmuseum2

Posted by at 6:05 AM | Permalink

You won't catch kitchen gardeners doing this with their hard-won tomatoes! The footage comes from "La Tomatina", an annual tomato-throwing festival in the town of Bunoi, Spain where residents and visitors turn five truckloads of tomatoes into puree in the span of one juicy hour.

For more info on the festival,see http://www.latomatina.es/

Posted by at 3:57 PM | Permalink

Overweight residents of an Italian town will be paid to lose weight, the mayor said on Monday.

Men living in the northwestern Italian town of Varallo will receive 50 euros ($70) for losing 4 kg (9 pounds) in a month, Mayor Gianluca Buonanno said. Women will get the same amount for shedding 3 kg (7 pounds).

If they can keep the weight off for 5 months, they will get another 200 euros ($280), he told Reuters.

"Lots of people are saying, 'I really need to lose some weight but it's really tough.' So I thought, why don't we go on a group diet?" said Buonanno, who said he was about 6 kg (13 pounds) overweight.

The town of 7,500 people started the campaign on Friday and some residents have already signed up, he said.

Around 35 percent of Italians are overweight or obese, according to European Union figures, with waistlines expanding as the country's healthy Mediterranean diet has given way to processed foods rich in fat, sugar and salt.

Source: Reuters

Posted by at 8:35 AM | Permalink

By Yaeko Abe, printed in the Asahi Shimbun, June 22, 2007

Across the world, backyard vegetable patches have traditionally been the preserve of bearded baby boomers.

In recent years, however, a rustic urge has been catching on in Japan. People of all ages and interests have been getting down on their hands and knees to cultivate the earth.

Some do it to put fresh, pesticide-free vegetables on the table. Others simply want the satisfaction of growing their own produce.

In response to booming demand, allotment gardens that make use of fallow farmland are cropping up everywhere. There are up to 3,000 across the nation--the little "kitchen garden," it seems, is making a comeback.

Urban vegetable gardens that cater to members only are being created in front of railway stations in major cities. Tokyoites are now able to grow vegetables in patches that straddle railway lines.

Continue reading "Kitchen gardens enjoy a comeback in Japan" »

Posted by at 2:05 PM | Permalink

National Public Radio, Morning Edition, April 27, 2007

With her famed Berkeley, Calif., restaurant, Alice Waters helped give rise to a new cuisine based on locally grown, seasonal ingredients. Waters and her biographer discuss what has made the Chez Panisse such an offbeat and memorable place to eat for more than three decades.

Looking back, Waters would say it all began for her with a bowl of cafe au lait. As a student on a sojourn to Paris during the 1960s, Waters had never sipped anything so good. Soon, trips to the French countryside introduced her to the power and pleasure of local foods: mussels just off the boat, freshly pressed virgin olive oil.

Waters came back to Berkeley transformed. She hatched a plan to convert a run-down old house into an elegant bistro.

Continue reading "Alice Waters: delicious revolutionary" »

Posted by at 2:15 PM | Permalink

The heir to the British throne, Prince Charles, described as "crazy" European Union legislation which prevents the sale of seeds from old vegetable varieties, in an interview released Wednesday.

"What could be crazier than, I think, having the kind of EU legislation which made it impossible to sell the seeds of many of these wonderful old varieties that people have developed over thousands of years?" he said.

"Hundreds of varieties have been lost -- wonderful things which our forefathers took enormous trouble to develop and which, in many cases, are resistant to all sorts of prevalent diseases."

Under EU seeds marketing directives, seeds must meet minimum quality standards and old varieties fall foul of strict testing criteria.

Posted by at 6:55 AM | Permalink

Different countries, regions, and cities are promoting gardening and sustainable living through policies and incentives. In Belgium, the policy of "bebloemingsacties" (literally: planting action), provides economic incentives as follows:

-31 euros ($40) are paid per square meter for growing succulent mosses, grasses and herbs for a green roof. The program pays a maximum of 5,000 euros ($6,500); the minimum is 6 square meters.

-250 euros ($325) are paid for collecting and reusing rain water. The money goes to fund a collecting system and pump.

-Each household can get as many as three chickens which will consume kitchen waste and add fertilizer to the garden.

Countries less well-heeled than Belgium grow 90 percent of their fresh produce out of necessity. Two cities known for their urban gardens are Accra, Ghana, and Havana, Cuba.

Venezuelan leaders, inspired by Cuba's small urban farms, have started a socialist farming cooperative called "Interior economy." Premier Hugo Chavez started Organoponicos (urban gardens) to aim for 20 percent food production from urban gardens. Tools and land are subsidized through this program.

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

Posted by at 10:24 PM | Permalink

by Alexei Barrionuevo, published Februray 27, 2007 in the New York Times

David Bradshaw has endured countless stings during his life as a beekeeper, but he got the shock of his career when he opened his boxes last month and found half of his 100 million bees missing.

In 24 states throughout the country, beekeepers have gone through similar shocks as their bees have been disappearing inexplicably at an alarming rate, threatening not only their livelihoods but also the production of numerous crops, including California almonds, one of the nation’s most profitable.

“I have never seen anything like it,” Mr. Bradshaw, 50, said from an almond orchard here beginning to bloom. “Box after box after box are just empty. There’s nobody home.”

The sudden mysterious losses are highlighting the critical link that honeybees play in the long chain that gets fruit and vegetables to supermarkets and dinner tables across the country.

Continue reading "When honeybees vanish will our food follow?" »

Posted by at 9:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

By JIM DOWNING, Published December 19, 2006 in The Sacramento Bee

Two high-profile E. coli outbreaks this year have some in the food business wondering - once again - whether it's time to go nuclear. For decades, many food safety experts have argued that irradiation - zapping food with high-energy rays to kill microorganisms - could avert hundreds of deaths and perhaps millions of illnesses each year. But for just as long, federal regulators and food retailers have been leery of bringing the technology to market.

Despite exhaustive reviews by federal scientists and endorsements by public health and medical groups around the world, irradiation by its very name conjures up images that are anything but wholesome - nuclear fallout, for one.

That imagery, combined with some lingering uncertainties about irradiation's effects on food, has helped grass-roots activists make a potent case against it.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved irradiation as a disinfectant for a limited range of foods, including spices and ground beef.

But a food industry petition to greatly expand that approval to include many ready-to-eat products - fresh bagged greens, for instance - has been awaiting review by the agency for more than seven years.

Now, with both government officials and the produce industry feeling pressure to respond to the recent outbreaks, irradiation is again up for debate.

Continue reading "US Considers Nuclear Option" »

Posted by at 5:01 PM | Permalink

By MARIAN BURROS, published in the New York Times, 7 December 2006

Outbreaks of food-borne illness from produce have increased drastically as the way fruits and vegetables are grown, distributed and consumed has fundamentally changed.

Over the past couple of decades, Americans have doubled their consumption of fruits and vegetables, more and more of this produce is imported, and the number of plants where it is processed has shrunk.

“High centralization of production is great when everything goes right,” said Dr. Robert Tauxe, an epidemiologist with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “When something goes wrong, you have a big problem.”

A little bit of contaminated produce from one farm can infect tons of produce when it is all mixed together.

“Someone makes a small mistake, but someone chops up green onions and puts them in salsa and ships them off to Taco Bell, and you have exponentially magnified the problem,” said Carole Tucker Foreman, an agriculture official in the Carter administration, speaking hypothetically.

Continue reading "Growing Peril on Path From Field to Plate" »

Posted by at 8:42 AM | Permalink

The US Department of Agriculture has released a new study examining the potential implications for US agriculture production if all Americans adopted eating habits consistent with the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Comparing food availability data to Food Guide Pyramid Servings data, the report authors estimate domestic fruit, vegetable, and whole grain crop production would need to increase by 7.4 million acres (nearly 2 percent of cropland) to provide enough food for the increased consumption recommended by the guidelines.

Assuming the needed supply was obtained only from domestic sources, the US would need to more than double fruit acreage to 7.6 million acres and increase vegetable acreage from 6.5 million to 15.3 million acres. Whole grain consumption would need to rise, but total grain production acres would need to fall by nearly 6 million acres.

To meet the new recommendations for milk products consumption, the study predicts production would need to increase by nearly 30 percent ­approximately 108 billion pounds per year­to a total of 274 billion pounds annually. The report’s numbers put an interesting perspective on the continued opposition of the specialty crop alliance to full planting flexibility on program crop acreage.

The complete report is available at www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err31/err31.pdf.

Source: the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

Posted by at 5:10 PM | Permalink

The USDA has recently published the latest US hunger statistics: 35 million people live in households that have either "very low or low food security". To put it more simply and bluntly, 12% of the total US population doesn't have enough to eat.

While the hunger rate is down somewhat in 2005, it remains higher than in 1999-2001. “It is simply unacceptable that after years of economic growth, 35.1 million people in this country face a constant struggle against hunger,” said Jim Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC). “While the small drop is a move in the right direction, we should be far from satisfied. Change is moving too slowly for those still struggling, and we need to make ending hunger a national priority.

Click here for a table showing how the 50 US states rank on hunger

Posted by at 10:42 AM | Permalink

By LINDSEY TANNER, Associated Press

New research on vegetables and aging gives mothers another reason to say "I told you so." It found that eating vegetables appears to help keep the brain young and may slow the mental decline sometimes associated with growing old.

On measures of mental sharpness, older people who ate more than two servings of vegetables daily appeared about five years younger at the end of the six-year study than those who ate few or no vegetables.

The research in almost 2,000 Chicago-area men and women doesn't prove that vegetables reduce mental decline, but it adds to mounting evidence pointing in that direction. The findings also echo previous research in women only.

Green leafy vegetables including spinach, kale and collards appeared to be the most beneficial. The researchers said that may be because they contain healthy amounts of vitamin E, an antioxidant that is believed to help fight chemicals produced by the body that can damage cells.

Continue reading "Study: Vegetables may keep brains young" »

Posted by at 6:23 AM | Permalink

By Marian Burros, published September 20, 2006 in the New York Times

If you crave spinach salad despite government warnings about possible contamination of spinach from California, buying local might do the trick.

The chances of buying uncooked spinach containing the deadly bacterium that has been making headlines for several days are significantly reduced if you know the farmer and how he farms, and if you wash the spinach thoroughly before eating it, a government official acknowledged.

The Food and Drug Administration has advised people not to eat any fresh spinach at all, not even cooked, although sufficient cooking (160 degrees for 15 seconds) kills E. coli O157:H7, the bacterium that has sickened scores of people around the country, including at least 18 who are critically ill, and killed at least one. The agency is concerned that even if the spinach is cooked, bacteria may have been left behind on a countertop or a knife, which could then contaminate another food being served raw.

Dr. David Acheson, chief medical officer of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition at the FDA, said the agency “wants to maintain a simple consumer message’’ and not confuse people by saying which circumstances are appropriate for eating uncooked spinach. But in a telephone conversation he acknowledged that it is less risky to eat locally grown spinach.

“Clearly the risk is significantly reduced if you know the farmer and know his farm,” he said, “particularly if you are on the East Coast,’’ far from the suspected source of the contamination.

Posted by at 6:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Architect Fritz Haeg is a man on a mission: he's looking to redefine the American lawn. Through his "Edible Estates" project and some good press coverage (see below), he's finding an audience for his delicious vision of what a frontyard could be.

Continue reading "The delawnification of America" »

Posted by at 10:03 AM | Permalink

The new USDA data on home food production in the US is in and it ain't pretty. The value of home-produced foods as a percentage of the total value of foods produced dropped by 20% from 2004 to 2005 meaning that we have hit the lowest mark in US history. If you take into account the fact that the average mouthful of food travels over 1500 miles from field to fork in the US, it's accurate to say that Americans have never been farther removed from the making of their food as we are now.

Now for the good news: what we're doing collectively and individually in our yards, lots, allotments, plots, and aplotments (yes, I know it's not a word, but it should be) is more important than ever. So keep it up and be sure to show your neighbor what a truly local and red ripe tomato tastes like. That's the best argument we have for doing what we do.

Posted by at 7:03 PM | Permalink

By The Associated Press and Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — Climate warming could spell disaster for much of the multibillion-dollar U.S. wine industry.

Areas suitable for growing premium wine grapes could be reduced by 50 percent — and possibly as much as 81 percent — by the end of this century, according to a study Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The paper indicates increasing weather problems for grapes in such areas as California's Napa and Sonoma valleys.

The main problem: an increase in the frequency of extremely hot days, said Noah Diffenbaugh of the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Purdue University.

Continue reading "Climate change could spell sunset for wine industry" »

Posted by at 2:51 PM | Permalink

(Reuters) - A frozen "Noah's Ark" to safeguard the world's crop seeds from cataclysms will be built on a remote Arctic island off Norway, the Norwegian government said on Tuesday.

Construction of the Global Seed Vault, in a mountainside on the island of Svalbard 1,000 km (600 miles) from the North Pole, would start in June with completion due in September 2007.

"Norway will by this contribute to the global system for ensuring the diversity of food plants. A Noah's Ark on Svalbard if you will," Norwegian Agriculture and Food Minister Terje Riis-Johansen said in a statement.

The doomsday vault would be built near Longyaerbyen, Svalbard's main village, with space for three million seed varieties. It would store seeds including rice, wheat, and barley as well as fruits and vegetables.

Continue reading "Arctic "Noah's Ark" vault to protect world's seeds" »

Posted by at 4:37 PM | Permalink

Feeling too busy to cook from scratch, yet too guilty not to? Most of us have experienced the feeling. Could it be that we need a "dream dinner" meal assembly center (see below) in our community. The concept is simple: they do the hard work, you take all the credit.

Or, then again, maybe we all just need to slow down and make time for the important things in life. What is your opinion on this new trend in "almost home-cooking"?

Continue reading "Betty Crocker with a cellphone" »

Posted by at 4:07 PM | Permalink

As Kitchen Skills Dwindle, Recipes Become Easy as Pie

By Candy Sagon, Published in the Washington Post, March 18, 2006

At Kraft Foods, recipes never include words like "dredge" and "sauté." Betty Crocker recipes avoid "braise" and "truss." Land O' Lakes has all but banned "fold" and "cream" from its cooking instructions. And Pillsbury carefully sidesteps "simmer" and "sear."

When the country's top food companies want to create recipes that millions of Americans will be able to understand, there seems to be one guiding principle: They need to be written for a nation of culinary illiterates.

Basic cooking terms that have been part of kitchen vocabulary for centuries are now considered incomprehensible to the majority of Americans. Despite the popularity of the Food Network cooking shows on cable TV, and the burgeoning number of food magazines and gourmet restaurants, today's cooks have fewer kitchen skills than their parents -- or grandparents -- did.

Continue reading "Cooking 101: Add 1 Cup of Simplicity" »

Posted by at 7:26 AM | Permalink

No, not that meatloaf, although he too has enjoyed some newfound popularity of late. We're talking the meat we eat, or don't if you're a vegetarian. As the article below points out, meatloaf is back in style which begs a question for many homecooks: did it ever go out of style? No one told us.

Whether you're a newcomer to meatloaf or a seasoned veteran, we think you'll enjoy this classic version:

Ingredients
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped celery
2 teaspoons chopped garlic
1 teaspoon salt, divided
1 tablespoon chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
2-3/4 pounds unseasoned meatloaf mix (ground beef, pork and veal) or ground beef round
3/4 cup fresh bread crumbs (2 slices firm white sandwich bread)
1/3 cup ketchup
2 large eggs
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
4 slices bacon
1 large can plum tomatoes in juice (or your own, if you have them)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large garlic clove, chopped
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Procedure
1. Arrange rack on lowest position in oven. Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onions, celery and 2 teaspoons garlic; cook 5 minutes, until vegetables soften. Stir in 1/2 teaspoon of the salt and the parsley. Remove from heat and let stand until cooled to room temperature.
2. Combine meatloaf mix, bread crumbs, ketchup, eggs, remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt, nutmeg and the cooked vegetables until blended. Transfer mixture to a shallow pan; shape into a 9-1/2x5-inch oval. Arrange bacon slices on top. Bake 70 minutes, until an instant-read meat thermometer inserted in center registers 160 degree F.
3. Meanwhile, combine tomatoes, 1 tablespoon oil, 1 clove garlic, 1/4 teaspoon salt and the pepper flakes in a 9-inch glass baking dish, breaking up tomatoes with a spoon. Bake on lower rack with meatloaf, 35 to 40 minutes, until sauce thickens. Serve with meatloaf. Makes 6 servings.

Continue reading "Meatloaf Makes a Comeback" »

Posted by at 7:49 AM | Permalink

2005 might well be remembered as the year that hybrid cars "broke through" into the mainstream with the Toyota Prius leading the pack. It's true that these cars could offer great benefits to society if more drivers replaced their old gas guzzlers with their fuel-efficient cousins.

However, if you really want to have a positive impact on the environment, you would do well to start by reconsidering what you eat rather than what you drive, say Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin of the University of Chicago.

The two recently compared the environmental savings of switching to a vegan diet versus switching to a hybrid vehicle and - guess what?- the tofu won. Eshel and Martin studied the amount of fossil fuel needed to cultivate and process various foods, including running agricultural machinery, providing food for livestock and irrigating crops. They also factored in emissions of methane and nitrous oxide produced by cows, sheep and manure treatment.

The typical US diet, about 28 per cent of which comes from animal sources, generates the equivalent of nearly 1.5 tons more carbon dioxide per person per year than a vegan diet with the same number of calories, say the researchers.

By comparison, the difference in annual emissions between driving a standard car and a hybrid car, which runs off a rechargeable battery and gasoline, is just over 1 ton.

There are those of us for whom sliced tofu just doesn't cut it, so to speak. If you don't want to go vegan or even vegetarian, choosing less-processed animal products and poultry instead of red meat can help reduce greenhouse gasses. And, of courses, always buy locally produced foods when possible.

Source: New Scientist magazine, 17 December 2005

Posted by at 6:21 AM | Permalink

And that's just in the US, says Timothy Jones, a professor at the University of Arizona.

A study by Jones and the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2003 estimated that more than 50 million tons of edible food are wasted in the United States each year. The study looked at farming, retail establishments and homes. It found that:

• Twelve percent of American crops, valued at $20 billion, go unharvested due to difficulty in predicting demand.
• Retailers, including restaurants, throw away 35 million tons a year, valued at $30 billion.
• Households dump $43 billion worth of food a year, or about 14 percent of what they buy.
• American households throw away 1.28 pounds of food a day, 27 percent of which consists of vegetables.

Jones says that people often buy fresh vegetables because they think they are eating healthfully. But many then go home, pop a frozen pizza in the oven and throw the vegetables out.

There are many things that could be done to prevent this waste:
• At the farm level: encourage gleaning so that edible crops are made available to individuals and groups (such as food pantries) that are in need and in a position to harvest them.
• At the community level: encourage the composting of food wastes.
• At the individual level and in schools: teach young people how to cook and how to be creative with that leftover head of broccoli.

Posted by at 7:24 PM | Permalink

Price is Main Deterrent to Buying Organics

Results from a new online global survey from ACNielsen show that U.S. consumers are among the least likely shoppers from around the world to regularly purchase organic food and beverage products. Asked about their purchasing of organic alternatives from 11 food and beverage categories, just 6 to 15 percent of U.S. consumers said they purchase such products regularly – well short of the average among consumers from all 38 markets included in the study.

For full story, please see:
http://us.acnielsen.com/news/20051205.shtml

Posted by at 9:06 AM | Permalink

And, while we're at it, why does he wash his fruit in the bathtub?

Unless you have been living in a cave for the past few years, you will recognize this young man to be UK celebrity chef Jamie Oliver. Dismissed by many culinary professionals as more celebrity than chef, Oliver is winning over the people that count.

A recent study conducted by the UK food company Tate & Lyle found that consumers are becoming increasingly educated about food and as a result are questioning the health profile of their favorite brands. The study credits Oliver, among other influences, for his well publicized crusade to improve the food served in Britain's school cafeterias.

According to the study, the increase in awareness regarding health issues has caused consumers to question the nutritional value of the food they buy and consume on a regular basis and to become skeptical about brand claims. When asked, 65% of consumers agreed with the statement 'often brands that claim to be healthy aren't healthy at all'.

Tate & Lyle said consumers are looking for ways to improve their diet, with 66% of respondents across Europe affirming that they were always looking for ways to eat more healthily.

Across Europe, while consumers are becoming more concerned about the health consequences of their diet, the majority of people still believe that taste is the most important factor in determining what they eat. More than two in five consumers (42%) agreed that enjoying food is more important than nutrition, while one in three people (33%) argue that taste and health are equally important.

Source: Datamonitor Newswire

Posted by at 6:48 AM | Permalink

Switzerland's Neue Zurchner Zeitung reports voters' backing on Sunday for a five-year ban on the use of genetically modified crops.

The 55.7% vote in favour of the moratorium is, says the paper, "a surprisingly clear result".

Geneva-based Le Temps welcomes the vote.

Swiss people take scientific research seriously, the paper says, so the decision is "an important signal".

It says they resisted what it calls "the assault of globalised junk food" and "an irreversible mutilation of the natural heritage".

Another Swiss daily, Le Matin, also hails the decision.

"Swiss citizens... are not prepared to sell their souls and convictions to satisfy their consumer tastes," the paper says.

It describes the vote as "a warning shot" against the liberal policies of the government and the political right.

"The Swiss have shown their clear-sightedness in not giving a blank cheque to scientific circles, and especially the food lobby," the paper adds.

Source: BBC News

Posted by at 7:52 AM | Permalink