FoodWords Between Deadlines
Sunday, September 30
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FoodWords is a free weekly digest of great food stories from all
over the Web. To subscribe, click here or there
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"In Taiwan, one sentence that was often repeated when friends
greeted each other was 'Ni ch'ih pao le, mei yu?' ('Have you
eaten yet?'). Clearly, I had come to the right place."
-- Nina Simonds
Gourmet magazine
January 1979
FoodWords
Volume 1, Number 2
September 30, 2001
Today's Specials:
o Letter from the Editor: Read Any Good Cookbooks Lately?
o The Buffet Table
o Announcements
o Subscription Details
Dear FoodWords readers,
This issue is a week or so late, for which I apologize. Just
couldn't work up the enthusiasm for putting the newsletter
together. However, today is a beautiful fall day in Green Bay,
Wisconsin -- the sky is a deep blue, the leaves are beginning
to turn color, and the guard hairs on my cat Tia's thick brown
fur are shot golden with sunlight. Today, I want to think about
food! Hope you do, too.
While visiting a friend's house for lunch, I started paging
through the library copy of "Hot Sour Salty Sweet" (Jeffrey Alford,
published by Workman Publishing) which her husband had used to
create a Thai chicken soup the night before. It's a wonderful book;
As soon as I got home, I reserved it for myself. Better return it
soon, Don.
I've also been poring over Gourmet magazine's 60th anniversary issue.
I'm a fan of Editor Ruth Reichl, although I run hot and cold on
the magazine itself. However, the September issue is a treasure.
Today's quote came from it.
Thanks to everyone who subscribed to FoodWords' first issue,
which of course was riddled with errors. Welcome to our new
subscribers, and thanks to those readers who were brave enough to
come back for another helping.
Here we go!
Comments? Click here
1. Sushi in Paris? Worth the Wait and the Crowds
(International Herald Tribune)
One of the great services the World Wide Web affords fans of
terrific food writing is 24-hour access to Patricia Wells, a
cookbook author, newspaper food writer and a great person to
interview. (I met with her for more than an hour one icy Chicago
afternoon. Good writers can be awful interviews, but she was a joy,
and the interview wandered far afield before we concluded.) Today,
her pieces appear regularly in the International Herald Tribune,
published in Paris, her adopted hometown.
2. Trans-fat Labeling Standards Urged
(foodnavigator.com)
The Bush Administration has asked the Food and Drug Administration
to finish making food-labeling rules clarifying the presence of
trans fatty acids in food products. "Trans" fats are those that
have been hydrogenated - had an extra hydrogen molcule added, as
in partially hydrogenated vegetable oil - in order to make them
firmer for use in cooking and baking. "Trans" fats are considered
to be among the worst for heart health. Some food manufacturers
are resisting, although they acknowledge the new labeling results
are inevitable.
3. Bread in a Can, Man
(Flak Magazine)
I can think food that are much more unnerving than Boston brown
bread in a can (anything with the eyes left on, for starters), but
the concept apparently unhinged this poor writer. However, he
recovered long enough to do something creative with it. Perhaps too
many years of eating Vienna Sausages has inured me to strange food.
Or maybe it was those Pampered Chef hors-d'oeuvre bread tubes that
did it. Anyway: normal or not? You make the call.
4. Brazen Careerist: The Art of the Meal
(Business 2.0)
Penelope Trunk is the pseudonym for a woman who lives and writes
(and is trying to get her life back together) in New York City.
In this article, published before the terrorist attacks, she
describes, in snarky detail, how to eat your way through a
business meal without embarrasing yourself.
5. Emeril's Sitcom: Flat or Funny?
(New York Post, MediaLife Magazine)
Personally, I find Emeril Lagasse to be like cayenne pepper: a little
goes a long, long, long way. No denying he's popular with some of the
masses, however; so popular that - how could you have missed this big
news? - he has his own TV sitcom this fall. I don't know if it
has been on yet, but critics have been sniping for months that it's
as flat as a fallen souffle. Now that the delayed TV premiere season
is here, either the fat's in the fire or the proof is in the pudding.
One critic says it's ho-hum, the other says it's actually kind of
funny. You watch it and let me know.
Not so funny
Not so bad
6. The Brioche that Failed
(Troika magazine)
If you've never made or consumed really good brioche (a French egg bread,
indescribably moist, chewy and delicious when made correctly), you might
not understand the poignancy behind this writer's fate, to be so near and
yet so far from heaven, even if it does come from a baker with a temper
so foul he makes the Soup Nazi look like Mother You-Know-Who.
Thanks for reading. Look for the newsletter in another two weeks, or so, or tune in here every once in a while to see what kind of quirky,
short-shelf-life, bizarre or breaking news I have posted that
day.
posted by Unknown9:08 PM
Soup: The Wild Thing
Not for the folks at Soupsong are the tamed soups in the red-and-white can. No sir. They hearken back to the days when the ingredients in soup were just as wild as the surroundings. Want to walk on the wild side, souperifically speaking? :
Check it out
posted by Unknown
Tuesday, September 25
Time for Organic Wine?
Well, why not? If everything else you eat is certified organic, then surely the wine you drink should follow suit. My fervent hope is that the quality has improved since organics first made their debut more than a decade or so; this article from Alibi claims they have.
posted by Unknown
Friday, September 21
Still Here!
Hey, everybody -- I'm still around but have not had the time or inclination to post any food stories for a while. Now, however, I am reading and raring to go, so please -- watch this space.
If you haven't subscribed to the newsletter yet, why donchya? The next issue comes out this weekend.
posted by Unknown
Friday, September 7
The Ethnography of a Neighborhood Cafe
Monty Python meets academia, and the result is the Journal of Mundane Behavior. In the June issue: You might think they're ne'er-do-wells hanging out at the Flaming Cup Cafe, but they're really researchers, taking everyday actions and turning them into complicated theses. Well, okay.
Here's the abstract: "Café society is something that many of us as customers and/or social theorists take for granted. Cafés are places where we are not simply served hot beverages but are also in some way partaking of a specific form of public life. It is this latter aspect that has attracted the attention of social theorists, especially Jürgen Habermas, and leads them to locate the café as a key place in the development of modernity. Our approach to cafés is to ‘turn the tables’ on theories of the public sphere and return to just what the life of a particular café consists of, and in so doing re-specify a selection of topics related to public spaces. The particular topics we deal with in a ‘worldly manner’ are the socio-material organisation of space, informality and rule following. In as much as we are able we have drawn on an ethnomethodological way of doing and analysing our ethnographic studies."
Hmmm. Well, you do get an interesting history of cafes and bars. You know what they say about tough jobs: someone's got to do them, and it might as well be academicians who have figured out how to write off the time they spent away from their offices and classrooms.
posted by Unknown
The Brioche that Never Was
Here's a truly poignant story about being so near and yet so far from heavenly brioche, made even more precious because the French baker who makes them has a legendary foul temper. From Troika magazine.
posted by Unknown
Crimenently! (as my mom would say)
I feel personally dumped on twice in one story, thanks to Sharon Noguchi of the San Jose Mercury-News. First, she makes some snotty comment about one daughter's tastebuds having a distinctly Midwestern bent because she builds her diet on "meat, starch, sugar, oil and salt." Like they don't eat meat and potatoes in California. Might I remind Miss California-style that a lot of the fruits and vegetables we get up here on the Frozen Tundra get shipped to us from agrifactories in . . . . CALIFORNIA!! The dirty little secret among California vegetarians is that they get to keep all the ripe-red, juicy-meat tomatoes, juicy-sweet watermelon, and lemons with considerably higher juice-to-rind ratios for themselves while they send us green baseballs and expect us to believe they're really tomatoes, and hockey pucks painted to resemble lemons. Huh!
Then, she goes on to praise the lunchbox-making art of Japanese mothers who lovingly pack artistic, nutritious lunches for their children. So, now I'm supposed to toss the Scooby-Doo lunchbox in favor of a wood-lacquered bento-bako full of sushi? Sorry - this okaasan has her hands full just getting the Little Prince out of bed and into the bathroom in the morning. Oh, here's the answer: I can BUY "obentos" -- sounds like the Japanes version of a Lunchable (and granted, those evil creations did come from that most Midwestern of all food-factories the Oscar Mayer Co.). I might not descend to the Lunchables level in packing my kiddo's lunch, but a humble peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich that gets eaten is better than a fancy obento that looks pretty.
Off to milk the cow in the backyard . . . Oh, I suppose you want the link too, eh?
posted by Unknown
But it still has anchovies in it . . . .
The winner of the 10th annual American Institute of Wine and Food's Caesar Salad Competition in Dallas made it after two previously unsuccessful tries. How different could it be? You decide; the recipe's included in this piece from the Dallas Morning News. We who can't bear the taste of those icky little fish on our unsophisticated palates will stand ready on the sidelines to hand you breath mints.
posted by Unknown
More chocolate!
Truly, I am not chocolate-obsessed (that just doesn't look right, spelling-wise, but no dictionary at hand at present), but here's another chocolate-related story:
The University of Chocolate in Paris. Or some such. The story is from The Age newspaper of Melbourne (I think!) Australia.
posted by Unknown
I garontee . . . . Justin Wilson, one of the kings of Cajun cooking, died on Wednesday. Love him for his folksiness and humor, loathe him for popularizing the concept of the deep-fried turkey.
posted by Unknown
Thursday, September 6
Chocolate AND peanut butter are good for you? It's a miracle!
This just in from ABCnews.com : If you can't stay on a diet, it's because you aren't eating enough peanut butter. We're not talking massive PB infusions, though.
posted by Unknown
A potato chip with snob value? Flak magazine details the thinking behind Frito-Lay's introduction of Miss Vickie's chips in the Lower 48. Synopsis: They're average, but the French connection gives it cache. (That's "ca-SHAY," by the way.)
Yes, I am all done shilling for the newsletter. Well, now I am.
posted by Unknown
Here's a riddle: How is eating fast food like going to church? Well, I don't think it is, even on Communion Sundays, but others beg to differ, like this guy. Still, he has a point 'r two. I found this story at Relapsed Catholic, a Weblog of religion news from the great to the goofy. The news stories are good, but author Kathy Shaidle's commentary is usually better, even when she makes no comment.
posted by Unknown
Food waste in school lunch programs: This story from the Aug. 29 Miami New Times details the waste and inefficiency in the Miami schools' hot lunch program. How does your district's program stack up in comparison? Meal programs have always been an easy target for food writers, from a nutrional angle (the lack of it, specifically), because of product quality and the usual snipes at the flavor. However, it's a timely topic if you're looking for a local angle -- what are your district's statistics (it rhymes!) on free and reduced-price lunch requests this year compared to last? I hear it's up at my son's school -- sign of the times? Same for breakfast, whether it's full price, reduced or free:
This and other topics will be included in the next FoodWords free email digest of current food news on the Web, scheduled to go out on Sept. 9. Subscribe today! Thanks ever so.
posted by Unknown
Chocolate in the news again! Today's topic: How much vegetable oil can a manufacturer substitute for cocoa butter fat in chocolate? The issue is coming up at the next meeting of the Codex Committee on Cocoa Products and Chocolate in Switzerland (but of course!) This article comes from Gourmet News, a great trade publication covering the specialty-food market. If you're a food writer or editor, you need this magazine in your arsenal, and I don't say that just because its editor, Joanne Friedrick, is my friend and former co-worker. You might even qualify for a free subscription.
posted by Unknown
Wednesday, September 5
You know, some days it just doesn't pay to read the nutrition news.
First, the Yahoo!DailyNews has a story saying coffee is bad for you because it can cause temporary hardening of the arteries.
ah, but the very next story says coffee is good for you .
I still don't get it. Where's my powdered creamer and my NutraSweet? Maybe the lesson here is not to depend on Yahoo!DailyNews for my nutrition advice, eh?
Before I forget, subscribe to FoodWords!
Please? Thanks! Yeah, it's free, cheapskates. Yeah, you can forward it as long as you include lots of fawning remarks about how wonderful it is. No, "You get what you pay for" is not a fawning remark!
posted by Unknown
Shocking news, kids: Chocolate might actually be good for you! Yes, it's all true: some professors at the University of California at Davis did research back in the 1990s that found chocolate has antioxidant properties -- good for your heart, keeps you young, etc. That's not really new news, but the news is that the researchers spoke at a press conference yesterday at Davis.
Here's the story that moved on the Infobeat wire Tuesday (not the greatest news
source, but we pass no judgment):
http://www.infobeat.com/articles/news_health_2_90401.html
Here's the original announcement from 1996:
http://www-pubcomm.ucdavis.edu/newsreleases/09.96/news_chocolate.html
and the original (and enlightening and easy to read) FAQ on the research:
http://waterhouse.ucdavis.edu/chocolate.html
and here's the bio on Alan L. Waterhouse, the Davis professor whose day job is wine chemistry but who apparently moonlights with chocolate. (Note the chocolate link):
http://waterhouse.ucdavis.edu
Who knew UC-Davis was such a foodie paradise? Here are a professor's odes to two of life's essentials, and two major research targets (you can't say Davis doesn't have its priorities straight):
An Ode to Chocolate:
http://listproc.ucdavis.edu/class/200101/nutrition20-w01/0018.html
Later on, we move to the hard stuff. An Ode to Wine:
http://listproc.ucdavis.edu/class/200101/nutrition20-w01/0019.html
Still not enough chocolate information for you? Here's yet another link, to
a past exhibit at the Exploratorium, a fantastic children's museum in San Francisco:
http://www.exploratorium.edu/exploring/exploring_chocolate/index.html
All these links came from UC-Davis sources. Okay, I found them while prowling around the site. Food pros take note: Davis is an excellent source for all kinds of food information. Seriously, kids.
posted by Unknown
Tuesday, September 4
subscribe to FoodWords!
posted by Unknown
Sunday, September 2
Now, now now it's working! Yippee! I guess it just takes a long, looooooong time. whew!
posted by Unknown
Hi everybody! Here's the new Weblog for FoodWords. Check here to see what tasty morsels I found while trolling the Net for work and pleasure. The inaugural issue of FoodWords was posted Sunday, Sept. 2. If you want to subscribe, click here:
mailto:join-foodwords@burst.sparklist.com . Thanks for visiting!
posted by Unknown
