5 second rule

Recommendations

Okay, first of all, my internet, phone line, and cable have all been down for the past 3 hours. 

I know.

I could live without the phone and cable indefinitely, but asking me to make do without internet is a bit much.  I had the major DTs and wandered my house looking for non-electronic things to do.  I ended up cleaning out my kitchen's junk drawer/spice cabinet, a horror show of colorful powders, stale seeds, and mangled twist ties.  Oh, I found rubber bands, about 500 pens, 6 dried out highlighters, 14 mismatched post-its, 4 pairs of scissors, 3 box cutters, 2 turtle doves and a partridge in a pear tree.

It actually felt really good to get organized.  I also did a little laundry, but I assume you have no interest in the minutiae of my clothes-washing habits.  If I'm wrong, you've got bigger problems than I'm qualified to solve.

Still down.  Still down.  Couldn't check email, post pithy comments on the blog, waste time on Facebook.  Couldn't work on my articles because I needed internet access for my research.  What to do?

Well, cook, given that it's nearly Thanksgiving, yadda yadda yadda. So I roasted up some turkey drumsticks for stock/gravy, made my favorite Thanksgiving Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Pecan Crumble, and threw together a batch of no-knead bread dough. 

But I've got to be perfectly frank with you: I still haven't picked a turkey recipe, OR a stuffing recipe.  I'm leaving those two to the last minute because I can never decide which way to go.  So help a girl out, please.  Today I'm asking YOU for your favorite turkey and/or stuffing recipes and recommendations.  You can either post a link or just describe the dish below. 

And while you're at it, I'm in desperate need of some new songs for my iPod.  One can only listen to Within Your Reach, Train in Vain, Brandy (You're a Fine Girl), or Someday, Someway so many times without one's head exploding.  Can somebody please bring me into this decade?

So, to recap your assignment, I need:

-your favorite (tried and true, please) turkey ideas; and/or

-your favorite (tried and true, please) stuffing ideas; and/or

-3 recommendations for my iPod, preferably for songs released since the turn of the millennium.

Ready, go.

Civility

Shrimp is a shellfish.  Avocado is a fruit masquerading as a vegetable.  Sour cream is a dairy product.  Corn tortillas are a grain.  Somehow, even though they have little in common, these four foods from different backgrounds manage to get along just fine.

Why are people so consistently unable to do the same?

A house across the street from my kids' elementary school has an enormous yellow political banner draped across its front.  It's huge. The message is loud and clear and relates to one of the California propositions.  (No, it's not Prop 2.) 

Now, I don't know this family, but I saw the mom yesterday when I walked past the house. I said hello, as did she.  We smiled.  Her dog came up and wagged its tail at me.  Friendly lady.  Friendly dog.

And I couldn't possibly disagree with her politics more.  I think she's dead wrong on this issue.  But I do respect her right to drape a ridiculously large banner across her house, if that's what she feels she needs to do.  It's her property, and she obviously feels strongly about this issue. 

I'm still going to say hello to her, smile, and pet her dog.  That's what people in a community do, right? Whether or not they share the same values?

This morning, I walked by the house again.  Someone had parked a white van in front of her walkway.  The van's back window was painted, in enormous white letters, with the words "BIGOTS LIVE HERE" and an arrow pointing toward her house.  The side window proclaimed, "God hates haters," a pointed reference because the family, from what I've heard, is devout.

Now as much as I disagree with this woman's political stance, I am sickened, SICKENED that someone feels it's appropriate to park a car in front of her house, label her a bigot, and express this vitriol in front of an elementary school.  I assume the car's owner has a legal right to do this since it's parked on a public street, but who in their right mind thinks this is the best way to express political disagreement?

I know this post isn't much about food today, but sometimes I wonder what's happened to civil society.

Have a taco, and consider bringing one to your neighbors.  Whether you agree with their politics or not.

Sponsorship

I heard about this on NPR last weekend and thought it was a joke.  It wasn't.

An assistant professor at the University of Montana brokered a deal with a local taco joint called El Diablo to sponsor his U.S. history class.  On the first day of class, the professor displayed El Diablo's logo on a projector screen, handed out El Diablo stickers, mentioned the business in class and printed its logo on the course syllabus.  In return, the restaurant paid the history department $250.

Here's some context from the local paper, the Missoulian:

Last June, the [history] department ran out of paper and toner for the copying machine...  Professors had to ride out the rest of the semester without printing or making copies.  'We're struggling for basic everyday needs,' [the professor] said, because of the rising cost of school supplies.

The professor learned after the fact that his actions violated departmental policy and promised to conform to the rules in the future.  But he still maintains that the university should allow advertising in the classroom.

(The university's attorney disagrees.)

Is it me, or does this just raise all the hairs on the back of your neck?  I'm waiting for my friend Andrew-the-econ-professor to weigh in because I'd love to know what he thinks.

If we let El Diablo into the classroom, how long will it take before big national chains and food companies follow suit?  They're already in the stadiums.

I can see it now.  "Welcome to Nutrition 101.  Today's discussion on sugars and fats is sponsored by Biffy's Donuts, the softest, freshest donuts in town."

Seriously?

Doctor, my eyes
Tell me what is wrong
Was I unwise to leave them open for so long
-- Jackson Browne, 1972

I think my local newspaper has lost its mind.  Dropped off its rocker.  Fallen and can't get up.  I seriously question the sanity of whoever is now in charge of the food section.

Let me begin by saying, in all seriousness, that the San Jose Mercury News gave me my first break in the food writing world.  It published my first two food articles ever, and for that I will always be grateful.

And the economy is terrible.  And the newspaper industry is suffering.  And the Merc is really, really suffering, particularly the now bare-bones Food section which is pulling nearly all its content off the wire services.  I know they're looking for a new writer, and I hope they find him or her soon.  Very, very, very soon.  Actually sooner, if yesterday's Food section is any indication of where things are headed.  (I responded to an ad saying I'd be happy to contribute freelance content, but I'm not expecting many calls after this blog post.)

Which brings me to Marshmallow Fluff.  

The top-of-the-fold headline of yesterday's Food section blares: "Lunch lessons" and then "What will get your kid excited about the brown bag? Ask a squirrel."  Okay, fine, so it's another article about how to jazz up kids' lunches.  Anyone who has read a food magazine, newspaper, or foodie website (including this one) knows that school lunches are a hot topic in early September.  The focus is generally on how we can make kids' lunches more creative and more healthful -- by incorporating more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.  (See last week's article in the SF Chronicle.)

So, yesterday's article offered 8 ideas for getting creative with peanut butter.

Here's 1 of my 2 favorite recipes:

Fluffy: Mix 1/4 cup each of marshmallow fluff and creamy peanut butter with 1 tablespoon corn syrup.  Spread on mini-pitas, top with strawberry pieces.  Makes 8 mini-pitas.

Wow, I mean, where do I begin with this?  Let me say I've eaten a few Fluffernutter sandwiches in my time (back in the 80s), and all my memories are good.  But never in my wildest dreams, in my richest, most preposterous fantasies, did it occur to me to add corn syrup to a Fluffernutter sandwich.  Here's what's in Fluff already: corn syrup, sugar syrup, vanilla flavor, egg white. 

Oh, well, I could see why it might not be sweet enough. 

My second favorite recipe suggestion is this:

Indulgent: Melt 2 tablespoons of semisweet chocolate chips and stir into an ounce of cream cheese and 1/4 cup peanut butter.  Pair with all-fruit spread (try black cherry) on bagels.  Serves 4.

SO, let's see, we need cream cheese, and peanut butter, and melted chocolate chips, and, just to make sure it's sweet enough since melted chocolate can be kind of, I don't know, ascetic, some fruit spread.  In other words, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with cream cheese and melted chocolate.  For your kid's lunchbox.

Here's my question: If you give your kids the Fluffy on Monday and the Indulgent on Tuesday, what are you going to send on Wednesday?  A box of sugar cubes with melted chocolate dipping sauce and a sippy cup of corn syrup?

Seriously?

Shrinkage

Oh my God, it's true.  Packages are getting smaller, and many of us aren't even noticing.

This article in the New York Times explains what's going on.  Remember those half-gallons of ice cream that so seductively perched in your grocer's freezer?  A relic, apparently.  Many top brands are now offering a quart and a half or a quart and three quarters rather than the standard 64 ounce (half gallon) size.  And you'd better believe there's no blaring seal affixed to the container screaming, "Now! With less ice cream!"

When I read the article, I only half believed it.  But walking through my local supermarket yesterday brought the reality home.  We're either paying more for the same quantity of food, or we're paying less for, well, less.  Which is better?

I'm a stickler for transparency.  The more knowledge, the better.  Not that I can fault Breyer's ($4.99/1.75 quarts) or Dreyer's ($4.99/1.5 quarts) for coming up with a clever solution to make the out-of-pocket price look more reasonable.  Like us, manufacturers are up a creek without a paddle, and it's our responsibility as consumers to look closely at the per unit price.  But I'd rather feel the sting of the sticker shock up front and deal with it rather than scratch my head, wondering if my ice cream is really more expensive or if I'm simply getting fewer scoops per carton. 

I've become that crazy lady in the market, emitting ever-more-audible "oh my gods" as I push my cart through the aisles.  At Trader Joe's, which doesn't seem to be playing this game (to my knowledge), 12 ounces of Organic Grade B maple syrup has been increasing steadily in price.  It's now $7.99/bottle.  But the bottle still holds 12 ounces, which I appreciate.  I've started buying less syrup, and will continue to do so until the price comes down.

I suppose people who only have, say, $50 to spend on groceries per week may feel like they're benefiting, in a roundabout way, from the smaller-packaging system.  They can still spend their $50 and continue to get the same variety of products as they did before, albeit fewer ounces' worth. 

But it's all a shell game, isn't it?

Morels/Morals

If you go to a restaurant, and it's simply not as good as you'd hoped, how do you react?  Do you start sending food back when it disappoints?  Do you mention your dashed expectations to a manager?  Or do you suck it up, pay your bill, and chalk up the experience to the inherent risks we all take when dining out?  Perhaps it depends on your mood, your age, the price point of the restaurant, or whether you're trying to impress your dining companion. 

Perhaps it depends on all of the above.

I used to be a complainer.  I think I was fair, but I was taught that when customers paid hard-earned money for a meal, they had a right to food prepared just the way they liked.  But I've moderated this stance somewhat as I've gotten older. The more I eat out (and I ate out a lot as a reviewer), the more I've come to accept that my tastes have gotten fussier and harder to please.  This isn't necessarily the restaurant's "fault."  If the curry isn't spicy enough, it may just not be spicy enough for me.  I won't send it back, but I also won't order it again.

An out of town friend recently visited me in San Jose.  We met for dinner at a popular restaurant in a chi chi neighborhood.  Entrees floated above $20.  I'd had a mediocre lunch there a few years earlier, but we decided to give it another shot.

Mistake.

Both of our soups were awful.  My friend sent hers back, as well as her Diet Coke because it tasted funny.  I couldn't eat more than 3 spoonfuls of my soup.  But I felt torn: I'd ordered a carrot vichyssoise, which is a weird thing for me to have ordered in the first place.  Cold creamy carrot soup with truffle oil?  I should have known better. I pushed the bowl aside.  The waitress noticed it immediately, but after expressing appropriate sympathy for our two previous complaints, she whisked my full soup bowl away without asking what was wrong.  I don't blame her.

On to the entrees.  Because I'm someone who often makes entree selections based on the accompaniments, when I saw a lamb dish with morels I pounced.  It sounded great on paper.

But the lamb arrived sans morels.  Standard white buttons took their place. 

Now, morels are an unusual, specialty mushroom.  They're expensive, and rare, depending on the season.  They're fancy.  Plus, they're what convinced me to order the overpriced lamb dish in the first place. 

I was annoyed.  Did they not think I'd notice? 

So, my questions: Do you think this was an honest mistake in the kitchen, where a cook simply placed the wrong kind of mushrooms on the plate?  (The manager's explanation.)

Or, do you think this popular, overpriced restaurant regularly sends out cheap button mushrooms and wagers that only 1 in 5 customers (pick your odds) will speak up?

Or, perhaps, the kitchen usually sends out morels but ran out just this once?

What would you have done if you'd been at our table, given the entire context of our meal? Let's have a discussion about the moral of my morel bait-and-switch.

After your comments are in, I'll leave a final comment with how things played out.

Corn

photo by iowa spirit walker, reprinted under a Creative Commons License

Whenever I see a full page ad in a major newspaper, I'm immediately suspect.  I haven't a clue how much these ads cost, but I know they're not cheap. An organization, corporation, or religiously or politically-minded group willing to fork over that much cash simply must be on the defensive.

Don't you think?

Page A5 of today's New York Times features a huge ear of corn emblazoned with the words, "And now, a little food for thought."

Here's the accompanying text:

A little sweetness in life is good.  And what sweetens lots of our favorite foods and beverages are sugars made from corn, such as high fructose corn syrup.  It has the same natural sweeteners as table sugar and honey.  And the same number of calories.  But like most foods, sweeteners should be enjoyed in moderation.  Please visit our website and learn the facts.  We welcome a healthy discussion.

Of course, the ad was sponsored by the Corn Refiner's Assocation in response to the still-raging debate over the nutritive value, or lack thereof, of high fructose corn syrup.  I should have some clarity on this issue, but I don't.  I simply avoid HFCS because I avoid nearly all processed food and that's generally where HFCS is found.  (Please don't mention the occasional camping-trip Pringles.)

I've read for years that HFCS promotes obesity, is sweeter than sugar, is more concentrated, symbolizes big, evil agribusiness, and so on and so on and so on.  But not all of these things are true. At least, they may not all be true.  The noise on both sides makes the facts extremely difficult to parse.

But is a giant ad the answer, or will it simply create even more confusion?  The ad leads the readers to a website, where the CRA presents its "facts" through the lens of blatant self-interest.  That's going to do more harm than good, at least for me.

Respected author Michael Ruhlman recently offered these thoughts in the comments section of his own blog:

I haven't studied the situation carefully, but my understanding is ... [that] there's nothing inherently evil about HFCS, it's the fact that it's allowed agribusiness to create really unhealthy food very cheaply. the crappy food, sweetened by this cheap sugar, is the real danger. same as saying salt is bad for you. in fact you will die without salt. salt in the cheetos and ketchup and campbells chicken noodle soup is what's bad for you.

And I think I agree.  It's not the HFCS per se. It's what the syrup is in.  And what the syrup is in, I'm afraid to say, is usually gross.

Which is reason enough to avoid it.

Maybe I should take out a big ad in tomorrow's paper. 

Anyone got a few bucks?

I'll take the burger, the fries, and a large Orwell, please

 

Photo by Bonnie Burton, reprinted under a Creative Commons License

I've got no beef with technology.  That said, the increasingly automated nature of certain segments of the food industry does give me pause. A recent article from the Canadian Broadcasting Centre (CBC) introduces us to HyperActive Bob, a robot designed to minimize the involvement of actual people during the fast food experience.  According to the article's author, "Despite being one of the world's largest industries, fast food restaurants still depend far too much on human involvement..."

Far too much on human involvement, eh? Without human involvement a fast food restaurant is essentially a vending machine.  With a drive-through.

Enter Bob, a robotic sensor mounted on a restaurant's rooftop that detects incoming traffic and tells the staff to start cooking.  I know you haven't decided what to order yet, but Bob isn't concerned with such trivialities.

"While early versions of the system tried to profile vehicles and guess what the occupants might order -- a minivan entering the lot could indicate children approaching, for example -- Bob now works on statistics derived solely on traffic volumes."

Woah, not so fast there, Sally.  This early version may have been abandoned, but it still provokes THE SHIVERS that someone tried to predict my order based on the make and model of my car. 

And there's more.  McDonald's in Venezuela uses biometrics -- sensors reading fingerprints and handprints -- to confirm that employees have actually reported to work.  "'You'd save not just on payroll expenses but on supervision,' says Peter Cheesman, marketing director for the International Biometric Group in New York.  'If you don't need someone watching people clock in and clock out... you can save thousands of man hours.'" 

I bet you can. And we may very well be at a point in our society where biometrics have their place -- in airports, perhaps, and certainly at nuclear power plants.  But at a burger joint? 

Really?

Yes, Johnny, have another ding dong. Apparently it's good for you.

photo by James at 42, reprinted under a creative commons license

The Times of London just ran an article with this genius headline: “Too much healthy eating is as bad for children as too much junk.” Pardon? You mean the whole wheat bread I feed my kids is actually harming them? What’s tomorrow’s headline going to say – death by quinoa?

According to the article (which you can read here), some British children are suffering from “muesli belt malnutrition” defined as “the overzealous application of ‘healthy eating’ rules imposed on their daily food intake.” It goes on to say, “A recent study warns us that too much fibre and too little fat can lead to vitamin deficiencies and stunts growth in the under-fives.”

Now, I’m not sure a U.S. media source could get away with quoting “a recent study” without telling us who conducted it and, even more important, who commissioned it. Maybe Cadbury Schweppes funded the research. Maybe a pissed off four-year-old did. Seems relevant, though, no?

And for the record, I don't take issue with the crux of the story, which suggests that children shouldn't eat high-fiber foods like whole grains, fruits, and vegetables to the exclusion of dairy, fish, eggs, and meat. But most reasonable parents already understand the concept of a balanced diet. (Reasonable vegetarian parents, of course, balance their kids' diets with higher fat foods like nuts and seeds and protein-rich offerings like beans, pulses, and tofu.) 

But equating whole wheat and leafy greens with Ding Dongs and Bugles?  Please.

Stealth Health

photo by thefemgeek, reprinted under a creative commons license

MANY OF US are sick and tired of being told what to eat. We're educated enough to understand that saturated and trans fats are harmful, that whole grains are beneficial and that we should be eating fruits and vegetables by the truckload—or at least in far greater quantities than we're doing now.

But when we dine out, it's tough to find dishes that fulfill these directives that we actually crave. Either we order the "healthy" items and feel deprived, or we indulge in the standard fare that's probably not very good for us. This dichotomy can drive an adventurous but health-conscious eater insane. Why do we have to choose between what's good for us and what tastes good when eating out?

Recently a group of seemingly diverse but like-minded professionals gathered in Napa to address this very question and to offer some hope. At the third annual Worlds of Healthy Flavors retreat at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA), top nutrition scientists from the Harvard School of Public Health met with corporate chefs of several major restaurant chains and volume food-service companies to discuss this disconnect.

The scientists provided sobering data on soaring rates of obesity, cardiac disease and Type 2 diabetes but also provided insight into how we can reverse these trends using food that's readily available. Culinary experts from the CIA as well as foodie icons like Rick Bayless and Mollie Katzen were on hand to demonstrate how chefs who serve thousands of meals daily (we're not talking independent restaurants here, but major national chains, hotels, and colleges and universities) can rethink traditional meals to make them bold and exciting while improving their health profile enormously—all without making a big show of how much healthier the food is because we still equate healthy with tasteless and boring. The group termed this new approach "stealth health." In other words, if people don't know the new menu choices are better for them, they're actually more likely to enjoy the food—so long as it tastes great. And that's the key.

So how do you do this? Simple: restaurants that subscribe to this philosophy won't remove menu items that people love, but will provide more exciting choices with improved flavor profiles to tempt us in other directions. Corporate chefs and menu designers will begin to think about flavor first, borrowing techniques and ingredients from other cultures that make standard fare sing with fewer of the bad things (unhealthy oils, excess carbs, refined sugars) and more of the good (healthy oils, produce and whole grains). No one's going to complain so long as the food boasts knockout flavors and satisfies our need to feel indulged when we eat out.

Now I'm sure there are naysayers out there who will complain that it's nobody's job to keep you healthy but you, and if you want to keep downing your bacon double cheeseburgers and Big Gulps you should be able to—and you will. But there may soon come a day when the rest of us will be able to eat out—on the road, at an airport, in a hotel—without feeling that every choice on the menu is either a heart attack in waiting or a depressing "healthy" meal that tastes like crap.