“Things We’ll Never Understand,” #5,988,010:
Look in stores soon for our next exciting publication: Uncle John’s GONE FISHIN’ Bathroom Reader!
Posts Tagged: ‘Food’
January 5, 2012
$736,000 For One Tuna
December 9, 2011
Norway is Out of Butter
No, that is not super-secret spy code language – Norway is really out of butter:
The soaring popularity of a fat-rich fad diet has depleted stocks of butter in Norway creating a looming Christmas culinary crisis.
Norwegians have eaten up the country’s entire stockpile of butter, partly as the result of a “low-carb” diet sweeping the Nordic nation which emphasizes a higher intake of fats.
Our guess is Norwegian farmers will milk this story for all it’s worth. They’ll spread it far and wide. Keep churning it out…
This story is made all the more ironic by the fact that Norway actually looks like a lump of butter that was dropped on the top of Finland and melted down the back of Sweden:
Which is why “Norway” means “What the heck is on my back!?” in Swedish.
November 29, 2011
Horse-Slaughter Plants Legal in U.S. Again
"Mr. Ed says he's extremely cross with you, Mr. President!"
Horse slaughter plants have become legal again, after Congress quietly unbridled restrictions on processing horse meat. President Barack Obama signed the enabling bill on Nov. 18.
The last such plants apparently closed in 2007. One critic:
Cynthia Armstrong, Oklahoma state director of The Humane Society of the United States, responded that Americans don’t eat horses.
“And they don’t want them inhumanely killed, shrink-wrapped and sent to Japan or Belgium for a high priced appetizer. Where and how one makes a living isn’t an issue here. In our culture and in our hearts, the horse holds a lofty place. And it’s not on the barbecue grill,” Armstrong said.
And here’s something we did not know about the three horse-slaughter plants that did operate just a few years ago:
Of the horse meat supplied by the three equine slaughter houses that operated in the U.S., about 10% was sold to zoos to feed their carnivores, and 90% was shipped via air freight to Europe and Japan for human consumption.
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Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader’s HOLIDAY SALE – 30% of all books - goes through December.
October 25, 2011
The “Tuna” At The Restaurant Might Not Be Tuna
There’s a good chance it’s actually “ex-lax fish”:
The sliver of raw fish sold as white tuna at Skipjack’s in Foxborough was actually escolar, an oily, cheaper species banned in Japan because it can make people sick. The Alaskan butterfish at celebrity chef Ming Tsai’s Blue Ginger in Wellesley was really sablefish, traditionally a staple at Jewish delicatessens, not upscale dining establishments.
Those were among the findings of a five-month Globe investigation into the mislabeling of fish. [...]
All 23 white tuna samples tested as some other type of fish, usually escolar, which is nicknamed the “ex-lax’’ fish by some in the industry because of the digestion problems it can cause.
You know what someone has to invent? A handy pocket-fish-DNA-tester that you can take to the restaurant with you. “I’ll have the ahi ahi. And I’ve got my handy pocket-fish-DNA-tester – so watch it mister!” (Or maybe there’s already an app for that?)
September 17, 2011
White House Home Brew
Well who’d a thunk it:
President Obama quaffed beer with 23-year-old Dakota Meyeron Wednesday … a day ahead of presenting the former Marine Sergeant with the Medal of Honor on Thursday. Turns out the beers were some of the special homebrew the White House chefs have been making since last January, a White House spokesman told Obama Foodorama. The President served Meyer White House Honey Blonde Ale.
If you’re anything like us – and we know you are (poor sods) – you’re thinking the same thing we are: That there beer was made in the White House. In other words, it was made in The People’s House. In other other words, that means that that’s OUR BEER! And we want some! (Can we get it delivered? Maybe the Post Office could do it? Could be just what it needs…)
Bonus: It’d make that whole “Wee the People” business make a lot more sense, too…
September 7, 2011
Ben & Jerry’s “Schweddy Balls” Ice Cream
Oh man, we can’t believe that they did this:
We thought it would never happen. When we reported that comedian Ana Gasteyer had spilled the beans on a new Ben & Jerry’s ice cream flavor based on a Saturday Night Live skit that pokes fun at NPR, we thought it would never happen.
But we were wrong. Ben & Jerry’s announced today that “Schweddy Balls” ice cream is on its way to store shelves across the country.
Oh lordy. Here’s the “Schweddy Balls” video. (Oop: It’s at the Ben & Jerry’s link, too.)
May 23, 2011
Hunger-Killing Veggies
Well, one of them is actually a fruit:
“Today, Nourishing the Planet introduces a new series featuring the four vegetables—and one fruit that acts like a vegetable— that you have likely never heard of that are helping to alleviate hunger and poverty.”
Here’s one. First, it looks like this:
3. Spider plant (Cleome gynandra)—also known as African cabbage, spider wisp, and cat’s whiskers—is a wild green leafy vegetable that grows all over tropical Africa, Asia, and the Americas. It is not formally cultivated, but among poor rural communities—especially in the Kalahari and Namib regions of Southern Africa—young leaves are collected, cooked, and eaten like spinach. Spider plant is generally considered a weed, plaguing maize and bean fields in Kenya and other countries. But called mwangani in Swahili, spider plant is highly nutritious and is well adapted to many African ecosystems.
You can read about the rest, including the best ways to prepare each of these foods, over at the link at the top of the page. Bon apppetit!
[pic]
May 17, 2011
A Little Watermelon With Your Explosion?
Better living exploding through chemistry!
Watermelons have been bursting by the score in eastern China after farmers gave them overdoses of growth chemicals during wet weather, creating what state media called fields of “land mines.”
[...]
Prices over the past year prompted many farmers to jump into the watermelon market. All of those with exploding melons apparently were first-time users of the growth accelerator forchlorfenuron, though it has been widely available for some time, CCTV said.
Now here’s a video of an exploding watermelon.
More here.
January 17, 2011
Starbucks Has Yet Another Word For “Large”
A whole new way to annoy coffee drinkers.
We wonder how many times some form of this conversation has taken place in a Starbucks:
Sleepy Morning Customer: I’d like a coffee please.
Snotty Morning Barista: What size?
SMC: Large.
SMB: We don’t have large.
SMC: [blink] What?
SMB: We don’t have large.
SMC: Do you have small?
SMB: No.
SMC: You don’t have small. Okay. Do you have different sizes?
SMB: Yes.
SMC: Is one of them larger than the other?
SMB: We have three sizes.
SMC: [pinches area between eyes] Okay. One of them is larger than the other two, I’m guessing.
SMB: [pause: has to think] Uh, yeah.
SMC: I’ll have that one.
SMB: Which one?
SMC: Oh dear lord…
We can now add a fourth size to Tall, Grande, and Venti: Trenta. (Thankfully, word on the street is you can just ask for the “Bucket o’ Coffee.”)
January 2, 2011
Do They Really Need to Make Chocolate Better?
“The production of high quality chocolate, and the farmers who grow it, will benefit from the recent sequencing and assembly of the chocolate tree genome, according to an international team led by Claire Lanaud of CIRAD, France, with Mark Guiltinan of Penn State, and including scientists from 18 other institutions.”
Hmmm. I’m seeing future headlines along the lines of “DNA evidence reveals who stole the chocolate from the office cupboard.” The horror!
In a related note: The study identified 28,798 chocolate tree genes. 28,798 is also the number of the recipe for “How to Render Lard” at Food.com. A coincidence? We don’t think so…
