Proponents of raw milk claim this magical elixir can cure childhood asthma and even allergies. I’m skeptical, but the evidence is overwhelming that the unpasteurized stuff goes down easier for lactards. But it doesn’t protect against stomach viruses.
Although I really like Straus Family Creamery’s pasteurized-but-not- homogenized milk in the glass bottle with the cream on […]

CheckBiotech.org: Europe’s Food Safety Authority has ruled that a genetically-modified cotton plant, which can be used in food as cottonseed oil, presents no cause for concern. No word on whether the EU will require such derived ingredients to be labeled as GM and let consumers decide whether they want to take the risk.
Access North Georgia […]

Greetings from Pensacola, FL, which our most loyal readers (the ones related to us) will remember I last wrote about in June, when the Potato and I visited my grandmother. I’m back here for Christmas, having just survived a hellish bout of stomach flu.
It’s been a long week, and I’m only just now feeling sort […]

Washington Post: Three new installments in the paper’s excellent series “Harvesting Cash,” about federal agriculture subsidies — “Federal Subsidies Turn Farms Into Big Business,” about how the largest family farms receive the largest share of subsidies, “A Big Farm, but Not So Big It Could Get By Without Subsidies,” about the caught-in-the-middle operators who need […]

Daily Telegraph: Scientists have found that stomach bacteria may affect weight gain, by impacting how many calories are derived from a food item. One person may extract more calories thanks to the bacteria.
San Francisco Chronicle: California’s Assembly is considering a ban on the use of trans fats in restaurants and cafeterias.
Independent Online: The H5N1 […]

Inspired by Omniho’s post on broth, I decided to confess to some fruitful cooking about which I have little clue. I’ve been making sauces lately without really knowing what I’m doing, but the results have been tasty.
Yes, I have cookbooks that discuss sauce-making, not to mention Sokolow’s The Saucier’s Apprentice, which I have yet […]

The fine folks at The Gawker have skewered the language of bloggers. The list was shared around our virtual newsroom, eliciting a few chuckles and snorts. After brief examination, we find ourselves guilty of using a few of the clichés. Oy.
We may drop one or two, but give up the -y affix […]

BusinessWeek.com: Welcome to the dietgeist, BW — the top bizmag says a movement to celebrate local farmers is sweeping the country. While Whole Foods has led the way among corporations, other food chains are also playing up local produce, including Kroger, Publix, and Food Lion. Even Wal-Mart is running a “Salute to America’s Farmers” […]

You know what I love about being sick? Nothing!
The particularly irritating thing about my current cold is that I can’t taste anything. However, I did make some chicken broth. Actually, I’ve been making chicken broth for a long time, I just didn’t realize it.
I learned from Chickenman that the best way to cook […]

Curious asks: “Does Washington state have special rules for selling raw dairy products in state? I thought the FDA put the ax to selling raw milk awhile ago….”
Broadly speaking, the FDA has jurisdiction over food safety that involves food that crosses state lines. Individual states have jurisdiction over the in-state sale of raw milk, […]

L.A. Times: Think corn is the king of U.S. cash crops? Think again. An analyst is claiming that another C-crop, one also written about by Michael Pollan, is the biggest. Hint: California grows a third of it.[Thanks Rachel!]
San Francisco Chronicle: The E. coli outbreaks have farmers scared of encouraging anything that will attract animal life, […]

Last week our CSA box was full almost entirely of greens. We had a sizable bag each of arugula, spinach, bitter greens, and baby lettuces. According to the newsletter, we had narrowly missed getting bok choi as well.
I like salad, and I especially like it right now, when I’m constantly being mugged by holiday cookies […]

I’ve lost track of the post where the local mushroom CSA was discussed - oh, there it is, but I’ll give this topic a full post just the same.
Provisions Mushroom CSA is piggy-backing on Helsing Junction CSA Farm’s delivery system to provide mushrooms. Their information is not available on Helsing Junction’s web site, nor […]

United Nations: According to a draft report by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Org., 190 of the more than 7,600 breeds in the FAO global database of farm animal genetic resources have become extinct since 1990, and 1,500 more are deemed at risk of extinction.
Sacramento Bee*: We knew this was coming — irradiation is being […]

Last week the Economist wrote about the movement to “vote with your trolley” [shopping cart] and essentially argued the best thing that concerned citizens could do to fight global warming was to boycott organic food.
I’m joking, but the article inspired a thousand Web rants and refutations – even making it into Dan Mitchell’s What’s Online […]