Growing food is an art: Amy Franceschini, a San Francisco graphic designer and visual artist, is trying to revive the victory gardens planted during World War II. San Francisco Chronicle
The man who gave us Thunderbird & Boone’s Farm: We were ignoring the news that nonagenarian wine mogul Ernest Gallo has died — until now. Jon Bonné has come to bury the cranky old coot, not praise him. San Francisco Chronicle There’s something positive that we haven’t seen mentioned in any of the obituaries: according to a Wine News 2000 cover story, Gallo’s Sonoma operation is sustainable, even practically organic in its practices, thanks to Ernest’s late brother Julio.
Bees here, now: More insight into the rent-a-bee business being plagued by “colony collapse disorder” — some blame poor management. Almost 70 percent of all the transportable beehives in the U.S. are currently in California now for the almond pollination.RecordNet
Caviar emptor: Who knew that sturgeon near Sacramento are being farmed for caviar? Although commercial fishing of wild sturgeon is illegal in California, the lucrative black market continues to motivate poachers, and they’re taking a serious toll on the wild stock. Fascinatingly, the chief taster at Sterling Caviar in Natomas is the son of working-class Mexican immigrants. Sacramento Bee*
Trojan corn: The Mexican government is responding to the “tortilla crisis” of rising corn prices by importing tons of U.S. transgenic grain. Latin American Press
Colossal haul: The story behind how the world’s largest squid was caught in January, by a fishing vessel in the Antarctic hunting for the endangered toothfish. The 990-pound frozen carcass of the squid is going to be donated to a museum. It’s a gripping story, but we can’t help thinking: There oughta be a law against this kind of fishing. Newsweek
Sam & Ella in your jar?: ConAgra has extended its recall of Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter all the way back to products sold since October 2004. FDA.gov
Rice work if you can get it: Indian rice growers may benefit from GM contamination of U.S. rice, as the EU looks elsewhere for imports. Dow Jones But with the Indian government busily promoting and subsidizing GM trials, it’s only a matter of time before India’s crops are contaminated, too.
They shoot hunters, don’t they?: A “sportsmen’s club” was fined just $400 for tying dozens of live turkeys to straw bales as targets in an archery contest. Disgusting. Post-Gazette
“Food and joy = health”: The first chapter from sociologist Barry Glassner’s “Gospel of Food” argues that Americans unhealthy relationship to food originates in the fact that we don’t rank enjoying it very highly. New York Times
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Humor:
March 10th, 2007 at 5:52 pm
Sacramento Sturgeon: I believe Sterling has been doing this for many years; Joanne and I have had theirs a couple of times a few years ago. We’ve been wondering if the quality of it will get it into high-end restaurants…I see on their website that they have three quality levels and I don’t know which ones we’ve had. We haven’t had it recently.
When we lived in Clearwater, FL, dining at Bern’s Steak House, you had a choice of 20 caviars. I keep wondering if there’s any place in the Bay Area that even has ten different caviars. Our one visit to Tsar Nicolai at the Ferry Terminal was not positive.
March 11th, 2007 at 7:23 am
India’s experience with organic cotton has not been great (see http://organicnote.com/view/show/311) : “Cows in India are being poisoned to death by grazing on genetically modified Bt cotton.”
March 11th, 2007 at 10:24 am
Bees here, Now: There was an interesting editorial in the SF Chronicle yesterday from a beekeeper in Pennsylvania, “Could genetically modified crops be killing bees?”
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/10/HOG5FOH9VQ1.DTL
March 11th, 2007 at 11:03 am
hi Ono: You meant “with GM cotton,” right? And yes, we’ve seen a few of those news stories about the Bt-poisoned cattle.
Food Fight: thanks for the link!