Back in 1998 Rolling Stone published the first of several articles by Eric Schlosser that would become the 2001 nonfiction bestseller Fast Food Nation. The magazine’s Dec. 14, 2006 issue, the one with Snoop Dogg on the cover, has a riveting feature — titled “Boss Hog” and detailing Smithfield Foods’ hog-farming operations — that […]

Not to be outdone by a list of favorites from our old stomping grounds, we here in the Puget Sound region have our own list of fine foods to celebrate. With one exception, we had not encountered these treats before 2006.
1. Fish Brewing Company’s Winterfish: This seasonal, organic beer from Olympia - well […]

‘Tis the season to make year-end lists. In honor of the last day of 2006, here are my ten favorite local delicacies. Amazingly, I had never tasted any of them before this year.
1. Marshall’s Farm Marin wildflower honey: I used to think honey came in plastic bears and tasted sweet and nothing else. This amazingly […]

Our motto was, “Spit and go!” Our task was monumental: Ten wineries, two livers, and eight hours until our dinner reservations. This was our 2005 Oregon wine tour.

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 […]

“There’s shit in the meat.”
That’s the money quote from the movie version of Eric Schlosser’s “Fast Food Nation,” released last month, that reverberated as I scanned the Google News headlines about how nine Taco Bells in New Jersey and Long Island are closed on suspicions they gave 39 people E. coli poisoning, two of them […]

New York Times*: Our Daily Bread, a new documentary opening today, takes viewers inside the industrial food chain with no narration or text. Writes the reviewer: “[It] can be extremely difficult to watch, but the film’s formal elegance, moral underpinning and intellectually stimulating point of view also make it essential. You are what you eat; […]

As if Thanksgiving shoppers didn’t have enough trouble distinguishing from among the labels natural, free range, organic, and heritage, now there’s another distinction to watch out for: heirloom vs. heritage.
(Thanks to Jack & Joanne for pointing this out, unfortunately too late for the print version of my story “Celebrating Thanksgiving, Berkeley-style,” in the Berkeleyan, which […]

Slate: What makes a steak taste good? In this well-done primer on beef — a must-read article for meat lovers — Mark Schatzker delivers an overview of the effects of marbling (how the USDA determines the grade), breed, feed, hormones, and aging. And then he conducts a taste test with USDA Prime “conventional” beef (wet […]

A few months ago, I noticed a new brand at Berkeley Bowl, the local independent supermarket where I buy a lot of my meat and dairy. Western Grasslands, the beef I’ve been buying since becoming a born-again carnibore in 2002, had been replaced by something called Panorama Grass-Fed Meats.
The next time I saw the blue […]

Grist magazine: Tom Philpott gets cranky over school lunches, where the new “hot opportunity” as defined by the Wall Street Journal lies in selling processed crap to schoolkids for breakfast. Philpott, who is fast becoming our favorite reality-based ranter, says that the USDA’s lunch program has been “terribly successful, if your goal is to create […]

As I have mentioned before, the Potato Non Grata and I are not skilled wine tasters, despite all the practicing we do. After our previous experience group-tasting some organic wines (no added sulfites) and ones from organically grown grapes (with sulfites), I had resolved to be more open-minded about the organic ones, and accept that […]

It starts like this…
The Butter Bitch and I are driving home from work late one evening in early May. Both of us officially work on the east side of Lake Washington and have worked nearly 12 hours. The sun has set, but traffic is very light at this time of night. Neither […]

“Getting doned” is how a friend in Portland referred to the consumption of milk and donuts. He rhymed “doned” with stoned because “getting doned” has a satisfyingly stupefying effect. Apparently, being from Nevada isn’t just about guns, gambling, and the mob, but also about how to alter one’s consciousness using everyday food items.
My friend would […]

The Butter Bitch and I celebrated Bastille Day in as close to the French fashion as one can find in Seattle for a reasonable price: Savory crepes and balloon animals at a local crêperie, complete with Lillet and a corny “French Chef” balloonist who was standing in for the regular magician. We considered going to […]