Endless Simmer - A Food Blog

- Bobby has taken a commanding lead in the Spice Master Who Cooked It Better, but  it ain’t over ’til it’s over - you’ve still got a couple days left, so make sure to cast your vote. Don’t forget to catch the mudslinging.

JoeHoya: My opponent’s dish represents four more meals of the same Middle East strategy.

We hear some shady 527’s are planning last-minute anti-Rosemary push polls.

- Meanwhile, I still don’t know who to believe in the whole raw milk debate:

Jenny: the benefits of raw milk have been illustrated in several studies and the risk of pathogens is incredibly low in raw milk from clean dairies. Pasteurization is simply an excuse to produce dirty milk.

Nikki: So what does raw milk have that pasteurized milk doesn’t…that I NEED to have in order to lead a healthful, fulfilled life? And can I get these properties from another source? Does it have to be dirty milk? And yes, it is dirty. Raw=dirty.

Fearless Kitchen: I’m pretty opposed to government interference in matters of personal choice. If someone wants to drink raw milk I have no problem with their drinking raw milk, with the caveat that they need to know what they’re getting into. And I do like raw milk cheese, proximity to cow hiney notwithstanding. I wouldn’t eat it if my immune system were compromised or if I were expecting or something like that, but since none of these are the case… As for drinking, I’ll stick to beer. Solves the problem for me!

Finally, Rooms digs back to Sarah Palin’s recipes and brings us some much-need scientific knowledge:

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On Rooms’ birthday, we’d like to thank her for her culinary point of view (to sound like the douches from The Next Food Network Star) : science! She’s taught us about the albumin protein of an egg, the relationship between fennel and flatulence and the lives of crabs, no, not that crab.

Happy Birthday, Rooms!

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With BS’s successful citron endeavor behind us, I thought I too would ask “WTF?”

We’ve managed to grow some gorgeous fennel in our garden, but as you can see after the jump, the cuke patch is taking over, and trying to bring the fennel down. It’s harvest time.

I planted this knowing that I like fennel, but am realizing now that it’s go time that I don’t actually know what to do with it. Any ideas folks? I know you’ll come through for me ES readers!

Also some interesting facts about fennel post jump. . .

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We may be famous for our lobstah up here, but I made some damn good crab cakes with some local Maine crab meat last summer that I’ve been meaning to share with you guys. I was reminded after the post a few weeks back. This is an alteration/combination of a recipe from my mom and some Old Bay inspirations. I didn’t have any Old Bay on hand, but I knew I wanted the flavor in there, so I looked up the ingredients and tossed in most of them proportionate to how much I like each spice.

These are wicked good, better than restaurant! Enough talk, recipe after the jump.

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Vs.

Water is food, right? Good, glad we agree. I like to consider myself conscious of the environment, I have a recycle bin at home, in the office and I buy the 365 cleaners from WF, although I do miss the comfort of soft toilet paper. Oh, and I’m also a sucker for gadgets. So last week when a friend of mine who works at an environmental non-profit told me of a reusable filtered water bottle I knew I had to get my hands on one and tell you guys about it. We like to educate and inform here at ES, not just entertain!

The Wellness H2.O Bottle is a reusable plastic bottle with its own water filtration system, kind of like a portable Brita. The company behind the bottle claims that it can filter up to 1100 gallons of water without the need to replace the filter, which they state is a savings of $1,000 in bottled water, if you drink that much bottled water. And for our DC readers this is pretty much mandatory for the water out of our taps!

Read my review after the jump.

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Okay! The first recipe for the first veg harvested from our very own garden this year! I’m so excited! We’ve already been using our radishes for a few weeks on salads, but radishes actually intensify in flavor, and can get pretty spicy the longer you leave them in the ground. Ours were getting quite bitey, and some almost carrot sized, so we needed to harvest them.

Then we needed some way to consume a large amount of spicy radishes, hence the invention of the delicious bounty of goodness pictured above. Looks fabulous, huh?

Recipe after the jump (plus bonus recipe!)

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Ugh. I’ve been freelancing in an office all week, which means I’m currently sharing that universal Friday feeling with all you other desk monkeys out there - the overwhelming need for intoxication. Lucky for you (and me), I’ve got the lowdown on the latest news in drunk city:

- When you’ve just got to go out on a Friday, but you know you’re going to be too tired to even talk to your friends, the go-to strategy is simple: mix your alcohol with a red bull, and you’re an instant social butterfly. But what about when you want to drink yourself further into solitude, when you only want to drink so that you can take a nap? That’s when it’s time to grab yourself some Drank: The anti-energy drink. Supposedly inspired by a cough-syrup-like concoction popular in the Southern hip-hop world, this carbonated, grape beverage is spiked with melatonin, valerian root, and rose hips, and promises to “slow your roll.” Mix it up with some vodka, invite a few friends, and get ready for a slumber party.

- And what about when you wake up on Saturday morning with the urge, to well, keep drinking? Bloody Marys made it acceptable to drink vodka in the a.m., and mimosas did the same thing for Champagne. Now check out the Rosy Dog, a brunch-y invention that finally makes 9 a.m. beer drinking a classy activity.

- Next up on the drinking horizon is a development that only those inventive Japanese folks could have brought us. Space Beer. Necessary? No. Awesome? Yes.

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From time to time I like to check in with my people from across the pond - it’s a relationship with the motherland that I like to keep at a distance, 3k miles to be exact. My point is, there can be, on occasion, the odd little tidbit of news that I take away with so much pride that it makes me so happy to be British. Let me tell you about a few of these food-related anecdotes that I think you might find interesting.

The first piece of this craziness is known as hobnobbing with the Hob Nobs… Keep with me. The Holiday Inn hotel chain in the UK carried out a “quiz” to 1,000 businesses re: biscuits. The results:

About four out of five UK businesses believe the type of biscuit they serve to potential clients could clinch the deal or make it crumble.

For Anglo-American clarification, biscuits in the UK are the equivalent of what you Americans call cookies, generally. I love this:

The chocolate digestive was deemed to make the best impression followed by shortbread and Hob Nobs.

My personal favourites are the Chocolate Hob Nobs, but it just baffles me that this could even be an issue in the boardroom. What do you think, would you be impressed enough with a particular snack in a meeting for it to be a make or break deal?

Read more of my homeland madness after the jump, and drop your thoughts in the comments.

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As we have learned from the current administration, scare tactics work. Apparently there have been some concerns brought up about eating too much soy. So of course people are starting to freak:

Tofu bad?: Is it true that tofu can cause breast cancer? I am worried about that, and also when I am pregnant, should I avoid tofu? As a vegetarian, I eat a fair amount of tofu and am wondering if I should limit my intake of tofu. Thanks!

Kim O’Donnel: the jury is still out on soy. Here’s a link to an article on the controversy. I think everything in moderation is the key. I would also buy organic or locally produced tofu, eliminates the GMO factor. Don’t avoid tofu, but a diverse diet, yes, do that.

But as Ms. KOD confirms from her WaPo chat, soy (just like chocolate and weed**) should be enjoyed in moderation. Americans, of course, over use everything they get their hands on. The article notes that in Japan, soy is consumed in limited amounts, not like the gigantic soy burgers eaten in the U.S. So before all of our veggie friends freak out, keep eating your fake cheese, just do so in a conservative fashion.

**Chocolate and weed were used for emphasis purposes, and not the idea of KOD.

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