Hott Links - - Page 8

by Maids

Is Organic Always Good?

We all know Gansie is a huge proponent of farmer’s market/local produce, and that the nation’s First Lady has recently been a prominent supporter of vegetable garden fun. A lot of my friends belong to this CSA or that CSA. And everyone I know seems to be buying or farming organic these days. Organic is one of those words that often gets bandied about in the local-foodie/farmer’s-markety circles. I was reminded of this fact when ES fan and new ES commenter NeeNee, who also happens to be one of my best friends from undergrad, recently reported to me:

I’m getting my green thumb on. I’ve had a severe problem at garden stores this spring, but we hope to be totally overflowing with veggies this summer. However, good plants grow in good dirt, and our dirt is friggin terrible. It has no organic matter, and we can’t possibly make enough compost to make it good. I’m ashamed to say that I’m not a very organic farmer….

Sorry, NeeNee, I didn’t ask for your permission before I broadcasted your addiction to gardening to the whole world via the interwebs! But as I was saying, I recently read this Huffington Post article on organic farming, Organic vs. Conventional: Have you been robbed?, that led me to question whether organic is really all that good. Now I’m not sure that NeeNee has all that much to be ashamed of. The author of the afore mentioned article,Makenna Goodman, a sustainable-living blogger and free-range egg farmer from Vermont, describes the reason she chose not to farm organic eggs, but instead opts for feeding the chickens cheaper grain and letting them roam free on her bucolic Vermont farm. Makenna argues:

Hott Link: Red Fever

Just some quick breakfast porn for ya’ll. This recipe caught my eye since C. Christy was wondering a couple weeks back ’bout whether putting red velvet in cupcakes was flagrantly un-kosher (is there a southern equivalent for kosher?)

Anyway, I’m gonna say it’s definitely A-OK, because southern food guru Doug DuCap of Hugging the Coast is putting it all up in his pancakes! I know it’s food coloring, but still, that’s a damn pretty plate. Is it the weekend yet? I’m ready for brunch.

Red Velvet Pancakes with Brandied Cherry Butter [Hugging the Coast]

by BS

Robots Confirm: Human Flesh Tastes Just Like Bacon

This may be helpful when zombie times come. Wired reports:

Researchers have designed the cute little guy to the right: a metal man gastronomist, “an electromechanical sommelier”, capable of identifying wines, cheeses, meats and hors d’oeuvres. Upon being given a sample, he will speak up in a childlike voice and identify what he has just been fed. The idea is that wineries can tell if a wine is authentic without even opening the bottle, amongst other more obscure uses…

But when some smart aleck reporter placed his hand in the robot’s omnivorous clanking jaw, he was identified as bacon. A cameraman then tried and was identified as prosciutto.

Is it weird that I really want to know whether I taste more like bacon or prosciutto? I’m guessing maybe a fine sopressata.

(Photo: Wired)

in Bacon / Pig 6 comments

by gansie

Hott Links: Look What’s Kosher Now

Like a good daughter, I came home to New Jersey for the conveniently mid-week Passover sedars. My mom is fairly strict when it comes to what is kosher for this no-bread, no-grain, not even bubble gum unless it’s Bazooka Jew (the comic strip is in Hebrew) holiday. But because being Jewish is a whole segment ripe for new marketing campaigns, every year there’s more and more that the religious can digest for these carb-less eight days. Here are the highlights.

One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor [LA Times]

Ancient grains are so hott [Courier Post]

Coke uses real sugar [Huffington Post]

photo: My mom’s baked cheese open face Matzah sandwich

in Cheese / Holiday / Sandwich 3 comments

by BS

Is Gefilte Fish the New Bacon?

That’s Heeb Magazine’s question, noting the oft-maligned Passover appetizer is having a bit of a foodie moment. Personally, I have to be honest. I never tried this at sedars when I was a kid — why would you eat gooey fish balls when there were fried latkes to be had? — and somehow I have managed to never come across it as an adult. It’s true — I’ve never had gefilte fish. I know, worst half-Jew ever.

Is it really as bad as people say? Or as good as those other people say? Maybe I’ll go out and buy some this Pesach. Or Maybe I’ll just catch a gefilte fish wrestling match:

(Photo: Eszter)

in Fish / Holiday / Personal 5 comments

by gansie

Fettuccine In a Sea of Injera

Over Inauguration weekend, 80P and I crashed a dinner for Liza’s out of town guests. Her friend was in from, um, Nebraska or Iowa or North Dakota, no wait, Montana. And Liza wanted to show off DC’s Ethiopian food. Unfortunately, everyone else in the city thought the same.

We finally found a place that wouldn’t be over an hour wait. But that was only after we spotted an Italian restaurant, La Carbonara, in Little Ethiopia. I scanned the outside menu and pledged to come back: there was fettuccine alfredo to be had.

And so I’ve returned. Actually a few times. I’ve gotten to know Chu Chu, the owner and sometimes chef. I’ve also gotten to slurp down plenty of creamy noodles.

I love Chu Chu’s story: He grew up in Ethiopia, then worked in an Italian restaurant in Italy, then opened up an Ethiopian restaurant in Italy and now lives in the United States and owns an Italian restaurant in Little Ethiopia.

Confused? Read on.

Hidden Pleasure: Italian Restaurant La Carbonara [Express]

Photo: Express

in Uncategorized 4 comments

by BS

Pig Progress: Very Necessary Eating Inventions Roundup

– “Cook better, look better, bite better” with the triple-spiral slicer Wunder Weener.

– Everyone give a big round of thanks to Sweden for FINALLY inventing a 100-percent real bacon product that comes in a tube. Behold Squeez Bacon.

– And at long last, a product that gets that bacon-y smell where you need it the most: Bacon Lube.

*I’ll let you readers decide which, if any, of these new products are April Fools jokes. Personally, I’m going to go ahead and believe in them all. The world is better that way.

More Bacon: Recipes, raves and other bacon bits in Endless Bacon.

in Bacon / Endless Bacon / Pig 2 comments