Brewer-in-Chief

Just heard this on CBS: Barack Obama recently met with a member of our military at the White House, and served a very special, hard-to-find brew.  Which is strange, since it's made in DC.  Why is it so difficult to find?  It's the White House's own brew. As NPR reported a few months ago, Obama decided to do this for St. Patrick's Day (to honor his partial Irish heritage).  Historians say this is the first time beer has ever been brewed in the White House.  Yep, I would've guessed 1807 or some time around then.

Flying Green Tomatoes

Yesterday's installment of NPR's Fresh Air featured Barry Estabrook, author of Tomatoland, which investigates just why our plump and beautiful supermarket tomatoes also taste like soggy styrofoam. In short, they are bred for weight and aesthetics, not for taste, because the farmers get paid by the pound, not by the "Mmmm":

"For the last 50 or more years, tomato breeders have concentrated essentially on one thing and that is yield — they want plants that yield as many or as much as possible," writer Barry Estabrook tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. "They also want those fruits to be able to stand up to being harvested, packed, artificially turned orange [with ethylene gas] and then shipped away and still be holding together in the supermarket a week or 10 days later." [NPR 2011]

His opening vignette with Gross discusses how a few of these mutant Florida green tomatoes flew off a truck near his car while he was driving down the road. They almost broke his window. But what he later saw was not damaged tomatoes, but still perfectly formed and firm green tomatoes on their way to have whatever it is Big Ag does with that ethylene gas to them to turn them red extra fast.

Click on the link at the beginning to go to the podcast page.

Farmers' Markets of America, Unite!

I just heard on NPR this morning a new series they're doing for their Morning Edition program. They are exploring the farmers' markets of America. Of course, they can't hit all of them. They're just doing a representative sample. The first installment of this series looks at a farmers' market in northeastern Vermont (How much more Yankee-fied can you get?). Here, they're focusing on my old nemesis, the tasty fiddlehead fern which, when prepared incorrectly, could make you very ill.

Presidential Burgers

I saw this the other day on the rarely watched, occasionally unwatchable CBS Early Show. Chef Michael Schlow tailor-made burgers for each of the two major party presidential and vice presidential candidates, using stories, scandals, speeches and Mr/Mrs Potato Heads for inspiration.



In alphabetical order by name:

For Sen. Biden (D-Delaware): Easily the most complicated burger, for the most verbose candidate - the "Bluehen-Footinmouth Burger", made from the official bird of Delaware, the blue hen (or if lacking that, capon or turkey), covered in sauteed blue foot Chanterelle mushrooms. Dijon and rosemary also go on the burger. Perfect for bringing on the Acela Express from Wilmington to Washington.

For Sen. McCain (R-Arizona): a Southwestern-themed patty of short-rib meat, covered in Navy bean paste and a nopal-tomatillo salsa. And well-aged cheddar. Very well-aged. Might be irritable though (for the colon, I mean)!

For Sen. Obama (D-Illinois): the "Barack-o-Burger", using a different ingredient for each of the letters in Obama's name: Onion-Bacon-American cheese-Mayo-Arugula (and Schlow came up with the "arugula" on his own, no dig, he swears!). On 80-20 ground chuck, or preferably Kobe beef, since his campaign has enough to pay for such a burger.

For Gov. Palin (R-Alaska): hockey-puck sliders, hold the lipstick (her words, not mine). And not a moose in sight, dontcha' kno', but they can be made more authentic with moose meat. Serve with Russian dressing to everybody but your brother-in-law.

As usual, the third party candidates are ignored. Any ideas for them? I'm eager to hear ideas for these people:

• Ex. Rep Bob Barr (L-Georgia)
• Ex. Rep. Cynthia McKinney (G-Georgia)
• Consumer advocate Ralph Nader (I-Connecticut)

Now if we could only get rid of Rachael Ray this easily

I have now seen the weirdest news story of the year: Thai prime minister Samak Sundaravej
just lost his job. The reason? He appeared on a Thai cooking show for pay.

Yes, a cooking show.

Granted, there are other things afoot. This was just the catalyst. But still: a cooking show? There are better reasons for demanding the ouster of a prime minister seen by many detractors as a puppet for unpopular former prime minister Thaksin Shinowatra. I guess Bush shouldn't go near the Food Network any time soon.

Wet-Mud Colored Biscuits Filled with Toothpaste

I heard this on NPR the other day, and now it's on ABC. I did not realize that Oreos had not crossed over to the UK. From the sound of things, they aren't exactly welcome. This is funny, actually. If you are wondering how to obtain Oreos in the UK, here are some hints. Though really, why would you want to? They're not very good.

Henry Hong and Crab Cakes on WYPR Thursday

Just saw this on WYPR's website:

Thursday, April 3

1:00-2:00

A recent cover story in the City Paper told us all about Maryland’s signature dish: the crab cake. We’ll talk with Henry Hong about the history of the crab cake, how they’re made, and the best spots in Baltimore to get your hands on this favorite seafood treat.

Normally I wouldn't keep abreast of what is on Mid-Day with Dan Rodricks. I was a Kojo Nnamdi fan long before they booted Mark Steiner form WYPR (partly because of Steiner's show, but that's another story). But in a switch over today from WAMU to WYPR I saw this mention of the City Paper crab cake story and was pleased to know that I had not missed it. They are interviewing Henry Hong, who wrote the piece. My friend Eric tells me he is the son of Suzie from Suzie's Soba. Is he? Regardless, I am free at that hour so I'll be listening. Hey, maybe I'll even call or email in!

Has Paula Deen sold her soul to those ham people?

I love this picture.

Forgive me for getting political here, because I try to make it happen as little as possible, but something has been itching at me. Jacob (the Food Network Addict) has brought up a controversy I have only been aware of over the last few weeks. If you didn't know, Paula Deen is a national spokeswoman for Smithfield Ham, a backbone - hambone? - of the nation's ham and pork industry. Smithfield, it turns out, has been having union troubles. This is specifically at its plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina (an appropriately named town, like Crab Cake, Maryland). The controversy, to simplify, is over whether or not there are unsafe workplace conditions (the website Smithfield Justice talks about this in great depth; I tried to find a website that spouses the opposite viewpoint, but all I've found so far is the actual Smithfield site itself). Much of what Smithfield has done is, well, this (from the New York Times):

Smithfield, for example, has run a flood of television advertisements boasting that the company is a good, safe place to work. The advertisements aim to persuade [North and South] Carolinians to apply for jobs and to counter arguments made by a union trying to organize the plant that Smithfield jobs are high stress and unsafe, with stingy benefits.

They've also had immigration crackdowns after hiring illegal immigrants to work there, leading to 21 arrests and an outflux of Hispanic laborers (from the same article, leading to a spike in wages, as well as a turnover rate among legal immigrant and non-immigrant laborers that is over twice that of illegal immigrant laborers, according to this article).

Amid all this controversy comes Smithfield spokeswoman Paula Deen. She is starting to irritate people for other reasons, and even I admit, that whole fried stuffing thing was a shark-jumping moment for her. So I was curious to hear what she had to say about this controversy when I found out about it. I must be dense or something - there were protesters outside the recent Metro Cooking Show in DC, but I did not see them. I don't know where they were, or maybe I thought they were somebody else. There must be something wrong with me because I did not see them. But I did hear Paula on NPR's Diane Rehm Show. After talking about her life story, Paula got smacked by callers about her relationship with Smithfield. The typical comment to Paula Deen was "You are compassionate, so why aren't you showing compassion for the union workers? / Why won't you meet with them or listen to their grievances?" Paula's typical response is the same one she gave on a recent interview on a Savannah TV station (quoted frm Food Network Addict):

You wouldn't come to me if you had a brain tumor and said please, operate on my tumor, cut it out. No, you wouldn't come to me for that. I wouldn't come to a union organizer to help me develop recipes in my kitchen or to help me come in and cook. I want people who know what they're doing and I have no knowledge of those kind of issues.

Now, I do like Paula Deen (despite the fried cake thing), and I think she's a sincere woman. At least she seems like it to me. So I hope her critics are wrong. But if you're a spokesperson for a company that has some issues, you're going to be the face of those issues whether you want to be or not. It truly seems as if Paula is just dodging the issue altogether. True, on NPR she did say that she met with a small group of workers from the Tar Heel plant and they seemed to be happy with no union at all. But does that explain the letter sent by pro-union folks at the plant? (Or are they even from the plant in the first place?) I admit, union support and membership has run in my family for several generations, so my opinions on the Tar Heel controversy are going to be skewed. But what is the spokesperson's role in all this? My take, in a comment on Jacob's blog, sums up where my thoughts are on the Paula Deen issue:

...She strikes me as sincere, but part naive [in wanting to believe what Smithfield is saying] and part "better not piss off the overlords at Smithfield". If you're a celebrity profiting off a big company with serious questions about how it treats its staff, you should indeed be held accountable. She likes to play the dumbass, but I doubt she's as stupid as she claims to be. Either she needs to come right out and say, "I have no problem with how Smithfield treats its employees and they should thank their lucky stars they even have jobs" or admit, "Yep, I admit Smithfield is really hurting its workers at its Tar Heel, NC, plant, and I must sadly part company with them until they treat them with the dignity they deserve." This "Oh-I-don't-know-nuthin'-I'm-just-a-simple-girl-from-Savannah [correction, Albany, Georgia]" schtick is not working.

In truth, Paula does try to portray herself as not-too-bright - she very literally did that at the Metro Cooking Show, for example - "Michael's the smart one!" However, I get the impression she's very smart - you have to be at least a little savvy to keep your family off the streets, start your own business and become a major television star, all with a clinical diagnosis of agoraphobia. So I do think Paula knows what she's doing. She may be in a difficult place to do anything about it. If I were in the same boat, I'd hope I'd take a hike from Smithfield. But who can say if we're not in that situation? Still, trying to take no side at all? Come on, Paula, you have to have some opinion. Thoughts?

CBS Sunday Morning Show

It just started - today's episode of CBS Sunday Morning is all about food - because this week is Thanksgiving. Topics include the US's fascination with celebrity chefs, a visit to McCormick in Sparks that starts a look at the history of some of our favorite spices (and their truly international pedigrees), ridiculously overpriced restaurants (making those truffles that sell for $999.99 a pound at Wegman's look positively "ghetto"), fasting for spritiual and non-spiritual enlightenment, among other things (I could only figure out a permanent link for the first story). There's also a collection of interactive food quizzes! And their "Are You Food Savvy" quiz isn't what you'd expect. Their first question reads thus:

Comparing low-carb and high-carb dieters, who lost the most weight at the end of a year?

I went against the conventional wisdom and got it right. It was one of three questions I correctly answered. Out of ten. I don't feel so savvy right now.

Am I now becoming that sort of person who watches CBS Sunday Morning? It's not the most exciting show. They can take a fascinating subject - King Tut, human trafficking, hip hop roller derbies, whatever - and make them so, well, not exciting. Just kind of blaaaah. Which is why I will probably switch back and forth between it and the Food Network, which is all food all the time.

Speaking of TV: didn't Project Runway kind of suck on Wednesday? I've been thinking about it and it's becoming a parody of itself already. I hate to see that happen to it because it really is better than most reality TV shows: it's a creative challenge, not one where you have to eat bugs, or sleep five people to a bedroom while trying to plan how to vote your roommates out of the house, or be crammed in gorgeous digs that a third world dictator's children fantasize about living in while a TV network that used to play music pays for your room and board while you intern at your dream job (Real World my ass). But this group is pretty silly. Which is why I was really left rolling on the floor when I skipped all the PR blogs and found this extra-bitchy review of Episode 1 by Dave White for the Advocate (the GLBT version of People). Leave it to a gay man to throw the best insults at a group of fashion design reality show contestants! I love this line; it kills me:

Elisa is creating something that looks like what would happen if Sigmund the Sea Monster shit out Celia Cruz. [links added by me]

Nuff said. Funny! Even funnier with visuals!!!

Take this:

Then add and then violently subtract this:


And you end up with this:


Funny, yes?