foodmuseumblog

Buying in Bulk from Trader Joe's

In line with dozens of instant soups and packets of Indian food to buy for Foodie Spouse who soon returns to a Trader Joe devoid life in Florida, I marveled at the final total, topping my all-time high. But apparently my purchase was small potatoes compared to that of a prior shopper, who had driven into Albuquerque from Durango, and loaded up one cart with wine, upper and lower decks, and another cart with food.

"Those folks spent over $600!" said the checker.

FS showed up and asked, as usual, when TJ would finally make it into Florida.

Not anytime soon, we were told. ( Sigh.)

"Well," said FS, tossing the Pav Phaji and Lentil Rice Biriani into bags. " At least in Florida we have Ikea--one in Tampa and one in Orlando. Ha!"

The checker, clearly a newcomer, looked stricken. "There's no Ikea here?"

The WH Beer Thing

Bud Lite. (!!?)

Had anyone asked, I would have suggested that the WH beer meister/meistress put a selection of locally brewed offerings on ice, with appropriate tasty snacks, and let the Prez, the Prof and the Cop choose among beers produced by some of America's finest small breweries.

 Shenandoah Brewing Company in Alexandria, VA is one--Their Stony Man Stout might have appealed to someone.  Capitol City Brewing Company in DC ( been there, drunk that)  has this:  Capitol Kolsch, along with Amber Waves Ale. Patriotism run wild!  I mean let's drink seriously good, local beer, and promote the best.

I'll drink to peace and understanding from here, maybe with a Jack Rabbit IPA from the Chama River Brewing Company in Albuquerque, dudes.

Don't Take Away Our Right to Slurp and Get Fat!

If you haven't yet seen the (corn) syrupy ads from the beverage industry opposing a possible tax on soft drinks/sodas/colas, then you have not relived the bizarre "educational" films we had to sit through as teens back in the day, minus the flapping sound of the film leaving the reel. ( There was always a geeky kid in thick glasses running the movie projector who leapt up to save the day at that point.)  Apparently sodas are woven into the fabric of American life far tighter than I knew, right up there with apple pie, handguns for the demented, and fear of health care reform.

Anyhoo.

Let's just tax everything food-stupid, like the tiny portions of fake cheese packaged with partially hydrogenized-fat-laden crackers, chemical-infused microwave popcorn, iceberg lettuce, and icky- sweet huge, mushy so-called Delicious apples. 

Actually, I honestly have no clue as to the acres of  food-stupid offerings available at the supermarket.  If I am standing in line at one, I am clutching toilet paper or cleaning products, and the people in front of and behind me are buying cartons of Dr. Pepper and Sprite, usually Diet. These people are by definition fat. Diet Schmi-et. Fat.

My personal chubs come from drinking wine and nibbling on full-fat and real- sugared Delicious ice cream. I think I'm already being taxed on wine-imbibing, so let the soda-slurpers pay their fair share! ( Leave my Starbucks Java Chip Frappuccino alone.)

Tomato Glue

Anyone who has ever labored to clean tomato seeds from a wood cutting board knows their tenacity. ( Or maybe it's just me--I don't clean up that much as I go, much to the bane of Foodie Spouse ....)
My point is , why is  tomato seed glue not available at Ace Hardware? Why do I have to buy Gorilla Glue?
Once once begins thinking about it, what about bloody oatmeal, for lord's sake? Talk about cement.
And anything to do with flour, of course.
Meanwhile, I've noticed that an heirloom tomato I planted in a bin is putting forth abundant bloom, but is not setting fruit at all. This is a first, but so pleased am I with my bin zucchs, cukes and purple and white marble eggplant, I am not stressed about the tomato.
Just wondering about tomato seed-derived glue.

Moon Food for Thought

Noting the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, I remember well where I was when I heard the news. I was eating dinner, chicken Kiev with green beans,  in the garden of a  restaurant in Iran, in Kermanshah, having just been reunited with my fiance, a Peace Corps volunteer whom I had not seen for over a year.

The waiter came out and gestured at the moon, clearly visible from our table. "Your Americans are walking around up there," he said. We looked more closely at the moon, symbol to lovers, object of poetic fancy, and felt both exhilarated and vaguely depressed.

"People are tromping around on the moon, " I said.  Apollo Eleven carried a particularly unpoetic fellow up there to the land of green cheese, who read aloud a corny line as he stepped from the lunar landing module ladder onto the dusty moon surface.

Much chatter ensued later among the literati, as to the need for a writer, a poet, to visit the moon and report back with a bit more descriptive precision.

Thus far, this has not occurred.

( Moon pot roast from Apollo 17, 1972. )

Back from the Mountains

Plucking some chive and Italian parsley this morning with which to top my smooth, velvety scrambled eggs, eaten with buttered rye toast and Sumatran coffee, I pondered the food stories I might have addressed in recent days.

Or tried to. Oddly they have evaporated, after a brief and glorious camping trip in New Mexico's Pecos river region, our tent pitched beside a rushing stream at 8300 feet. While we observed fly fisher persons bringing in trout, we ate none, relying instead on tasty sushi from Trader Joe's,  and on a TJ  "felafel plate," a dry, tasteless loser of an entree, gotta say. And eggs, yet again.

Simple fare en plein air--a runny blue cheese, crackers, and a glass ( mug) of a decent Spanish blended red.

Guess I didn't miss much: Americans are still fat, Michelle Obama is deepening her interest in food and kids, and a wise Latina stays steady among the last gasps of Repub white guys in suits.

New: Engaging piece on Irish poet Seamus Heaney, whose musings on the potato we take delight in. He has just turned 70, and recalls an evening drinking poteen, home brew distilled from spuds, with another poet, Ted Hughes.

Panda Cake as Inspiration

 The National Zoo's 4 year-old panda, Tai Shan, whose babyhood antics I followed delightedly via the pandacam, celebrated his birthday today with a cake made of  "water, bamboo, shredded beets and beet juice," according to today's Washington Post.

That sounds refreshingly veggie-appropriate so I am pondering adding shredded beet to some kind of cake. Red devil? Or maybe a striped effect, in an angel food cake topped with strawberries.

And soon, shredded zucchini?

These "healthy" additives do not take away from the decadent cake-taste pleasure we all love, but somehow, the carrots of carrot-cake fame, do, do they not? ( I may be alone on this.)

I draw the line at garlic, onion or carrot in my cakes. Just sayin'.

(Tai Shan's 1st birthday cake--person-type--found here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/19764857@N00/192819747)

Go Away, Sarah! Plus, Ecoffins, For When That Time Comes.

Would someone please utilize a majorly huge hook and remove the amazingly self-absorbed Sarah Palin and her massive ego from the "front pages" of the Internets ? Thank you.

Now we can turn our attention to eco-friendly coffins, a topic on which we all can agree. Seems it is now possible to encase your loved ones or even, looking ahead, oneself , in a degradable coffin handmade from bamboo and/or banana sheaves. Both plants, of course, feed people, and both have multiple uses in construction, with bamboo by far the stronger and more versatile.

The company is Ecoffins and its website oozes eco-appropriate/natural/ sensitivity. Mind you, I became bogged down on the difference between a casket and a coffin, because apparently the company sells Indonesian-made  banana-sheave caskets and also bamboo coffins.  Some sources indicate that "casket" was a euphemism for "coffin," but others insist a "coffin" is wide at the shoulders while a "casket" is just a long box.

Whatever.

Each of these clever containers will degrade in from 6 months to two years, along with the remains, which is as it should be, given the "dust to dust, ashes to ashes" thing, right? The UK website is here.

Someday soon I suppose funerals will have "themes," and one will hire a funeral planner to throw, say a tropical homage to Uncle Al, complete with rum drinks,  roast pig, and a festive yet respectful banana-festooned banana coffin, maybe with a mini Carmen Miranda figure woven into the, uh, rigging.

( Banana leaf and hyacinth coffin in photo is by yet another vendor, Daisy Coffins, in the UK. http://www.daisycoffins.com/talk-to-us.html)

Kale Soup, and Ponderings

 Foodie Spouse made a delicious Portuguese kale and potato soup for supper recently.
Kidney beans and soy "chorizo" sausage were involved as well.   And as I of late have become enamored of Brazil's lime-centered caipirinha drink,  I wandered into a traditional American supermarket, Smith's, to quickly grab some citrus, and was soon pondering Portugal's imperial role.  (Thank you, Prince Henry the Navigator, for getting things started. )

In 1500 this small European country claimed control over the largest cohesive land mass in the "new" world, and stamped Brazil with its quirkily-different-sounding-from-Spanish-yet-similar language, a massive slave trade, and eventually, a mix of people indicative of much mingling among natives, slaves, and Europeans. As well as black beans to die for, selenium-packed B. nuts, and cachaca.

Anyway--There I was, the eve of the Glorious Fourth in a supermarket in America, clutching limes headed for inclusion in a Brazilian drink. No bunting, no flags, maybe 3 flag balloons for sale.  Normally, as we all know, a "holiday" makes a store erupt in decorative items in tune with the theme. I do not even want to think ahead to checkers decked out as witches, fold-up Christmas trees, icky yellow candy chicks, and all that. But it struck me as odd that on our nation's holiest of holy days, there was virtually nothing.

But then--what products can one sell that speak INDEPENDENCE? Baby back ribs? Weiners? Flabby white no-food-value hotdog rolls?

Meanwhile, we still have plenty of the soup, inspired by a Cape Cod recipe based on what early visiting Portuguese fishermen from Cape Verde and the Azores were eating.  ( Note: this recipe does not contain fish so the fishermen evidently were storing sausage on board, and there were no potatoes growing readily, so...) The ingredients vary---but a spicy sausage is key. As is kale.

So this year at our house, to honor America, we are celebrating the major affront to George III by going Portuguese. Bom dia!

( Tks to this site for kale soup pic--http://www.capecodtoday.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=080)

Fat States, Non-Fish- Appropriate Companies.

Dubious Distinction Foodie Awards: The " fattest state" continues to be Mississippi, with ' Bama making a run at being number one. All that fried chicken? Colorado is the skinniest. ( Vermont??)  Fat, salt, and corn syrup over all.

Meanwhile, those who try to eat fish to keep the pounds off need to be wary of where they buy. The just released Greenpeace report titled Carting Away the Oceans wallops Trader Joe's and Costco bigtime, as having no seafood sustainability programs, a "willful disregard for our oceans," and no apparent desire to improve.  Whole Foods does well on this point, as do SuperTarget stores--even Walmart is not too shabby in this area. Read the report here.