foodmuseumblog

Y'aak'a Means Corn

I could write about tainted melons, and icky e.coli ground beef, but why? You know all that. Better to zoom in on a damn fine veggie Indian fry bread lunch, served up at Acoma Pueblo, in their Y'aak'a Cafe at the foot of the mesa. 

"Y'aak’a means "corn" in Keres, the language of Acoma.  Corn was farmed by the Acomans for centuries in the valley beneath the 367-foot mesa where we live.  It has sustained us for hundreds of years and is intertwined with religious ceremonies and art."

 

Bill Maher's Elusive Eating Habits

Apparently comedian Bill Maher doesn't eat anything from "the supermarket," nor anything that comes in cans or boxes. And he's healthy as hell. But nowhere on the Internets can I find what he does eat, and where he gets it. Does he grow his own veggies in L.A.?

A member of the board of PETA, Maher is not a vegetarian, but eats little meat. According to Wikipedia, he thinks high fructose corn syrup is a huge factor in Americans' obesity. I agree. And, he has a "very eccentric diet."

But what is it??

Anyone?  Does it really matter what Maher eats or does not eat? No. But still, I'm curious.

UPDATE:  Tks to commenter Andrea, I watched a new CNN clip with Larry King wherein  Maher describes his all-organic eating--when at home, where it's possible. A morning drink with raw egg, fruit, midday fresh veggie juice, grains..............at that point I think Larry lost interest, asking Maher if he ever ordered a steak in a restaurant ( LARRY!), but Maher went on to say "You can't make yourself miserable with your eating."   And stressed he's not perfect---Larry looked happier when Maher said he ate hamburgers on the road maybe twice a year.

Lettuce-Loving Sirens

O the sirens of Florida, the graceful behemoths that lie like gray logs just under the surface of the water. We recently examined manatees up close at the Tampa Zoo, where those under repair and rest after injury from boat propellers and other human hazards, chomp down barrels-full of lettuces. They and their gizzard-possessing fish friends, the local leaping mullet, are vegetarians of reknown.

From manatees.net--"Manatees eat over 60 different species of aquatic and semi-aquatic plants. Their diet includes manatee grass, turtle grass, various species of algae, mangrove leaves, and water hyacinths. They may consume 10% of their body weight daily in vegetation. Their digestive system allows the bacterial breakdown of cellulose in the hind-gut. To accommodate the great volume of high-fiber food they eat, manatatees have intestines up to 150 feet long."

Traveling Veggie Starves Not in Austria

Vegetarian Son of Foodie is visiting friends in Graz, Austria and has discovered the joys of kasespatzle, --micro-dumplings with cheese topped with grilled onions--and  kaferbohnen ( red kidney bean)salad --along with assorted beers--those thus far singled out are Murauer ( brewed since 1495) and Edelweiss, ( since 1475.)

I imagine by now a potato or two has passed his lips, as well as assorted voluptuous-sounding cakes, and superb coffee.

Fish That Fish Out of My Brew, Will You?

  The Guardian reports that some of our favorite  food and drink,  including Guinness stout, contain unusual animal products. The frothy dark brew, for example, is "clarified" using a form of collagen called isinglass, derived from the swimbladders of fish. ( Remember the "isinglass curtains you can roll right down, in case there's a change in the weather" from the song " Surrey with the Fringe on Top," from the musical Oklahoma!??  Not the same--that isinglass apparently is made of mica, and was a substitute for glass.) Only trace elements of the stuff remain after brewing, but that may be enough for rejection by staunch veggies.

Mars Bars candy, which once used the vegetable version of rennet in its milk chocolates, sometimes made from fig leaves or thistles , or  mold, is back to the animal variety, derived from calves, or "the stomach(s) of slaughtered newly-born calves," as the UK Vegetarian Society so nicely puts it. Rennet allows the calves to digest their mothers' milk.

As for beef gelatine? Evidently it's in Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, at least in UK products, to help the sugar adhere to the flakes.

( Photo from http://www.guinness.com/us_en)