12/30/09
Brahma
I have 3 brahmas 2 bantams and a full sized hen. The full sized hen is big, bossy and very social. One of the bantams, who is a buff brahma is not very nice to other birds. The little white brahma is almost a replica of the full sized white brahma except about 5 times smaller and her name is Susan. Brahma's are some of my favorite breeds with their amazing plumage and hilarious personality.
When I arrive at the barn the big white brahama always comes to greet me. She is the one who leads the hen house. Her name is Paprika.
12/23/09
First Year of bees
My first Year Keeping Bees
December 16th, 2009 by David LaFerney
"I’ve really enjoyed my first summer keeping bees – Working with, observing, and learning about the bees has been very interesting and enjoyable. Before I started I read a lot about the subject, but inevitably experience teaches things that I didn’t pick up on during months of study."
CLICK HERE TO READ ENTIRE Article
via cookingupastory.com
Not about food or chickens.
My cousin and me sailing the Beetle Cat, named Chocolate, out to Wasque.
12/22/09
Awesome Idea, thanks mom
My mom had a cool idea. Why not invite the cool people I have met to write a guest post for my blog. The first one is from Jerusha Klemperer from SLOW FOOD USA. I honestly can't believe these smart people said yes, then took the time to do it! THANK YOU.
GUEST POST ONE - Jerusah Klemperer from Slow Food USA
Jerusha Klemperer is the Program Manager for Networks and Partnerships at Slow Food USA, where she coordinated the US delegation to Terra Madre 2008 and before that served as the Assistant to the Executive Director. Also a writer of all kinds of things including book reviews, plays and blog posts, she is the editor of the Slow Food USA blog and a contributor to the Huffington Post, Civil Eats and her personal blog eathere2. See Huffington Post article here
Why I love to cook or Why I go slow
I love cooking because I love ingredients: I get such a thrill from visiting farms and seeing how food grows. The first time I saw asparagus growing I was shocked to see the spears popping right up through the dirt. How had I not known that? At the farmers market I love seeing brussels sprouts still attached to the stalk, getting a lesson in how they grow, while I’m shopping. I love eating something when it’s fresh—right off the vine, right off the farm. The taste is unbelievable.
I love cooking because I love transformation: Cooking is science meets magic. Anyone who loves a good science experiment or an art project can appreciate the magic of a sharp raw onion sautéing down into something sweet and sugary. Or the incredible transformation of fresh basil, oil, parmigianno cheese and pine nuts into pesto, a personal favorite of mine.
I love cooking because I love to share, to express my affection for friends and family through home-cooked meals: Cooking for people is a way to get people to hang out with you—it’s true! When you offer people home cooked food, they come in droves and the conversation flows and by the end of the meal everyone knows each other a bit better, and everyone feels taken care of.
It turns out that there are unexpected side benefits, too.
Health: When you cook for yourself, you eat healthier. I don’t do it for that reason, but it’s a nice perk. Home cooking tends to use way less fat (er, butter mostly) and way less sodium than restaurant food or processed food in cans or the like. Also home cooking never uses weird ingredients/chemicals you can’t pronounce. No nutrition labels necessary.
Knowledge: Understanding how things grow and how they get to our plate helps us understand community health, science and nature, and increases our connection to the earth and our awareness of ecological issues.
12/19/09
City Moves to Lift Ban on Beekeeping - from NYT
By SEWELL CHAN
"The city’s Board of Health on Thursday proposed lifting a ban on beekeeping, partly in response to the rising popularity of urban bee colonies and the efforts a group called Just Food that has sought to promote beekeeping as part of a sustainable-agriculture program.
The proposed revisions [pdf] to the city’s health code come after a city councilman, David Yassky of Brooklyn, introduced a bill this year that would legalize beekeeping. The change has the support of environmental groups like the Natural Resources Defense Council.
According to the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the city’s health code historically listed bees as prohibited animals “because of their ability to sting people.”
The department said in a statement: “After the Board of Health received a petition from a group wanting to promote honey-bee keeping as sustainable agriculture, the Health Department looked into urban beekeeping and found that responsible urban beekeeping does not pose a public health issue.”
The public has until Feb. 3 to submit comments on the proposed rule change, which the Board of Health would then vote on in March."
Senator and Mrs. Kerry
"In this book, Senator John Kerry and Teresa Heinz Kerry offer a compelling narrative, documenting the challenges confronting us. And they celebrate an inspiring new generation of Americans determined to serve their country in the most essential way: by doing whatever is necessary to secure its future. These men and women have had to act without meaningful support from their own government. but they have understood that our relationship to our environment—within our homes, communities, states and nations—is the great challenge of our time, and one that we cannot, in good conscience, ignore any longer. From scattered individual efforts, the new environmentalists have rallied community support and have developed new bipartisanship in problem solving. Their examples, from the leading edge of the environmental frontier, offer a vision for a future that all of us can share, and the prospect of an opportunity that every citizen can benefit from." - from rei.com
from grist.org
"The activists you spotlight embody what you call a "bottom-up" approach to environmental activism. You argue that it's more effective than a "top-down" approach. How so?
THK: Whenever we've had systemic and sustainable change in this country, it's because the grassroots has been ready to accept it. Top-down activity from the government cannot take root unless there's bottom-up acceptance. In other words, I don't think the feds can implement aggressive, massive change unless there's a readiness at the ground level. I think we're at that moment right now.
JK: You're going to have to do both. You can't deal with global climate change unless there's a government policy to have carbon priced, to have an economy-wide cap, to create incentives for capital to flow toward solutions. But the pressure to make all that happen is going to come more from the bottom up. That's what spurred the first environmental movement in the 1970s when we got the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, marine mammal protections, and all those other laws. We believe that a similar explosion of grassroots activity is happening today."
This book was written a long time ago, when I was 9. I'm thinking I will read it after Omnivore's Dilema kids edition.
12/18/09
St. Augustine School Chicken Project
If this South Bronx institution can run a sustainability program, "anyone can."
By Jane Margolies
Children tend chickens as part of an urban school curriculum. Photo from St. Augustine School website.
Thanksgiving poems written by second-graders are tacked up outside the principal’s office the day I visit the St. Augustine School in the South Bronx:
Mr. Turkey…
Nice and fat.
I’m going to eat you
Just like that!
In fact, the 200 students at this parochial school know more than many city kids do about where the food on their plates comes from. Behind the four-story brick 1905 school building is St. Augustine’s own chicken coop, where 15 hens with black feathers and speckled breasts lay large brown eggs. In the community garden across the street, students this year grew beets, cucumbers, tomatoes and broccoli. If all goes as planned, by June tilapia will be swimming under a blanket of hydroponic herbs in a tank in a new greenhouse. And, yes, even live turkeys are a possibility for the future.
It’s all part of the sustainability program at this PreK–8 school in the Morrisania section of the Bronx. Across the country, educational institutions are integrating environmental awareness into their curriculums and daily practices, according to the Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education, a nonprofit consultancy based in New York. What makes St. Augustine’s experiment in urban agriculture stand out is where it’s taking place — in an impoverished, highly urban area — and how closely it is entwined with the surrounding community.
The South Bronx, of course, was the poster child of urban blight in the late 20th century. Even today Morrisania, which is in the southwest part of the Bronx, lies in the poorest congressional district in the United States. The population is largely black and Hispanic. Every Monday, a line snakes from the food pantry at the St. Augustine Roman Catholic church, a magnificent Romanesque-style limestone edifice on a rise on East 167th Street, which was built in 1895 when the area was largely inhabited by Irish and German immigrants (after structural problems forced the diocese to close the building to the public this year, services were moved to the St. Augustine School auditorium). All of the school’s students receive free federal lunch; 87 percent live at or below the poverty level. “If we can do it,” says Michael Brady, the school’s director of development, referring to St. Augustine’s sustainability efforts, “anyone can.”
Over the last couple of years, the school has been making its day-to-day operations greener: It switched to compostable cafeteria trays made of sugar cane. Back-to-back copying is standard on a machine that uses a toner so green that “we were told we could drink it if we had to,” Brady jokes. Floor cleaner and liquid hand soap come from Snappy Solutions, a janitorial supply company that specializes in earth-friendly products.
But getting students to buy into the idea of being responsible stewards of the environment is crucial to “making sustainability sustainable,” says Brady, who is also the managing partner in a governmental relations and development firm based in Albany. And that is how last year the hens arrived on the scene.
The chicken project was sponsored by Heifer International, which funds agricultural ventures in poor areas around the world, and Just Food, a New York City nonprofit whose City Farms program works with community gardeners to increase food grown in the Big Apple, particularly in low-income areas where healthy food is scarce. Owen Taylor, the City Farms Training and Livestock Coordinator, came to the school and helped current and former students, staff and community members build a coop and pen out of timber and chicken wire in the Peace Garden behind the school. Awesome Farm, a small pasture-raised livestock operation in Tivoli, New York, an hour and a half north of the city, delivered the 15 black sex-linked hens (no roosters, which are classified as wild animals in the "large and predatory bird" category and are prohibited by New York City law).
READ MORE!!
White Crested Black Polish
For my APA Flock Tender Certificate I have to do a report on each breed in my flock. The second are Polish Hens.
I have two Polish hens. Both are white crested black polish. You can see these types in these pictures. In England these birds are known just as Polands. They are one of the most popular crested breeds. Their distinctive feature is a big mop or crest of feathers on the top of their head. Some describe it like and umbrella on their head, my mom thinks the birds look like Coco Channel.
These birds lay a white eggs, come in many color variations and may also be bearded or unbearded. Hens tend to weigh about 4.5 pounds. On average the first few years they may lay as many as 300 eggs.
Polish hens tend to move quickly and with sharp movements, this is in part because they can't see very well with their crest dangling in from of their eyes.
Jan Brett is a great person who knows a ton about Polish
12/16/09
Blue Cochins
this is one of my hens as a chick
For my APA Flock Tender Certificate I have to do a report on each breed in my flock. The first are Blue Cochins.
Background:
"Cochins came to the US and England for the first time in about 1845, when they were known as Chinese Shanghai fowl. The first ones were a buff color and their size and thick soft feathering created quite a sensation, especially in England. The American Poultry Association recognizes Buff, Partridge, White, Black, Silver-laced, Golden-laced, Blue, Brown and Barred varieties.
One of the largest chickens, a full grown cock can reach 11 pounds, with the hens reaching 8 1/2 pounds. With their thick fluffy plumage, the birds look even larger. Their skin is yellow and they lay a brown egg. Although bred mostly for exhibition, they make a good meat bird. Cochins are usually very calm birds and easily made into pets. They are also excellent broodies. " from Feathersite.com
My birds:
I have 4 hens. They are very easy to identify because they are completly covered in feathers from head to toe. Yes the feathers even cover the leg and foot. My blue cochin skin color is a pale yellow and they lay light brown eggs. All of my birds are very very social and chill birds. They aren't skittish or wild but quite social. The average weight for a cochin hen is about 8-9 pounds. I think my hens weigh about 10! Cochins are known to be good mothers. Mine have often gone broody for long periods of time and the only way to get them out of this cycle is to not allow them into their nesting box for a day. The problem when they go broody and the eggs aren't going to hatch is they lose weight.
Robert Kraft gets henhouse on Chestnut Hill
GO PATRIOTS!
"Robert Kraft scored his own personal fowl yesterday after Brookline health officials declined to throw the flag on the Patriots [team stats] poohbah’s plans to move his flock of chickens to a new locker room in Chestnut Hill.
Brookline Public Health Commissioner Dr. Alan Balsam sent word that the birds, which now reside at the family’s summer place in New Seabury, are welcome to winter at Casa Kraft in the toney town. However the barnyard biddies must be exiled to Cape Cod in July and August.
As we told you weeks ago, the Super Bowl biggie’s peeps petitioned the town for permission to bring the chickens home to roost during the cold months. But some of the Krafts’ neighbors were squawking because they didn’t want to be disturbed by the clucking fowl.
Balsam, who told us that three other town residents also keep chickens, had no problem with the request, but reserved the right to slap some restrictions on the pigskin poohbah’s whole back-to-nature experience.
According to a letter sent to the Krafts on Monday, the gentleman farmer must have both an enclosed shed and a pen - so there’s not a Chicken Run through the neighborhood. He must also feed the birds inside the shed and properly compost their waste. Roosters, which are ever so noisy, are not allowed.
Neighbors who cried fowl over the Krafts’ request, reported that the family already has a shed and workmen were seen adding onto it yesterday.
“As far as composting, they are either going to use one of our composting bins or something else they buy at Home Depot,” Balsam told the Track. “However, it will be inspected by the town.”
Balsam’s chicken cops will make unannounced visits to check on Kraft’s coop, and Farmer Robert will have to submit a pest control management plan as a requirement of the “Keeping of Animals” permit."
from bostonherald.com
Breakfast without Bees?
from Scientific American
"Without honeybees, many foods included in the breakfast at the left would become too rare for most people to afford. Shortages would affect an array of fruits, as well as jams and jellies, almonds and even milk, because dairies use alfalfa (which needs pollinators) as a protein-rich feed for dairy cows."
MORE ABOUT Colony Collapse here
At the Farmers Market
thank you Rebecca for the photo.
I try to take my birds to the Farmer's Market so that people can "meet" the birds. It is really interesting, because most people have never met a chicken before I think it is easier for them to eat chickens. In JSFoer's new book Eating Animals he writes about how his babysitter said to him when he was little “You know that chicken is chicken, right?”...once he thought about it, really thought about it he changed how he ate. Most people will say chickens are stupid so why not eat them. I disagree. Hens are funny, bossy, clever, smart and very social. Once you know this, I think it is harder to accept them being tortured in Factory Farms or even slaughtered in a poor way. That's why I take them to the Farmer's Market, so you can "meet" a hen.
12/15/09
The Cost of Wasted Food
Dec 2 2009, 8:10 am by Bill Niman and Nicolette Hahn Niman
"Like dwellings across the United States this past weekend, our home was filled with the aroma of simmering turkey bones. Heritage turkeys, we have learned these past two years, make exceptionally rich, flavorful broth. Part of this golden liquid was immediately used as the foundation of a large pot of turkey-rice soup, made with sage, thyme, carrots and celery. The rest we put into two containers that went directly into the freezer, where we also stashed some of the leftover meat.
Every scrap that was not something a human would enjoy eating we put into another huge pot, along with leftover spaghetti, bread, and rice--this one being doggie stew. About half of that went in the freezer, half in the fridge. Our dog Claire will be nourished by this stew for a couple of weeks. Nothing was wasted.
Such frugality with food comes naturally to both of us and has been fortified by time on the farm. In fact, we are pretty maniacal about it in our household. Our four parents all lived through times of real scarcity and taught us by example to treat food as sacred: throwing leftover food away was unheard of; allowing food to rot before it could be eaten was sacrilege."
CLICK HERE for whole article
In Winter, Even Hens Need a Heater - from On The Farm blog
"Winter dropped in on the farm with dramatic finality just the other day. The leaves of the pecan trees fell in unison, without the benefit of even the slightest breeze. The event was over in minutes. Apparently, the season's first, hard freeze the night before was the substitute facilitator.
In addition to the sudden denuding of the trees, the prospect of a 20-degree hard freeze instituted "improvements" to the Hen House as well. The 70 young pullets, living in the "nursery" side of the Hen House and mentored by the matronly hen, 7-year-old Aunt Tootie J. Tootums, are the hope for abundant eggs beginning in February. (The most productive season for eggs in Central Texas is from February through June.) Needing those potential eggs for our farm stand customers, we didn't want to lose any youngsters to the sudden cold."
CLICK HERE for whole article
Rare Breed - Saveur.com
By Molly O’Neill
Source: Saveur
Rare Breed Photo: Jim Turner
Beyond the town of Lindsborg, with its church steeples and 2,000 or so houses, the Kansas prairie is a flat forever. There's nothing to absorb wind or sound. The whinny of gears in a pickup; the bullish snort of a combine harvester turning frosty dirt—the noises of a winter afternoon seemed bigger than anything mortal. Standing in a field on Frank Reese Jr.'s farm outside town as the shadows grew longer, I felt truly alone.
I pictured Reese, a poultry breeder who was born near here, shepherding his turkeys across this same, endless horizon as a boy and wondered whether he too had felt alone. From an early age, he had the job of ushering birds on his family's farm from the barn to the open range so that they could peck for insects. He took to the role, and to the birds. When the other children in his first-grade class wrote adoring sonnets to their cats and dogs, Reese crafted a personal essay titled "Me and My Turkeys."
CLICK HERE TO READ WHOLE ARTICLE
Jonathan Safran Foer’s Compelling Case for (Not) Eating Animals
by Peter Smith good.is
"If we don’t eat dogs, should we eat any meat? Should you care about the vegetarian author’s latest provocation? I do.
Almost everything intersects with animal agriculture. Almost everything we talk about and care about: whether it’s the environment; whether it’s what it means to be human; whether it’s how we treat people; how we treat animals; consumption; America’s place in the world. Basically, animal agriculture is the most important example of each of these things and it’s not a part of any of these conversations. – Jonathan Safran Foer
Early in his new book, Eating Animals, Foer makes the case for eating dogs. While sleeping with your sister might be a taboo for good reason, man does not universally avoid platefuls of dog—although it’s clearly taboo in the United States. (Dog is one of the only animals Anthony Bourdain wouldn’t eat on his 2001 world television tour.) With 3 to 4 million dogs euthanized annually, why waste all that good dog meat? Foer has a suggestion, a sure-fire recipe from the Philippines: Kill the dog, marinate it, and fry the meat with onions and pineapple.
Foer knows how to create compelling stories. Like his two previous novels, Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, he deploys humor—a smart, ironic shtick—to approach difficult subjects. A dead dog is no laughing matter, but his recipe makes us question a more generalized hunger for meat. His case for eating a dog simply raises the much larger questions he’s getting at. Just because we can eat meat, should we? And should we be eating animals if they’re capable of suffering and, despite this, we force them to live in nauseating, nightmarish factories?"
CLICK HERE FOR WHOLE ARTICLE
Stop Feeding Your Garbage Can - from good.is
Talking to the chef of America's least wasteful restaurant
"Of the 350 billion pounds of food produced in America each year, we throw away a gut-wrenching 98 billion pounds, 98 percent of which ends up in landfills. According to the EPA, landfills are the largest human-related source of methane in the United States, accounting for 34 percent of all methane emissions. Methane from landfills is generated when organic food waste decomposes under anaerobic conditions. Our rotting food is therefore a major contributor to global climate change. The retail food industry, which includes restaurants, is responsible for 54 billion pounds of this waste, and hemorrhages $44 billion a year in wasted food. Fortunately, a few chefs are working to reverse this trend.
Leading the charge against food wastefulness are chef Russ Moore and his wife Allison Hopelain, the co-owners of Camino, a restaurant in Oakland, California."
CLICK HERE FOR WHOLE ARTICLE
12/14/09
Thank you #TNGG
Check out this cool blog - Thenextgreatgeneration.com this week it is all about food.
"They call us the Millennial Generation. And they talk about us a lot. This blog is where we do the talking, about how we live, what we think, stuff we like. Join us."
Thank you Mr.Boches (@edwardboches) for inviting me to participate.
Susan
Susan has been staying at our house. She was sick and we had to separate her from the flock. As you can see, she is feeling beter!
More on HFCS - from TakePart
Harmless sweetener or obesity culprit?
"High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) isn’t just in your soda. You can find it in yogurt, juice, bread, ketchup, bacon, and a host of other products. Each day, the average American unwittingly consumes over 11 teaspoons of HCFS—that’s 38 pounds every year! It accounts for nearly half the amount of sweetener used in the U.S. annually.
Made from federally subsidized corn, HFCS is cheaper than regular sugar. But corn requires more fertilizers and pesticides than other crops; and constant production weakens topsoil and pollutes watersheds. Critics say HFCS is to blame for ballooning obesity rates in the U.S. Others say it is no worse than sugar, and that both are harmful in large amounts. Who is right?"
I am still doing research on HFCS so I can respond to a letter from the Corn Refiners Association
More about the Corn Refiners Association (Corn Refiners Association. The trade group, made up of seven U.S. agri-giants, has spent a reported $30 million over the last nine months to convince everyone that high-fructose corn syrup, once a favorite sweetener, is just as healthy as sugar - from Takepart.com) Here is the Corn Refiners Campaign Sweetsurprise.com (I don't think that is a good name....what is the surprise??)
"High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) isn’t just in your soda. You can find it in yogurt, juice, bread, ketchup, bacon, and a host of other products. Each day, the average American unwittingly consumes over 11 teaspoons of HCFS—that’s 38 pounds every year! It accounts for nearly half the amount of sweetener used in the U.S. annually.
Made from federally subsidized corn, HFCS is cheaper than regular sugar. But corn requires more fertilizers and pesticides than other crops; and constant production weakens topsoil and pollutes watersheds. Critics say HFCS is to blame for ballooning obesity rates in the U.S. Others say it is no worse than sugar, and that both are harmful in large amounts. Who is right?"
I am still doing research on HFCS so I can respond to a letter from the Corn Refiners Association
More about the Corn Refiners Association (Corn Refiners Association. The trade group, made up of seven U.S. agri-giants, has spent a reported $30 million over the last nine months to convince everyone that high-fructose corn syrup, once a favorite sweetener, is just as healthy as sugar - from Takepart.com) Here is the Corn Refiners Campaign Sweetsurprise.com (I don't think that is a good name....what is the surprise??)
"Recycling chickens"
Kent Porter / PD
CLICK HERE TO READ ENTIRE ARTICLE
Thank you Rob M for sharing this link with me.
?When Jim Stauffer of Petaluma saw a chicken crawling out of a mound of compost like the living dead, he knew something had changed at the egg farm next door.
"We called them zombie chickens," Stauffer said. "Some of them crawled right up out of the ground. They'd get out and stagger around."
What changed was the method used to get rid of "spent hens," which are chickens that no longer produce eggs. And the change isn't just in Petaluma; it's throughout the country..."
CLICK HERE for another story on "Spent Hens"
"Cows With Names Make More Milk" - NYT
ILLUSTRATION BY JAN KALLWEJT
For dairy farmers, whether to name their cows may seem like a matter of taste. But it might not be. It could be a business decision.
A study of several hundred British dairies published in the journal Anthrozoös in March compared responses to a survey about cow treatment with independently collected milk data and found that cows that have names make, in a given year, about 258 liters more milk per farm than anonymous ones — a bump of about 6 percent.
More research is still needed. The possible psychological effects on cows of having a name, for example, have yet to be determined. But the results so far reveal a correlation: "The naming," says Catherine Douglas, the Newcastle University animal behaviorist behind the research, "reflects the humans' attitudes toward the cows, and therefore how they behave around them." Named cows are more often treated nicely, and well-treated, calm and happy cows make more milk. The point, Douglas says, is that it definitely can't hurt to name your cows.
Naming criteria vary widely. Some farmers name cows alphabetically; others recycle parents' names. Herb and flower names are popular in Britain. "You know," Douglas says, "Daisy, Rose, Buttercup." Douglas once named a cow after her sister, Hattie.
But some American dairy farmers scoff at this idea. Barbara Martin, a third-generation California dairy operator, says naming her 2,200 cows would be completely unrealistic. "Everyone," she says, "has an ear tag with a number." PAT WALTERS
12/10/09
"Old-hen meat fed to pets and schoolkids " - WHAT
"Pets might like it, but among most consumers, "spent-hen" meat isn't very popular.
It's tough, stringy and far less appealing than the more tender meat of broiler chickens. But that didn't stop the government from using the National School Lunch Program as an outlet for egg producers struggling to find a market for 100 million egg-laying hens culled each year.
From 2001 though the first half of 2009, USA TODAY found, the government spent more than $145 million on spent-hen meat for schools — a total of more than 77 million pounds served in chicken patties and salads. Since 2007, 13.6 million pounds were purchased.
Newsletters of a trade group representing egg producers regularly note the need to find new markets to "dispose" of spent hens. The primary options: pet food, compost — and schools.
Campbell Soup, for instance, stopped using spent-hen meat more than a decade ago. The reason: "quality considerations," company spokesman Anthony Sanzio says."
From USATODAY
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE
It's tough, stringy and far less appealing than the more tender meat of broiler chickens. But that didn't stop the government from using the National School Lunch Program as an outlet for egg producers struggling to find a market for 100 million egg-laying hens culled each year.
From 2001 though the first half of 2009, USA TODAY found, the government spent more than $145 million on spent-hen meat for schools — a total of more than 77 million pounds served in chicken patties and salads. Since 2007, 13.6 million pounds were purchased.
Newsletters of a trade group representing egg producers regularly note the need to find new markets to "dispose" of spent hens. The primary options: pet food, compost — and schools.
Campbell Soup, for instance, stopped using spent-hen meat more than a decade ago. The reason: "quality considerations," company spokesman Anthony Sanzio says."
From USATODAY
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE
12/8/09
12/7/09
12/6/09
12/4/09
12/3/09
The White House Hoop House - from Civil Eats
"This winter, the First Lady can take it one step further. Eating from the garden doesn’t only have to be limited to March-October. Michelle Obama is in a perfect position to show us that local food is possible outside of the summer months, no matter where you live. She can bring the country’s attention to the creative ways that people like Eliot Coleman and Will Allen manage to grow food in all four seasons."
Originally published at Slow Food USA
12/2/09
2/3 of Chicken Tested Harbor Dangerous Bacteria
Illustration by Keith Negley
"Consumer Reports' latest test of fresh, whole broilers bought in 22 states reveals that two-thirds of birds tested harbored salmonella and/or campylobacter, the leading bacterial causes of food-borne disease. The report reveals that organic "air-chilled" broilers were among the cleanest and that Perdue was found to be the cleanest of the brand-name chicken. Tyson and Foster Farms chickens were found to be the most contaminated. The report is available, free online (note, you have to click through the side bars to the left of the story) and in the January 2010 issue of the magazine."
by Naomi Starkman
Food Policy Media Consultant
Bill Maher asks IHOP To Cut The Cruel Cages!!
"You may come hungry to IHOP, but you shouldn’t leave happy. Not as long as they only use eggs from hens crammed into tiny cages where they can barely move an inch. This is so cruel that IHOP’s home state of California has made it a crime…Forget pancakes, IHOP now stands for ‘The International House of Pain.’”
FROM ECORAZZI
12/1/09
Here is why The Corn Refiners wrote to me
I wrote this for Joan Brunwasser and the Corn Refiners Association wrote "We would like to provide you with science-based information on this safe sweetner and be a reference for you for future articles"
Here is what I wrote - Try staying away from drinks that have an ingredient: high fructose corn syrup. It's not great for kids' bodies - you'll be astonished how many drinks, including fruit juices, have it. If I remember what I read correctly, the average American eats 35 pounds of HFC a year. Let's be honest - that can't be good. Could that be part of the reason kids are obese? Because HFC is in so many things?
So I have started to do a bunch of research - I have to say because the from Corn Refiners Association information comes from "the corn people" of course the information is pro HFCS. More research..
Is fructose making you fat? An interview with Richard Johnson, MD
The Sugar Debate
"Eating too much regular cane sugar may be unhealthy, but eating even modest amounts of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) could be even worse, say experts. The refined fructose in HFCS affects your body differently than other types of sugars, absorbing quickly into cells while bypassing your body's natural appetite-control mechanisms. This means you stay hungry and keep eating. What's more, fructose increases body fat more readily. So read labels carefully and avoid HFCS whenever possible."
Source: Get the Sugar Out by Ann Louise Gittleman, PhD, CNS (Three Rivers, 2008).
MORE LINKS BELOW.
Here is what I wrote - Try staying away from drinks that have an ingredient: high fructose corn syrup. It's not great for kids' bodies - you'll be astonished how many drinks, including fruit juices, have it. If I remember what I read correctly, the average American eats 35 pounds of HFC a year. Let's be honest - that can't be good. Could that be part of the reason kids are obese? Because HFC is in so many things?
So I have started to do a bunch of research - I have to say because the from Corn Refiners Association information comes from "the corn people" of course the information is pro HFCS. More research..
Is fructose making you fat? An interview with Richard Johnson, MD
The Sugar Debate
"Eating too much regular cane sugar may be unhealthy, but eating even modest amounts of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) could be even worse, say experts. The refined fructose in HFCS affects your body differently than other types of sugars, absorbing quickly into cells while bypassing your body's natural appetite-control mechanisms. This means you stay hungry and keep eating. What's more, fructose increases body fat more readily. So read labels carefully and avoid HFCS whenever possible."
Source: Get the Sugar Out by Ann Louise Gittleman, PhD, CNS (Three Rivers, 2008).
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