Vegetarian Foodie

Websites for Foodies

So I was having a gander around the web earlier and as always I am impressed with the degree of innovation I see. I discovered TasteBook. Have you foodies heard of this?

Tastebook is a clever interface which allows one to design their own cookbook. Cookbook features include: 100 recipes, a hardcover,an easy open binder and 10 chapters. See the sample:

The creator of the cookbook can pull recipes from the provided database or better yet for foodies,upload original recipes, original photos, and voila-your very own cookbook arrives on your doorstep.

How much for this you are asking? $34.95

Another website for foodies that I arrived at was FoodTube.Net. FoodTube offers an enormous collection of video recipes, most of which are totally boring (and I adore a video of good food porn). Like public access, I see the potential and FoodTube which proves popular with the foodies and logs a big chunk of traffic. If you find any great gems-let me know.

Taste TV enjoys status as the indie food channel. Slick and entertaining indeed and is worth spending some time on when it is cold outside and you are wearing thick socks.

BLT with Smashed Avocado

I grew up loving BLTs. I recall the BLTs of my childhood on toasted white bread and overly smeared with mayonnaise. I remember, so clearly, the soggy tomatoes and wilted lettuce and how when I would bite into the sandwich there was a distinct crunch sound. 

Thanks to the folks at MorningStar there is a stunning vegetarian bacon on the market, it is salty and crunchy in all the right places. The BLTs of today have accessorized with smashed avocado and it is very becoming! 

If you are in the mood to browse, there is a great excerpt from a photo essay called What the World Eats.

Being the before and after photos junkie I am, there is a good collection called We Like it Raw.

Do you know a great recipe for Ratatouille? There is a contest over at Recipe4Living.
 

Organic Vs Non Organic Food

The most recent horror film I have seen was entitled ‘The Future of Food’. Normally I enjoy horror movies but not of this caliber. The Future of Food is a documentary that depicts the contemporary plight of farmers as they struggle to compete against corporations like Monsanto as well as outlining the controversy over genetically modified foods. 

While most of us are aware that organic produce is better tasting than genetically modified food, the film offers plenty of additional reasons to say no thank you to GM foods. 

You can view the trailer on The Future of Food’s website: Trailer

If you have not seen it, I highly recommend it. It wasn’t long after the husband and I saw the Future of Food that we arranged for a weekly box of produce from a local organic farm called Garden of Eden Organics . We have quickly realized that the additional cost is well worth the money. The quality of the produce we eat is outstanding. We feel great about the food we are eating and we know where it comes from. 

Local Harvest is a great online resource for looking up organic farms, co-ops and farmers markets in your area.

Here is just a sample of some of the delicious produce we received in our box this week:

The 5 Second Rule

I had the Pleasure of waiting tables for a good 15 years of my life. I am no stranger to the 5 second rule.  Essentially, the 5 second rule states that if something drops onto the floor and is retrieved within 5 seconds it is okay to serve or eat. I am not certain who invented this rule but what is for certain is that the 5 second rule is popular in restaurants and even homes around the globe. In fact, research conducted in 2003 by Jillian Clarke states that upwards of 50% of adult men and 70% of adult women know about and employ the 5 second rule.

It looks as though a man called Paul Dawson and his research group over at Clemson University have proved some validity in regards to the 5 second rule:

"On surfaces that had been contaminated eight hours earlier, slices of bologna and bread left for five seconds took up from 150 to 8,000 bacteria. Left for a full minute, slices collected about 10 times more than that from the tile and carpet, though a lower number from the wood."

Well who would have thought there was actually truth to the 5 second rule? Read more about the 5 second rule as well as other assorted oddities over at the Freakonomics blog (great book by the way).   

The Cost of Food

Yesterday I stumbled across an interesting link from the US Gov. It is a table of estimated Cost of Food at Home. The table estimates weekly food expenditures for different sized families with varied spending habits that dates back to 1994. I clicked on February of 2007 and apparently, a family of four using the Liberal Food Plan will spend $203.20 per week. Compare the Liberal Food Plan to the Thrifty Food Plan in which a family of 4 will spend $106.70 per week.

Last week I maintained my grocery receipts and here are the results: Minus the $49.93 spent on wine & beer and the $11.98 spent on fresh cut flowers, my total food cost was $194.05.

I'd say the people that developed this table are pretty spot on if their concept of liberal includes purchasing fresh organic produce, baguette and French cheese. That is just the thing, the definitions of 'thrifty' and 'liberal' are vague but based on the food pyramid. A pamphlet on the same website states that, "Because most people have a diet that needs improvement, this revision of the market baskets is an important means of helping households eat more healthfully."     Interesting statement.

How does your weekly spend on food compare to the table? Do you feel as though your family eats healthy?