There are looney people in Holland, too

Everyone in America knows that the origin of the meat in hot dogs is, at best, dubious. But wooden shoe-wearing stoners in Holland take pride in the amalgam of meat in the frikandel-- a deep-fried sausage made from beef, pork, chicken and...gasp, horse.

The frikandel experience as recalled by Greg Lindsay:

The Netherlands appears to lag about a century behind the United States in sausage-delivery mechanisms, bypassing the standards bun in favor of a plastic sleeve and fork. I also ordered -- just because I was there -- pommes frites and mayonnaise, reflexively hearing John Travolta ("They drown 'em in that shit") echoing through my mind. Despite the deep-frying, the exterior of the frikandel was still soft, making it almost impossible to cut off a piece with a fork without spilling pink gloop on my shoes.

Photo by Greg Lindsay for Esquire

Mooove over, you fatty inferior cows

Mad scientists in New Zealand are working on creating a cow super-race, if you will. These alpha-cows will produce milk that is "high in health-boosting omega-3 fatty acids and makes butter that spreads as easily as margarine even when chilled,high in health-boosting omega-3 fatty acids and makes butter that spreads as easily as margarine even when chilled."

In 2001, a cow named Marge was identified as having a genetic mutation that made her milk and her offsprings' milk healthier. Scientists and dairy farmers subsequently got all geeked out.

Up next are plans to create beta-cows for lower quality cheeses and epilson-cows for sausage.

Hemp brownies- legal and nutritious

Some would say its the best of both worlds, the means and the ends to the munchies.

Hemp is a complete protein (meaning it's just as effective at maintaining muscle as red meat), and it's a great source of mega-3 fatty acids, the wonder nutrient linked to preventing heart disease, depression, and osteoporosis. Worried about tripping the light fantastic after your snack? Don't be. Hemp is a different variety of cannabis, and it doesn't trigger positive drug tests.

A few websites with the hook-up are Hempsisters.com, GlobalHempstore.com and LivingHarvest.com

From Women'sHealth.com, photo by Todd Huffman

Ron Paul, I got your recipe right here!

Those of you who have troubles with the slicing variety of "homemade" cookies are not alone. Apparently, Republican presidential hopeful and closeted Libertarian Ron Paul had issues with spacing and made a giant cookie. Mary Ann Akers of the Washington Post exposed his failure as baker in her Sleuth column today.

To help Rep. Paul out in successful satisfying his sweet tooth, here's my favorite recipe for choolate chip cookies:

1 lb Butter; softened
2 c Brown sugar
1 1/2 c Granulated sugar
3 lg Eggs; room temp
2 tb Vanilla
1 1/2 ts Salt
1 1/2 ts Baking soda
6 c All-purpose flour
24 oz Chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Cream the butter and sugars together in a large bowl. Add the eggs and the vanilla and beat thoroughly. In a separate bowl, sift together the salt, soda and flour. Mix the flour mixture into the liquid mixture one third at a time, to form the dough. Add the semi-sweet chocolate chips to the dough. Drop the cookie dough onto parchment-lined cookie sheets by the
tablespoon full. Bake in a preheated 350 degree F. oven for 10 to 12 minutes. BAKE NO MORE THAN 12 MINUTES! Do not brown or cookies will dry out too much cause then get nasty....

On a completely unrelated note. Rep. Paul also thinks prostitution and marijuana should be legalized.

Hmm, sounds like somebody has the munchies.

The Perfect Burger

...according to culinary ass-kicker Tony Rosenfeld at the Washington Post

And if you really get into it and want to make your own buns

and mustard

and grill some onions

and make relish

photo by Andrew Scrivani at NYT

Paint dries. Cheese ages.

If you ever wondered what cheese looks like as it ages, here's your chance to find out.

Frankly, I think watching a chunk of dairy matter sit in a dark room is pretty boring. But you got to give the West Country Farmhouse Cheesemakers props for loving what they do. Plus, its quirky and I like quirky.

Check it out at CheddarVision.com

Can a Congressman live on $21 a week?

After a week-long challenge to live on the budget given to food stamp recipients (which is very close to what I spent a week on food in college), Rep. Tim Ryan heard the siren song of a pork chop.

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.), co-chairmen of the House
Hunger Caucus, called on lawmakers to take the "Food Stamp Challenge" to raise
awareness of hunger and what they say are inadequate benefits for food stamp
recipients. Only two others, Ryan and Janice Schakowsky (D-Ill.), took them up on it.
McGovern and Emerson have introduced legislation that would add $4 billion
to the annual federal food stamp budget, which was $33 billion last year and
covered 26 million Americans. The proposal could be incorporated by Congress
into the new farm bill.
"We're trying to get this debate going," McGovern
said. "There are more working people today getting food stamps than six years
ago. . . . There's not a member of Congress that doesn't have hunger in their
district."
According to the rules of the challenge, the four House members
cannot eat anything beside their $21 worth of groceries. That means no food at
the many receptions, dinners and fundraisers that fill a lawmaker's week.
At
the Safeway, Ryan seemed to grow depressed as he realized the limits of his
budget. "It's unbelievable," he said, filling his small grocery basket with
peanut butter, jelly and bread. He bought a big bag of cornmeal that he says
he'll try to fashion into grits for breakfast and polenta for dinner. And he
grabbed some canned tomato sauce and pasta on sale. No money for meat, milk,
juice, fresh fruit or vegetables, save for a single head of 32-cent garlic to
flavor the tomato sauce.

Both lawmakers will keep blogs about the
experience, McGovern at http://foodstampchallenge.typepad.com and Ryan at http://timryan.house.gov.

Read it and learn

Rep. Tim Ryan's (D-Ohio) $21 shopping list:
Yellow cornmeal $1.43
2 jars strawberry preserves 4.80
1 jar chunky peanut butter 2.48
2 packages angel-hair pasta 1.54
Chock Full o’ Nuts coffee 2.50
3 cans tomato sauce 4.50
2 containers cottage cheese 3.00
1 loaf wheat bread 0.89
1 head of garlic 0.32
Total: $20.66

Photo by Katherine Fey

Attention all lushes!

Although it hardly ever happens with my boozer friends, sometimes after a party there'll be left over alcohol. One can either uncouthily nip the bottle like a homeless the next morning or make an impressive fruity dessert with minimal effort. The nuts of bolts of it are soaking your favorite fruit (my choice is berries or peaches) in a sugar and alcohol mixture. I like to use tequila, Grand Marnier or a light wine, but experiment and find out which one suits your palate.

After cleaning and slicing up your fruit, pour "the sauce," as my Grandpa used to call it, on top. Sprinkle about 2-3 tablespoons of sugar to the mixture and toss the fruit, booze, and sugar, making sure to cover each piece with liquid. Let everything sit for 15 minutes minimum (the culinary term for this is macerate, not that you care).

The boozy-fruit can be served as a topping on ice cream or on cake to soak up the sauce. Overall its good stuff and tastes like it takes a lot of effort. But you know different, you big alky.

Photo by Len Spoden

The white woman's crack just got whacker

An open letter to Coca-Cola,

Call me a purist, but I like my Diet Coke free of chemical shit.

Well, um, without all the new vitaminy additives that marketing bloodsuckers have tossed in to seduce skinny bitches and wannabe-skinny bitches to drink more of the liquid crack.

I take a Centrum daily and eat my leafy greens. Please let me have this one vice, Coca- Cola. You're manipulating us addicts, but we're smart enough take our chemical cocktail in its natural form. We don't want fortified vitamins and minerals in the world's best-selling sugar-free carbonated drink. We want the "great taste without the benefits."

Obesity is a real downer for you (and the millions of Americans whose tubby asses are perma-glued to the couch and covered in telltale orange Cheeto dust) but why target Diet Coke? If you're gonna monkey with products to revamp your image, mess with the tooth-rotting bile you sell in the red cans.

I apologize for getting a little cranky. I just haven't had any caffeine today.

Sincerely,

Lesley

Ice Cube, glocks and salad dressing

For years one of the items listed above was not like the others. One of these things just didn't belong. But since 1993 Food from the 'Hood has been bringing the best out of the ghetto by teaching Crenshaw High students to manage a garden and salad dressing company.

Anyone who has ever tasted "Straight Out' the Garden Creamy Italian Dressing" knows the group of entrepreneurial students has been successful. In fact the proceeds have helped 77 kids from Crenshaw attend college and receive test prep and tutoring.

The creamy italian, honey mustard and ranch varieties can be purchased at major grocery stores in Southern California. The rest of us poor schmucks can get a bottle on Amazon.

Oh, and it's healthy, too. Talk about a karma boost.

Food from the 'Hood site

Grill like a champ (and a nerd)

For those who have absolutley no space, love the taste of burgers and have a computer, boy, do I have the gadget for you. George Foreman has solved your grilling needs once again with a masterful contraption that plugs into a USB port and does the work for you. At about $100, its not exactly free but still a worthy investment if you're tight on square footage and frequently hankering for an Angus.

"The low-fat, high-bandwidth solution to your networked cooking needs is here. The George Foreman USB iGrill conveniently connects to your home or office PC using USB 2.0 technology, and provides a sophisticated web-based cooking interface. Download recipes, enter in the type of food, weight and desired degree of doneness, and the iGrill handles the rest. Running late at work? Need to get dinner on the table? It is easy to warm up the iGrill from any internet connection. With a little advance planning, your meal can be ready when you get home! "

Thinkgeek.com

To celebrate the begining of summer (and tank tops, flip flops and swimming pools) here are my picks for best articles on outdoor grilling:

Grilling 101

Build your own backyard smoker

According to Wikipedia...

Everything You Thought You Knew About Grilling Is Wrong

How-to's

Roasted, toasted and made on a rack

Photo Credit: Photos By Len Spoden For The Washington Post

As someone with perpetually burnt fingers, I have to give props to whomever thought of roasting peppers on a cake rack. Or maybe a dish drying rack, I don't know. What I do know is that these little charred veggies are a cheap, bad ass way to make almost any dish look and taste more impressive...and with so little effort. Just stick them over a flame and turn when the skin gets black and crinkly looking. Resting the pepper on the rack, well, that's pure utilitarian genius ( like using the cutouts on the spatula to make designs with powdered sugar on cupcakes- which takes the confidence of a real man I might add).

Phosphorus? Phosphoryou, Twinkie!

The magic of an American guilty pleasure exposed....

"Twinkies are as amazingly good as they are disgusting. But do you know why? We've picked a few facts from Twinkie, Deconstructed (Hudson Street Press, $24), by Steven Ettlinger.

Phosphorus, part of a key Twinkie ingredient, was discovered in 1669 by German alchemist Hennig Brand when he boiled down the urine he collected from local nuns.
Other Twinkie ingredients include the rocks trona and limestone.
Twinkies made per year: 500,000,000.
Twinkie cream gets its slippery sheen from cotton cellulose, which serves the same purpose in rocket fuel.
Despite popular lore, Twinkies will not survive a nuclear war any better than you will--their average shelf life is 25 days.
President Clinton put a Twinkie in a time capsule."

from Esquire magazine, April 2007

One more reason I love Mark Bittman

A few weeks ago, I really thought Mark Bittman just could not get any cooler. Not only does he have the best basic cookbook ever (How to Cook Everything is the title), he's a food guy who's got "bit" in his last name. It's like weathermen named Johnny Raines or Stormy Smith.

Then I saw his New York Times article this morning on how to set up an enitre kitchen for $300.00. Granted for most young folks, 300 bones is still a lot to spend in one place, but you can read it for inspiration.

http://http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/09/dining/09mini.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin