The Food Bond

Harry Chapin was many things, with a hefty dose of political activism included with his musical talent. He touched on a number of political issues over the years, but the one he kept coming back to, again and again, was hunger. “There’s enough food to feed everyone on this planet twice over. Why, why, why are people going hungry?”

This time of year, Harry would always talk about Thanksgiving food drives, when schools would ask kids to bring in canned goods and other food to share with the hungry. “Just imagine,” Harry would suggest, a principal who would stand up after a successful food drive and after the holiday and say “What we’re gonna talk about is ‘What are those people gonna eat next week?’”

Harry’s top charity was World Hunger Year, an organization he helped create in 1975.

People are hungry all year. Thanks for remembering to share what you can, when you can.

I have nothing in particular against popcorn, but it’s not something I urgently need. I rarely bother with the stale stuff at the movie theatre, especially for the price. (As Rita Rudner once observed, “I don’t like to pay $3 in the movies for a bucket of popcorn. Popcorn costs 13 cents a silo.”) I sometimes have microwave popcorn around the house for emergencies, such as friends coming over to watch a DVD, and I’ve had a massive jar of Orville Redenbacher’s in my kitchen cabinet since a friend moving out of town dropped off a box of random kitchen stuff.

Popcorn photo courtesy of Melanie Stewart-Hazlett.

One night last fall, I was out of the emergency microwave packets when a friend wanted some popcorn, so I fired up the web browser and refreshed my memory on stovetop poppery. You can go the Jiffy Pop route, of course, but those take up even more storage space than their microwavable successor. (Perfect for camping, though!) Or do as I did, and heat a tablespoon of olive oil (or other “good” vegetable oil) and a tablespoon of butter in a cast iron pot with a matching cover, with the stove on medium. Add a quarter cup of popcorn kernels when the pot’s hot, cover, and shake periodically. When the popping slows down, dump the popcorn out in a bowl and top while it’s hot.

What should you top it with? Well, I used freshly ground kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, but a cookout at a friend’s last night revealed some other great options. They buy cheap boxed macaroni & cheese for the cheese powder, putting it in a shaker and saving the macaroni for a tastier fate. They’ve also got cinnamon sugar, chili powder, garlic powder, and ground cayenne, and there was talk of curry powder, too. Ithaca movie theatre Cinemapolis offers nutritional yeast powder for their popcorn; it adds a nutty taste and makes the popcorn downright good for you!

The good news, of course, is that popcorn really is as cheap as Miss Rudner expounded. Well, you and I can’t have it for 13 cents a silo, but a jar of the stuff, even a premium brand, is still eminently affordable despite the ethanol trend driving wholesale popcorn prices up. Put away the chemical-filled microwave packets and try some fresh popcorn with your next DVD. And, yes, of course you can add some melted butter on top.

I’m quite amused, and more than a little intrigued, by news in The Guardian that the Belgian city of Ghent has declared every Thursday to be a vegetarian day. This radical experiment, which began today, seeks to promote “sustainable and healthy living,” says Tom Balthazar, the Labour Party councillor who pushed the idea in the city of about 200,000

While no one will be forced to go vegetarian, even for a day, organizers say every restaurant in the city will guarantee at least one vegetarian dish on the menu on Thursdays, and beginning in September, city schools will provide vegetarian school lunches by default. (Insistent parents will be able to arrange meaty food for their kids.)

I’m an omnivore, so while I certainly don’t eschew meat, there are lots of vegetarian foods I enjoy. In honour of Ghent, I’m going to try to make my own Thursdays vegetarian for a while and see how it goes. I began today with leftover sushi for breakfast before reading about Ghent’s new plan, so I’m not counting that, but I ran to Burger King for a BK Veggie for lunch.

These sandwiches, made with Morningstar Farms patties, are surprisingly good, and today I took advantage of the chain’s current offer to make any sandwich “angry” for 80 cents. A clever upselling gimmick based on the “Angry Whopper,” angrifying your food adds spicy sauce, jalapeño peppers, and onion rings. (It also includes bacon, but I left that off my BK Veggie for today.) Even without the angriness, I find the BK Veggie to be a great addition to Burger King’s menu. Vegetarians can ask that the patty be microwaved instead of placed on the grill conveyor belt that also carries meat, and strict vegans can skip the mayo.

I know I won’t have any trouble finding vegetarian dishes to eat on Thursdays in general, though there are situations when I know I’ll be tempted to eat meat. I’ll report back on how successful my plan is, over time. Meantime, if you’re interested in participating or want to keep track, use the #VeggieThursday hashtag on Twitter.

This week the 14850 Dining Report (where I do a lot of my food writing, focusing on local eateries) is talking about Passover and its food traditions. Straight out of the Bible’s Book of Exodus, the Passover story is about the Jewish people’s departure from slavery in Egypt, and the holiday is full of traditions that recall aspects of that story.

Most of the changes to people’s diet during Passover stem from commemorating the fleeing Jews’ rush to bake their bread before it had a chance to rise. This has been extended to a general prohibition on eating grains during Passover, including not just wheat, rye and barley, but also corn — which means the countless prepared foods that include corn syrup or corn starch are off limits for the week. The good news is that the corn syrup restriction leads to Kosher for Passover Coke, made with cane syrup for a couple of weeks a year. Look for the telltale yellow cap with Hebrew writing on it.

Some observant Jews eliminate not just bread and pasta and other grain items from their diets for a week, but also all legumes — which includes peanuts and soy, so such vegetarian staples as peanut butter and tofu are off-limits. These restrictions are mostly observed by Jews of Ashkenazic, primarily Eastern European, descent, but generally not by those of Sephardic descent, often from northern Africa or Spain.

Most alcoholic drinks are grain-based, including beer and whisky, though determined observers might seek out potato-based vodka (most commercial vodkas these days are grain alcohol) and agave-based tequila.

Local eateries can help those observing Passover by making sure there are some dishes available without grains — so, salads without croutons, soups without flour or corn starch, and entrees without pasta or rice. If you’re in my area, Hal’s Deli in downtown Ithaca offers a Passover menu each spring, including matzah ball soup, borscht, salads, and omelets. Or visit the Queen of Tarts on Maple Avenue for flourless chocolate tortes and coconut macaroons. Having matzah on hand — the flat, unleavened, cracker-like bread — will make eateries especially popular for Passover!

Other symbolic foods that appear in the traditional Passover Seder include a lamb shank bone that represent the Paschal sacrifice and the lamb’s blood placed on doorposts to ward off the Angel of Death; and charoset, the sweet mixture of apples and walnuts with wine that symbolizes the mortar used in constructing the Pyramids.

Of course, the most famous Passover meal is the Last Supper — the meal represented in Da Vinci’s painting which Jesus shared with his twelve disciples.

Whether you’re celebrating Passover or Easter or one of the even older spring equinox festivals celebrating rebirth, we wish you a happy spring season.

How disappointing to discover at a KFC in Michigan tonight that the Colonel is no longer offering packets of honey to go along with the 11 herbs and spices in his fried chicken, or for casually drizzling on a warm biscuit. KFC now provides packets of “Honey Sauce,” so labeled because it’s not honey, but a sauce made mostly from high fructose corn syrup and flavoured with 11% honey.

Has it occurred to them that honey is one of the easiest natural products to obtain and distribute, and that going to the trouble of producing fake, unhealthful crap isn’t going to endear the chain to their customers?

At a time when even the gargantuan PepsiCo is discovering the benefit of introducing a “Pepsi Throwback” soft drink made with sugar instead of HFCS, perhaps KFC (which used to be part of the Pepsi conglomerate) should ditch the overly sweet, overly carb-heavy alchemy in favour of the Real Thing. (Wait, wrong soft drink.)

Here I go for my first post!

While MHA likes to hit up eateries in the Ithaca area, I’m more of a cook/baker kind of chick.  Don’t get me wrong; I love trying out new restaurants and being adventurous when eating out.  Right now, however, I’m trying to experiment with new recipes and get a good handle on pastry making, so I often find myself cooking and baking up a storm.  It’s therapeutic, it’s creative and it’s fun!

Last night, I stayed home and baked up four loaves of beautiful bread.  I used about four overripe bananas to make an oatmeal banana bread.  I ended up giving it away to a friend, but he assured me it was delish.

I also decided to try my hand at making a few loaves of whole wheat bread.  I’ve tried making yeast breads in the past, but they’ve never come out quite right.  I’m kind of an impatient person, so I probably never give them enough time to do their rising thing.  I do love the taste of homemade bread, so I spent about four hours letting the fragrant dough rise and work its magic.  I’m glad I did because the loaves turned out really lovely.  I gave a few of the loaves away, but I saved the last one for myself and had a slice of it with butter and cherry jam for breakfast.  It was wonderful, and I’m so glad all of my hard work paid off!

I don’t have any photos to show off, but I will begin uploading some visuals in the future!

Cheese slices at Mama T's

A new late-night bargain idea: $1.50 cheese slices at the pizza “happy hour” at Mama Teresa’s in Ithaca’s Collegetown. They’re doing this from 10pm to 3am on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays — so it’s perfect for a snack on the way into Trivia Night at Pixel!

Sure, it’s a good way for them to finish off the day’s pizza, so it may not be the very freshest, but it’s a good deal for a quick late-night bite on the way to, or from, the library, the bar, or the party.

I was in Albany this weekend for the ECAC Hockey tournament, and was delighted to discover the new Wolff’s Biergarten at 895 Broadway, next to the Miss Albany Diner. This awesome old building (I’m guessing it’s a former fire station) now features a heavily European-beer-focused bar, several large-screen TVs showing soccer (fußball) or other sports (there was some basketball this weekend), and simple, quick, delicious German food like sausages and potato pancakes.

The beer’s sold by the .3, .5, and full liter steins, and there’s some delicious stuff on tap, a few wines (focusing on Rieslings and Gewurztraminers to stick to the theme), and a small selection of soft drinks. They’re doing weekend brunches, such as the above combo plate with choice of two sausages, scrambled eggs, potato pancakes, and a roll.

This’ll definitely be high on my list of places to get back to when I’m in Albany! Meantime, if you’re looking for work, they told me yesterday they’re hiring. In particular, Matt says they need barbacks right now. They just opened last Thursday, and the place looks like it’s been humming along smoothly for ages! I love the rough-hewn picnic tables, bowls of peanuts, and shells all over the floor.

This is the sort of eatery I can see working well nearly anywhere. The steam-table food-service approach and the simple foods mean low cost and high margin, and quick service means happy customers.