The Week in Food News (and a NIBBLE Update)!

This week I've come across some nuggets in the news and learned something interesting in Real Life.   News: if you have a bigger shopping cart you are very likely going to buy more stuff.  Maybe that's intuitive, but less so is that the larger your fork at a restaurant, the less you eat.  Real Life Discovery: While there is always a line to the door at Chipotle at 9:45pm, there is not one person there at 5pm.  Does that mean older people (early-bird special types) don't enjoy cilantro-infused rice?  Below are a few other recent tidbits in food news.


Favorite Quote So Far
The author of a New York Times article about a farm in Iowa humanely raising pigs was captivated by the farm, the health of the animals, and the fabulous taste of the pork they produced.  He wrote that it was easily the best he had ever eaten.  Lucky for us non-Iowans, Chipotle is doing it's part by buying all of the pork shoulder this farm offers them.  My new favorite quote comes from this article:

“Food isn't just a pile of stuff to be measured by weight and volume, and there’s a reason industrially produced meat is just a little more expensive than garbage."

Meat Eater's Guide To Climate Change + Health
The Meat Eater's Guide is really well done.  They studied the complete life cycle of many animals and vegetables that we eat and evaluated their contribution to greenhouse gasses in the environment.  If everyone in the U.S. followed "Meatless Mondays", it would be the equivalent of driving 91 billion fewer miles, or taking 7.6 million cars off the road.  They found that 20% of the greenhouse gas emissions from raising and producing cattle come from meat that just gets thrown out, so when you do buy it make sure you only buy what you can realistically use. Oh, and lentils are awesome.


It's important to know that the study only looked at farming using conventional methods (feedlots, antibiotics, etc), and not traditionally farmed, grass-fed animals.   People's biggest complaint about the humanely raised animals is that their meat is more expensive, but the guide addresses this by noting if you eat less of it you can afford to buy meat of a higher quality.  In Howard County, Clarkland Farm is my favorite place to buy grass-fed beef.     


Gojee
I was going to do a whole post on food websites and technology, but that's taking too long so here's my favorite new recipe website.  Gojee let's you put in an ingredient that you already have and suggests recipes that use it.  It's a visually stunning site, and the creators have personally reviewed all the recipes. Recipes have come from some of the best food bloggers, so you're definitely going to find something special.  While sites like AllRecipes have 5000 different recipes for chocolate chip cookies, Gojee has about 5000 unique and inspiring recipes in total.  

In NIBBLE News...

I cheated.  Once.  It was Tuesday, and I was starving (blame the marathon training). I had been thinking about candy for 4 or 5 days and I caved.  I didn't overindulge, and I haven't gone back so I'm still claiming success overall.