WE ARE WHAT WE EAT

[Tizer]

This type of revelation is nothing to do with advances in our knowledge of nutrition but simply a function of how much money is spent my marketing men in `talking it up'. Someone somewhere grew too many cauliflowers and wants to sell them! The USA is the worst place for this sort of PR - there are `trade associations' for just about everything all trying to outdo each other. Cranberries and walnuts are good examples.
http://njcranberries.org/
http://www.walnuts.org/

[Stanley]

I'm sure you are right Tiz. The bo0ttom line is that we are all 'potential consumers' and as such must be persuaded to buy! I prefer to rely on hard evidence I gather myself. All right I might miss out on some minor truth but at least I have the advantage of independence and cheaper food!

[Tizer]

Good news! A sensible approach at last. The Mediterranean style of diet allows you to eat plenty of of olive oil which is not only healthy but the oil damps down the hunger reaction in the brain so you don't feel so much need for snacking. But why is it taking so long for this message to get through to the public?

BBC, 17 November 2014
`Mediterranean diet is best way to tackle obesity, say doctors'
"A Mediterranean diet may be a better way of tackling obesity than calorie counting, leading doctors have said. Writing in the Postgraduate Medical Journal (PMJ), the doctors said a Mediterranean diet quickly reduced the risk of heart attacks and strokes. And they said it may be better than low-fat diets for sustained weight loss."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29929403

[Stanley]

Because olive oil hasn't got a long enough shelf life for the processors and there are cheaper oils. They are interested in profit, not how good it is for you.
Have a look at this LINK for the Mangalitsa pig. The article is not quite accurate as the Mangalitsa is popular with sausage makers because of the high fat content of the meat. 90% of Hungarian production is exported and its fame is spreading. See THIS for them being used in Dorset. So nice to see meat being appreciated for its taste and fat content, the best thing about pig meat of course. I hope the use of it spreads.....

[Wendyf]

My neighbours at Scald Bank breed Mangalitza pigs. They also do their own butchering. I believe it's a very expensive product, never tried it myself.

[Tripps]

I'm surprised I hadn't heard of it. here's a little gem from the website.


Miss Piggy from The Muppets is a Mangalitsa pig.

[Stanley]

Very close to wild boar meat evidently. Sausage makers love it.....

[Tizer]

Don't tell that to Miss Piggy!

[Stanley]

See THIS BBC article on the McKinsey report on the economics of obesity. Reactions have including yet more statements of the bleeding obvious, eat less, avoid fast food, take exercise.... Will people ever take notice? How can advertising campaigns like the dreadful 'eat more, cook less' be allowed? Cheap fast food made from the worst ingredients is too easy and at the root of much of the problem. Sometimes I despair of the human race......

[Tizer]

Humans, like other animals, evolved to eat as much as possible whenever it's available and this has still been the way for most of the world population until very recently - most people didn't earn enough money to gorge themselves on food, especially energy rich food. And we expended a lot of energy in catching and harvesting food, then more lately working in factories to earn enough to buy food. Now, humans in the developed world are swamped in food and expend little energy, but we keep on eating because we're hard-wired that way. The old controls - lack of food or lack of money to buy food - have largely disappeared. At the same time a vast industry has developed in reinforcing the desire for food and making it cheaper, more energy dense and easier to eat. Perhaps the human race will eat its way into oblivion!

[Stanley]

That could well be true Tiz. As I type this there is a report on Farming Today on sugar production and prices. In case you hadn't noticed the farm gate price of sugar beet has plummeted. Even more profit for the food processors!

[Tizer]

A recent `Open Country' Radio 4 programme on Orchards in Herefordshire was excellent. Lots of interesting information, e.g. I didn't know that a Yorkshire man, John Riley, played a major part in putting Hereford cider on the map. You can listen to it using this BBC Listen Again web page: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04n62n8

[Stanley]

Cider is one of the bright spots in our food story. The big makers nearly killed the small artisan cider makers but, like the micro breweries, they are on the rise again. Would that the trend back to natural products was as strong in the general food industry. Cheese is perhaps a good example of how they can survive but look at the way cheese has been attacked for being 'unhealthy'. Too much fat and salt according to the experts.
On a closely related subject, I wonder why there is such a dearth of good cheese in the US. Very strange.....

[Tizer]

I once spent a couple of weeks working at a research institute in Louvain, Belgium, and there were some British scientists there on long contracts with their families. They told me that on each trip back to the UK it was essential to stock up with Cheddar cheese, HP Sauce and Marmite. Mind you, they were spoilt for choice in Belgium when it came to beer with all those monastery brews! A favourite was Duvel (`Devil') with 8.5% alcohol.

[Stanley]

I came across one in Dordrecht called 'Mort Subite", I think it was about 15% alcohol. Mind you, it was lovely beer but needed treating with great respect! There's some i9ntersting information about it (including who owns it now!) in this Wiki Reference. (LINK)

[Tizer]

The gueuze and lambic beers were traditionally made by normal mashing of malted barley and boiling with hops but then piping the hot wort into an open cooling tank of the roof of the brewery. It was left there until cold and had collected sufficient of the wild yeasts and lactic acid bacteria from the air above (and anything else that dropped in) then piped down to the fermentation vessels. Thus the beers had characters that reflected the brewery's location.

On a different topic....Today's papers are reporting food poisoning bacteria on the outside of packaged chicken, e.g. the Daily Mail:
"Poisonous bacteria found on OUTSIDE of chicken packaging: Families told to store it away from other food. Families are being advised to double-bag their chicken in the fridge. Campylobacter, a dangerous bacteria found on raw chicken, is present on the external packaging of thousands of British chickens sold in the UK. This was according to Food Standards Agency report published this week"
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... -food.html

What's more interesting is that if you look back to 2011 you'll find Birmingham food safety officials had already warned the Food Standards Agency about the problem, as reported by the Telegraph:
"Outer packaging of chicken 'covered in bacteria' study finds. Picking up a packet of chicken in a supermarket is more likely to give you food poisoning than handling a raw bird, a pioneering survey has found. Birmingham Food Safety officials found that there was no link between the chickens infected inside and outside the packaging. Both types of bacteria are dealt with by thorough cooking and hand washing. The council's food safety team is believed to be the first to test packaging and it has reported its findings to the Government's Food Standards Agency (FSA) and major retail chains."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink ... finds.html

So it's taken the FSA three years to agree with the Birmingham report. I wonder how many people have been made ill in that three years. Well, Birmingham alone has 900 cases a year of Campylobacter food poisoning and some of those must be coming from bacteria on the surface of packaging.

[PanBiker]

How many times will the shelf stacker's in an average supermarket wash their hands?

[Tizer]

Or if they wear gloves to handle chicken in frozen and chilled cabinets, do they discard the gloves before handling other products and trolley handles etc?

Diverging...In our local Co-op supermarket one of the frozen/chilled cabinets has been emptied and is now stacked high with those big tins of sweets and chocolates. No wonder obesity is a problem!

[Bruff]

The growth of microbreweries, and an increased interest in cheese-making, bee-keeping, foraging and artisan-baking, has led to the emergence of the ‘urban peasant’. Seriously. These are folk who eek out a living making and then selling just enough to keep on going. Fair enough, for the time being a lot may well be people of what I think we call ‘independent means’. But in time this might be an increasing choice for many as a part of localism and a desire for a simpler, less materialistic life.

In all seriousness, I myself have explored this. I am fortunate in being of ‘independent means’ in that I have a garage at the back lying largely redundant for its original purpose given the increase in car numbers and access, yet ideal for ‘peasant’ crafts (suitably renovated). It is the perfect size for a microbrewery and given a graveyard is over the adjacent wall makes for an obvious choice of name for the brewery – ‘Bone Orchard’. I’ve never tried brewing though, but there are reputable courses you can go on (I think Moorhouses in Burnley run one) and start-up costs aren’t too excessive.

I have more experience with preserves and the like, and have made a basic cheese, and my wife is a splendid baker of bread using her 4-year old sourdough starter. I could see myself travelling the streets of Hoylake and environs on a pushbike with a basket delivering the weekly beer, cheese, bread and pickles to ‘subscribers’.

Well, I suppose you can dream……………

Richard Broughton

[Stanley]

The Hoylake version of the Good Life?
Tiz, I think part of the subject of the Reith Lectures this year is about doctors applying what we already know as a better way of improving health quickly than spending money on fresh research. I don't think for one minute he'll be denigrating the latter but advocating the former. Your Birmingham example could be an instance of this.
( I have just done my daily bleach attack on my pot, the sink and the U bend.....)

[Tizer]

( I have just done my daily bleach attack on my pot, the sink and the U bend.....)

I'll bet the sirens went off in Barlick warning residents to stay indoors until the green cloud of chlorine gas dispersed!

Richard, if you choose anything choose brewing. It's a wonderful, fascinating subject, a great combination of plant science, microbiology, and engineering. But there's a lot of competition out there now from thousands of small brewers.

[Stanley]

The Reith Lecture was brilliant. Apart from the subject matter the man is a storyteller and it was riveting. Well worth finding on Listen Again....

[Stanley]

Are you struck, as I am, by the complete disregard of all the dietary advice we get when watching the TV advertisements for massive over-consumption?

[Stanley]

Have a look at THIS report into Premier Foods being accused of blackmailing suppliers by threatening them with loss of contracts if they don't make a 'product investment' payment. In other words charging them for retaining their contracts. In truth this is nothing new but is done in other ways ranging in promotional discounts to use of sheer market power to force down prices charged by suppliers. The price wars we are seeing since April when the impact of new entrants lake |Aldi and Lidl hit the big boy's sales and more recently in Tesco and Morrison getting into trouble, is supposed to 'benefit the consumer' by lowering food prices. We are engaged in a race to the bottom and people like milk-producing farmers and small suppliers to the major food processors are suffering. This is no way to run a business or maintain standards. Under the Tory monetary version of economics this is seen as the market at work for the benefit of society, only the 'fittest' survive.
I see it as a major threat to diversity and quality of food at the basic level of small producers. It is the reason why home producers are beaten down by cheap imports with the consequence that we import food which can be produced here. 'Cheap food' is an illusion. It is popular with failing governments because it reduces the cost of living and encourages low wages.
Compare this with what happened to the UK cotton industry. For good economic reasons cheap imports killed a whole industry. On a smaller scale practices which drive small producers out of the food business damage quality and choice and in the long run this is far more important than low prices which massage imperfect market systems like the one we see in the supermarkets at the moment. The irony is that a recent survey reveals that since April food prices to the consumer have risen....

[Tizer]

It's a horrible, unethical business model but it doesn't surprise me from that company. They are in trouble as shown by a report in the October issue of food industry magazine `Food Manufacture ': "Premier Foods has delivered a `truly awful 2014 stock performance'...shares tumbled by 71% since March." Unfortunately it's Premier who pay my occupational pension! Not that I ever worked for them but the company I did work for was taken over by a venture capital group which sold it later to Premier. When it came time to take my pension I had a difficult job getting it out of them. So I'm not surprised they are screwing their suppliers.