The Guardian
Despite our love for cookery, we amateurs, it seems, are still committing cardinal culinary sins. Andrew Shanahan asks some top chefs what makes them wince
Read more...
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Artificial food colouring warning
The BBC
Parents are being advised by experts not to give their children food containing certain additives until the results of a new study are published.
the additives tartrazine (E102), ponceau 4R (E124), sunset yellow (E110), carmoisine (E122), quinoline yellow (E104) and allura red AC (E129)
Read more...
Parents are being advised by experts not to give their children food containing certain additives until the results of a new study are published.
the additives tartrazine (E102), ponceau 4R (E124), sunset yellow (E110), carmoisine (E122), quinoline yellow (E104) and allura red AC (E129)
Read more...
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Foodies in focus
A digital photography course with a culinary twist offers holidaymakers a new way to see - and eat - their way around the Vendée. Ian White says cheese in west France.
Food and photography are the two great passions in Roger Stowell's life. As a fashion photographer in the early 1970s, Roger worked on the pioneering women's magazine Nova, where he met Caroline Conran. She introduced him to her husband Terence who was having a modest degree of success with a chain of home furnishing shops he'd started up in 1964.
Under the Conrans' powerful influence, Roger branched out into food photography and, in 1975, helped Habitat to launch the wok to a young middle-class market eager to move away from the dull image of traditional British cuisine. Since then he has worked regularly for superior glossy magazines as well as shops such as Harrods and Waitrose.
Read more...
Food and photography are the two great passions in Roger Stowell's life. As a fashion photographer in the early 1970s, Roger worked on the pioneering women's magazine Nova, where he met Caroline Conran. She introduced him to her husband Terence who was having a modest degree of success with a chain of home furnishing shops he'd started up in 1964.
Under the Conrans' powerful influence, Roger branched out into food photography and, in 1975, helped Habitat to launch the wok to a young middle-class market eager to move away from the dull image of traditional British cuisine. Since then he has worked regularly for superior glossy magazines as well as shops such as Harrods and Waitrose.
Read more...
Alice Waters: Skye Gyngell cooks for her food hero
For as long as she can remember, Skye Gyngell's food hero has been Alice Waters, the visionary restaurateur behind Chez Panisse, in California. One recent, nerve-wracking, Sunday she not only got to meet her, but to cook for her.
Read more...
Read more...
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Seasonal eating - rhubarb
The Guardian
Given that rhubarb seems so quintessentially English, you might be surprised to learn that it originates in China and Tibet. It was first imported in the 16th century for its medicinal properties as a purgative. Since the 1880s it has been grown using a method of production known as "forcing" - which sounds decidedly cruel but actually just consists of growing it indoors in the dark and warm. The process was discovered by a careless gardener who left a flowerpot on top of one of his plants, only to find the shoots grew much thinner and were much tastier. In Yorkshire's rhubarb triangle (not a joke, see here if you don't believe me) it is still harvested at night, by candlelight.
Read more...
Given that rhubarb seems so quintessentially English, you might be surprised to learn that it originates in China and Tibet. It was first imported in the 16th century for its medicinal properties as a purgative. Since the 1880s it has been grown using a method of production known as "forcing" - which sounds decidedly cruel but actually just consists of growing it indoors in the dark and warm. The process was discovered by a careless gardener who left a flowerpot on top of one of his plants, only to find the shoots grew much thinner and were much tastier. In Yorkshire's rhubarb triangle (not a joke, see here if you don't believe me) it is still harvested at night, by candlelight.
Read more...
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Seasonal eating - asparagus
Conventional wisdom tells you that asparagus must be steamed, preferably in an asparagus kettle. Then again conventional wisdom tells you that the asparagus season doesn't start until May, so what does convention know? Asparagus is already appearing in farmers' markets, organic box schemes and shops, presumably another indicator of climate change and our unseasonably warm weather.
The most important thing to check when you are buying asparagus is the base of the stalk - that's where the first signs of age will show (and are often disguised by the elastic band holding it together). Look out for dried out or mouldy bits. Small thin stalks are more popular, but they aren't necessarily better - thick ones have more crunch and work better with stronger flavours like cheese.
Read more...
The most important thing to check when you are buying asparagus is the base of the stalk - that's where the first signs of age will show (and are often disguised by the elastic band holding it together). Look out for dried out or mouldy bits. Small thin stalks are more popular, but they aren't necessarily better - thick ones have more crunch and work better with stronger flavours like cheese.
Read more...
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
A taste for travel
The Guardian
For years gastronomes have trailed around France and Italy in search of delicacies. Now food tours are springing up all over Britain. Bibi van der Zee tries the cheese, beer and pork pies of Leicestershire
Read more...
For years gastronomes have trailed around France and Italy in search of delicacies. Now food tours are springing up all over Britain. Bibi van der Zee tries the cheese, beer and pork pies of Leicestershire
Read more...
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Britons throw out a third of all food, research says
The Guardian
By James Sturcke
Over-buying, wrong storage temperatures and fussy children were among the reasons people gave for throwing away 6.7m tonnes of food a year,
Read more...
By James Sturcke
Over-buying, wrong storage temperatures and fussy children were among the reasons people gave for throwing away 6.7m tonnes of food a year,
Read more...
Monday, March 19, 2007
In praise of ... sliced bread
The Guardian, Leader article
What have chip-and-pin bank cards, Jack Johnson, supermarkets espousing environmental causes and the website www.last.fm got in common? Not a lot except that they, and dozens of other items, have been described in the newspapers in recent weeks as "the best thing since sliced bread". This is curious. We live in an age of unprecedented innovation, yet the standard benchmark for judging excellence is not the jet engine or television or the internet, but plain old sliced bread. It is a marvel of viral marketing that this phrase is known all over the world, and it is no surprise that this month saw a key figure in its development recognised. Legislators at Little Rock, Arkansas, passed a resolution honouring Richard Otto Rohwedder, son of the inventor and, as a 13-year-old boy, the person who actually pushed the first loaf through an automated cutter in 1928. Senator Shane Broadway, sponsor of the resolution, observed that it would be "appropriate to recognise his part in history, culture and our society" and added: "All of us could not live without sliced bread." It is possible to disagree with that statement while acknowledging the longevity of the invention. Mr Rohwedder, who died in February aged 92, would have been delighted by a BBC news item pointing out that the freshly baked loaves in supermarkets are now selling for 89p or less, while Warburtons Seeded Batch sliced loaves enjoy premium status, costing up to £1.40p each. This is clearly the best thing for sliced bread since ...
Read more...
What have chip-and-pin bank cards, Jack Johnson, supermarkets espousing environmental causes and the website www.last.fm got in common? Not a lot except that they, and dozens of other items, have been described in the newspapers in recent weeks as "the best thing since sliced bread". This is curious. We live in an age of unprecedented innovation, yet the standard benchmark for judging excellence is not the jet engine or television or the internet, but plain old sliced bread. It is a marvel of viral marketing that this phrase is known all over the world, and it is no surprise that this month saw a key figure in its development recognised. Legislators at Little Rock, Arkansas, passed a resolution honouring Richard Otto Rohwedder, son of the inventor and, as a 13-year-old boy, the person who actually pushed the first loaf through an automated cutter in 1928. Senator Shane Broadway, sponsor of the resolution, observed that it would be "appropriate to recognise his part in history, culture and our society" and added: "All of us could not live without sliced bread." It is possible to disagree with that statement while acknowledging the longevity of the invention. Mr Rohwedder, who died in February aged 92, would have been delighted by a BBC news item pointing out that the freshly baked loaves in supermarkets are now selling for 89p or less, while Warburtons Seeded Batch sliced loaves enjoy premium status, costing up to £1.40p each. This is clearly the best thing for sliced bread since ...
Read more...
Saturday, March 17, 2007
Hospitals and schools on alert over listeria in sandwiches
The Guardian
By Thair Shaikh
Thousands of sandwiches were recalled from schools, hospitals and universities yesterday amid fears they could be contaminated with listeria, a potentially fatal food bug.
The Food Standards Agency removed the sandwiches after listeria contamination was found in samples during routine tests carried out on behalf of Ashford local authority in Kent.
Read more...
By Thair Shaikh
Thousands of sandwiches were recalled from schools, hospitals and universities yesterday amid fears they could be contaminated with listeria, a potentially fatal food bug.
The Food Standards Agency removed the sandwiches after listeria contamination was found in samples during routine tests carried out on behalf of Ashford local authority in Kent.
Read more...
Friday, March 16, 2007
Not available on a moped near you - the $1,000 caviar pizza
The Guardian
The humble pizza has come a long way from its 19th century origins as an oven-baked Neapolitan favourite. But the basic idea remains the same: bread-type base, gooey topping, a sprinkling of black pepper and get stuck in. Thick crust, thin crust, stuffed crust. But never upper crust.
Now a New York restaurant has decided to turn the pizza into a culinary marvel by smothering it in caviar and lobster and charging customers $1,000
Read more...
The humble pizza has come a long way from its 19th century origins as an oven-baked Neapolitan favourite. But the basic idea remains the same: bread-type base, gooey topping, a sprinkling of black pepper and get stuck in. Thick crust, thin crust, stuffed crust. But never upper crust.
Now a New York restaurant has decided to turn the pizza into a culinary marvel by smothering it in caviar and lobster and charging customers $1,000
Read more...
Thursday, March 15, 2007
Sushi knives are out for Michelin critics
The Guardian
By Justin McCurry in Tokyo
The Michelin guide announced yesterday it would publish for the first time in Japan, generating an outburst of culinary chauvinism from the country's chefs, bristling at the prospect of being told how to prepare sushi by French gourmets.
The Michelin Guide Tokyo will be the first edition published outside Europe and the US, and the organisation has already dispatched a team of undercover Japanese and European inspectors to assess the top restaurants in the Japanese capital. Although Michelin stressed that restaurants had nothing to fear from the guide, which rates cooking, service and decor, chefs were suspicious. Some suggested that "outsiders" working for the famous bible of gastronomy were not qualified to pontificate on the finer points of such delicacies as raw fish.
Read more...
By Justin McCurry in Tokyo
The Michelin guide announced yesterday it would publish for the first time in Japan, generating an outburst of culinary chauvinism from the country's chefs, bristling at the prospect of being told how to prepare sushi by French gourmets.
The Michelin Guide Tokyo will be the first edition published outside Europe and the US, and the organisation has already dispatched a team of undercover Japanese and European inspectors to assess the top restaurants in the Japanese capital. Although Michelin stressed that restaurants had nothing to fear from the guide, which rates cooking, service and decor, chefs were suspicious. Some suggested that "outsiders" working for the famous bible of gastronomy were not qualified to pontificate on the finer points of such delicacies as raw fish.
Read more...
Banana firm fined for paying off Colombian paramilitaries
The Guardian
A major US-based banana producer is to pay a fine of nearly £13m after admitting it made protection payments to a right-wing Colombian paramilitary group implicated in human rights abuses and cocaine smuggling.
In a deal with the US justice department, announced last night, Cincinnati-based Chiquita Brands International pleaded guilty to one charge of conducting business with a terrorist group, agreeing to a fine of $25m.
The settlement resolves a lengthy justice department investigation into the company's financial dealings with both right-wing paramilitaries and leftist rebels in Colombia.
Read more...
A major US-based banana producer is to pay a fine of nearly £13m after admitting it made protection payments to a right-wing Colombian paramilitary group implicated in human rights abuses and cocaine smuggling.
In a deal with the US justice department, announced last night, Cincinnati-based Chiquita Brands International pleaded guilty to one charge of conducting business with a terrorist group, agreeing to a fine of $25m.
The settlement resolves a lengthy justice department investigation into the company's financial dealings with both right-wing paramilitaries and leftist rebels in Colombia.
Read more...
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Eating through the ages
The Guardian
Boiled cow's udder, anyone? Or a ragout of pig's ear? Norman Miller leafs through chef Anton Mosimann's extraordinary library of antiquarian cookbooks
Read more...
Boiled cow's udder, anyone? Or a ragout of pig's ear? Norman Miller leafs through chef Anton Mosimann's extraordinary library of antiquarian cookbooks
Read more...
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
American wine giant Ernest Gallo dies
The Guardian
The man whose company popularised generic new world wines and introduced the high-alcohol-content Thunderbird to generations of British teenagers has died aged 97.
Ernest Gallo, the last of the two Gallo brothers to die, co-founded E&J Winery in 1933, building it into the world's second largest wine company.
It popularised grape varieties such as burgundy and chardonnay and is credited with creating an international market for Californian wines under the name Ernest and Julio Gallo
Read more...
The man whose company popularised generic new world wines and introduced the high-alcohol-content Thunderbird to generations of British teenagers has died aged 97.
Ernest Gallo, the last of the two Gallo brothers to die, co-founded E&J Winery in 1933, building it into the world's second largest wine company.
It popularised grape varieties such as burgundy and chardonnay and is credited with creating an international market for Californian wines under the name Ernest and Julio Gallo
Read more...
Fizzy drinks giving way to water and juice
The Guardian
By Rebecca Smithers, consumer affairs correspondent
Bottled mineral water is now out-selling cola in London, a report reveals today, and health conscious consumers are helping to fuel a continued growth in the soft drinks market, opting increasingly for still products such as water and juices rather than fizzy substitutes.
The research by the manufacturer Britvic finds pure juice, "sports" drinks and blended beverages known as smoothies have shown the fastest percentage growth in the take-home sector. And sales of water have risen by 11% to achieve £643m in sales.
Read more...
By Rebecca Smithers, consumer affairs correspondent
Bottled mineral water is now out-selling cola in London, a report reveals today, and health conscious consumers are helping to fuel a continued growth in the soft drinks market, opting increasingly for still products such as water and juices rather than fizzy substitutes.
The research by the manufacturer Britvic finds pure juice, "sports" drinks and blended beverages known as smoothies have shown the fastest percentage growth in the take-home sector. And sales of water have risen by 11% to achieve £643m in sales.
Read more...
Meet our new resident chef ...
The Guardian
Allegra McEvedy, who from today will write a weekly recipe for G2, describes her journey from the River Cafe in London, via Robert De Niro's New York restaurant, to her own chain of award-winning, super-healthy eateries.
Read more...
Allegra McEvedy, who from today will write a weekly recipe for G2, describes her journey from the River Cafe in London, via Robert De Niro's New York restaurant, to her own chain of award-winning, super-healthy eateries.
Read more...
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Leave Duchy Originals alone!
The Guardian
By Laura Barton
When the organic pasty squared up against the Big Mac, it was never going to be pretty. In the wake of Prince Charles's recent tirade against the Big Mac, defenders of McDonald's have levelled that the burger in question contains less salt and fat and fewer calories than some of the products in the Prince's Duchy Originals range. One analysis of the brand's Organic Ginger Biscuits gasped that each biscuit is higher in calories than a two-finger KitKat.
Read more...
By Laura Barton
When the organic pasty squared up against the Big Mac, it was never going to be pretty. In the wake of Prince Charles's recent tirade against the Big Mac, defenders of McDonald's have levelled that the burger in question contains less salt and fat and fewer calories than some of the products in the Prince's Duchy Originals range. One analysis of the brand's Organic Ginger Biscuits gasped that each biscuit is higher in calories than a two-finger KitKat.
Read more...
Monday, March 05, 2007
I'll take a cheesy marriage any day
The Scotsman
By FIONA MCCADE
SHOPPING for cheese has never been high on my list of romantic things to do. It can be fun, but I'd never thought of it as a bonding experience. Now, however, I'm going to treasure each moment I spend with my husband, mooching around the cheese heaven that is Ian Mellis, or Valvona and Crolla, because I've learned that the simple act of buying...
Read more...
By FIONA MCCADE
SHOPPING for cheese has never been high on my list of romantic things to do. It can be fun, but I'd never thought of it as a bonding experience. Now, however, I'm going to treasure each moment I spend with my husband, mooching around the cheese heaven that is Ian Mellis, or Valvona and Crolla, because I've learned that the simple act of buying...
Read more...
Sunday, March 04, 2007
Disciples of cheeses
Scotland on Sunday
By Sally Raikes
Paul Gayler, executive chef at the Lanesborough Hotel, can't get enough of it. And neither, it seems, can the rest of us. It has recently been claimed that there are now more cheeses made in the UK than in France, and it's true that an enormous number of farmhouse varieties are appearing on the market.
Sales of goat's cheese are on the increase, and classics such as parmesan and brie are becoming staples to rival cheddar and stilton. This all adds up to a delicious cheeseboard, but Gayler believes that we should be more adventurous. "Cheese's unique characteristics in cooking are too often overlooked," he says. "Why not pair blue cheese with white fish, or cheddar with a lobster bisque? Or use goat's cheese to make a pesto sauce?"
Read more...
By Sally Raikes
Paul Gayler, executive chef at the Lanesborough Hotel, can't get enough of it. And neither, it seems, can the rest of us. It has recently been claimed that there are now more cheeses made in the UK than in France, and it's true that an enormous number of farmhouse varieties are appearing on the market.
Sales of goat's cheese are on the increase, and classics such as parmesan and brie are becoming staples to rival cheddar and stilton. This all adds up to a delicious cheeseboard, but Gayler believes that we should be more adventurous. "Cheese's unique characteristics in cooking are too often overlooked," he says. "Why not pair blue cheese with white fish, or cheddar with a lobster bisque? Or use goat's cheese to make a pesto sauce?"
Read more...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
