chromedome

I've read partway through it once before, but got interrupted and never got back to it. Some of his conclusions have been hotly refuted by others, of course, but it's been a highly influential book and I really should finish it one day.

Yes, beef in general is a pretty big niche (there's faux pork and chicken too, but that's neither here nor there), and the faux products don't make much of a dent in the overall number. I think they appeal to the same consumer who seeks out pastured, humanely raised and otherwise-premium beef products...not 100% overlap, but surely a significant chunk in the middle of the ol' Venn diagram. In either case, there are both real and assumed benefits to be had in exchange for the premium price, and some are willing to go that route. Not gonna displace mass-market beef anytime soon, but it took a while for automobiles to displace horses as well.

Okay, that's a crucial detail for sure.

Major players like ADM, Cargill and Perdue are significant investors in faux meats and lab-grown meat initiatives, just as oil companies are major investors in renewables. They've all learned from the example of IBM. If you ever have the chance, read Tom Watson Jr's memoir "Father and Son and Company," about his years with IBM. A crucial turning point comes at the beginning of the 50s, when newfangled electronic computers showed signs of perhaps some day challenging IBM's business machine hegemony (then built around punch-card technology). Watson Sr's first instinct was to launch all-out war on the upstarts, including a scorched-earth campaign that would have denied IBM equipment and support to any company that bought an electronic computer. Watson Jr had a different idea..."What if we built our *own* computer?" We all know how that turned out. IBM's existing market leverage, combined with a stellar new product, gave them several additional decades as a top company in their space. Entrenched players getting into the "next-gen meats" space hope to do the same.

Spotted something interesting in my most recent grocery flyer. Maple Leaf Foods, one of Canada's leading meat-packing companies, is also the owner of the LightLife brand of faux-meats (not as well known as Beyond and Impossible, but a very similar product). They're now selling 50/50 blends of real and faux meat (burgers, sausages, etc) for the "I'm an omnivore but want to eat less meat" demographic. https://www.mapleleaf.ca/maple-leaf-50-50/

Commercially prepared mayo itself doesn't require refrigeration, as long as it's uncontaminated by other foods (as an aside, in laboratory testing, it has shown itself to be pretty good at killing pathogens). Over time its flavor or texture may degrade, but I use enough of it that this is not an issue. Homemade mayonnaise of course is a whole other story, and foods containing mayonnaise are susceptible to cross-contamination from the other ingredients.

I don't use kewpie (the notion of sweetened mayo doesn't appeal to me at all) but I keep my regular mayo in a squeeze bottle. That way it dispenses cleanly, and even when kids/grandkids are visiting I don't have to worry about a gunky utensil going back into the mayo (which leads to spoilage, potential food safety issues, etc). When it gets into the last 1/3 to 1/4, I just refill it from a larger jar using a scrupulously clean and sanitized utensil. It's a modest amount of extra work (though no more than cutting and scraping the squeeze bottle, for sure) and it means I don't have to waste fridge space on my mayonnaise. Also, I can enjoy both the convenience of the squeezer and the lower cost/ml of buying in the large jar.

Did you complete the trifecta by listening to the Velvet Underground?

To my taste a slight tang is the sine qua non of a good cheese sauce. I'll use buttermilk or yogurt to get it if the cheese isn't sharp/tangy enough. Of course, as I've said before, it's our differences that keep life interesting.

Lots of potatoes here. Like neighbours Maine and Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick is a major producer. Lots of local cabbage and apples, too. Most other stuff is imported, sadly.

Yeah, that's why I haven't done it yet myself (and of course, the fact that we've gotten off *very* light, virus-wise, contributes as well). I'd certainly have no qualm about ordering dry goods or pantry staples this way, but I really prefer to pick my produce personally (literally, in the garden sense, when possible). Also, a lot of my ordinary shopping consists of browsing the store for markdowns (aka "targets of opportunity"). A discerning eye is extra-important with those.

I guess it's not *that* different from the candied chestnuts that Europeans have eaten since forever. Sugary starch, right? ...which, come to think of it, describes a lot of desserts.

Posted here because there's a beefy section about the restaurant industry. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/04/how-pandemic-will-change-face-retail/610738

When my kids were little I would sometimes make them "tree dogs": a toasted hot dog bun, smeared on the inside with peanut butter, and with a banana in place of the hot dog. Could be finished with a drizzle of honey or a smear of jam/jelly if they wanted, or - on very special days - a few chocolate chips or a drizzle of chocolate syrup.

https://www.blogto.com/eat_drink/2020/04/toronto-bakery-uber-eats/

As the popular meme says, "Don't attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity*." I think of it as the "Occam's Razor" of human interaction. (Insert less pejorative synonym of your choice, here...)

I read this a few weeks back, but it seems germane to this discussion. He's not a big-name chef, he's a billionaire who owns a major chain, but I think it's transferable. The TL;DR version? Lay everybody off and maybe survive the year, or keep everyone on payroll and be belly-up in a month or two. https://www.texasmonthly.com/news/tilman-fertitta-coronavirus-interview/

https://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/companion-planting-guide-zmaz81mjzraw

On which note... the French-Canadian term for shepherd's pie (or cottage pie, more accurately) is "pâté chinois," which has always mystified me. It's hard to imagine anything less Chinese. Hmm. Wikipedia has an explanation, tenuous (and probably apocryphal) though it may be.

Same here. Just cooked some for the freezer last night, in fact.

I believe (but have not bothered to verify) that the use of it to describe a person, or said individual's frame of mind, is derived from the culinary adjective.

The recent culinary grad who worked for me at my restaurant was from mainland China (I forget the name of the place, but IIRC it's where they'd held the rowing events during the Beijing Olympics). He was truly shocked and appalled at some of the stuff sold as "Chinese food" here. The one that seemed to really rankle, in his instance, was a local buffet staple known as "Chinese chicken balls"... a tiny nugget of chicken, deep-fried in a ball of stodgy batter that's about the size of a Mandarin orange, and served with generically red sweet-and-sour sauce. Roughly a 5:1 ratio of stodge to chicken.

It's available pretty much everywhere in Canada, so I expect you could find it in New Jersey. Years ago I was the only non-Chinese person on my block in Vancouver, and it didn't take long for me to realize that they all used Pearl River Bridge. So I started using it too, and still do. (Note that this was nearly 40 years ago, so there may be premium or artisanal brands available now that weren't then. But still, it's as good as any mass-produced soy sauce I've tried.)

I used to have a vintage Moulinex "Jeannette," which was a sort of bridge between the hand-cranked slicers/shredders and the later food processors. It also doubled as a (sadly underpowered) meat grinder.