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annabelle

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Everything posted by annabelle

  1. Well, either we'll see them all in in court or they will reach a settlement, I guess. Didn't Paula set her brother up with the restaurant some years back? I know she was or has been bankrolling a number of ventures for her family members. At any rate, Paula is the one with deep pockets and name recognition, not Bubba.
  2. One of her managers has been accused of sexual harrassment and Paula is named as a codefendant.
  3. I think when and where Paula Dean decided to go public with the announcement that she suffers from diabetes is her business. She has suffered from agorophobia as a young mother and overcome tremendous odds to build her empire. She is the living embodiment of the American Dream or a Horatio Alger tale: small town divorced mother of two begins a sandwich business and after years of hard work opens her own successful restaurant and lands a show on television. She finds love for a second time in her later years and also sadly learns she has diabetes. Celebrity endorsments are hardly a new phenomenon. People either love or hate Paula, but they recognize her when she is on television. Football stars from days of yore are all over television (Terry Bradshaw is the latest) flacking Nutrisystem diet plans and so is Marie Osmond. Are we supposed to question their sincerity as well?
  4. What is this "American Diet" I am always seeing referenced on this blog? I've lived all over the country and people eat different things in different places and, yes we all love french fries but we don't eat them with mayonaisse like they do in Belgium. I agree that the food pyramid is a sham as is the BMI that has been embraced as a standard of fitness. Muscle weighs more than fat, so it would follow that athletes are going to be classed as "overweight" using a BMI easily found on a doctor's chart. Thankfully, most people don't have to do hard physical labor day in and day out in order to earn their meager wage, unless they are professional atheletes or construction workers, but that in turn leads to our being heavier because we don't work as hard as our grandparents had to. And thank God for that.
  5. If all the world were apple pie And all the sea were ink And all the trees Were bread and cheese What should we have to drink? "Iffing" one's self to death is an exercise in futility. I went back and reread your links and it is not demonstrated that the additions of cellulose and food colorings are health concerns, other than to the reporter who states without citation that food additives cause ADD/ADHD. In other words in her opinion. Back in the 70s when high fiber diets became en vogue, it was common knowledge that many commercial breads contained cellulose as a fiber booster. Information about everything is out there if one is willing to look for it. One need only read the labels on any packaged food products to find out what the product contains in its list of ingredients, required by the FDA. It is sheer laziness on the part of the consumer to buy juices, for example, that are clearly label "made from concentrate" and then claim to be duped. People are not sickening and dying from supermarket food unless it is improperly stored or prepared. Surrendering to having the USDA drop off care packages at a distribution center for us "citizens" is not a choice I'm willing to have made for me in the name of "honest" food or consumer protection.
  6. That was pitch perfect!
  7. Everything is in season somewhere. I like being able to buy things like bananas and grapes, asparagus and artichokes, oranges and avocados that are not grown locally because our climate doesn't support them. What we do grow here is mainly silage used for feeding out livestock not one's family. Last year it was blistering hot and my garden was spoiled even though I watered and babied it until it turned up its toes. I had to buy everything at the market or eat nothing fresh at all. Except beef. We have the largest stockyards in the country in OKC. I'll take "dishonest" produce from California over frozen or canned stuff any day. As Shalmanese pointed out, food miles are a bogus argument.
  8. The "hopelessly naive" remark was made to me by a professor friend of mine who is of the opinion that people are too stupid to look out for themselves and thus need ever greater government intervention in their lives. But that is waa-ay off topic, so I'l leave it there. Topic? It is a luxury today to have even a hobby farm. We've moved far and away from an agrarian society and most people wouldn't have the first idea of where to start with animal husbandry. (That would include me.)
  9. I think so, too. I have been told in the past that it "is hopelessly naive" to hold that opinion, but I still do.
  10. I meant "more inspections", not "more inspectors, Scoop. It was a typo, sorry. Thanks for the links.
  11. Scoop, you have mentioned the petroleum and wood pulp as food additives three times now. Obviously this is a concern. What are they being used in and what is the reason for doing so? Thanks.
  12. If current inspections are "a joke", how is having more inspectors going to fix that problem? Food is much safer than it was at the turn of the last century, when adulterated milk and spoiled beef were the norm in cities in the US.
  13. We don't have any livestock, but I have a lot of friends who ranch cattle and horses. We have a very large, I mean it's huge, kitchen garden, an herb garden and a salad garden. We don't have any chickens because our property is only an acre and a half and there are too many critters around here, including a family of fox. A chicken house would have to be too close to the house proper and I don't want to listen to my dogs barking at raccoons and skunks at night. My parents and my husband all grew up on dairy farms, so where our food came from was never a mystery. People don't like to talk about the ugly side of farming/ranching which includes culling deformed baby animals and cleaning up slaughter. Additionally, farming is tremendously hard work and physically exhausting. My BIL has a hobby farm in upstate NY, but he doesn't keep livestock. He uses it mainly for a deer hunting preserve and tapping his sugar maples for syrup production.
  14. Of course Food TV is annoying, Scoop. But, so are Jamie Oliver and Alice Waters. And so are posters who proclaim that, of course they never watch tv, because they're better than that. Holier than thou much? TV is entertainment, vast wasteland or not. "Corporate Overlords?" Those are called sponsers. Without sponsers, the Food Network would be in some back alley PBS channel at 8 am on Sundays. And none of this has anything to do with "honest" food. Which as tikidoc says, is a meaningless way to desribe food.
  15. It's one of those words like "sustainable" about which I remain puzzled. What does sustainable mean in this context? The same people who complain about overfishing, will complain about farmed fish. Should we just not eat fish in some sort of fruitless protest against fisherman and fisheries? The fish will still be at the market, regardless of whether we take a "principled" stand against buying or eating it. I guess if a chef serves up an "honest" Chilean sea bass, he is off the hook (so to speak)about serving an unsustainable fish. Assuming he didn't go catch it with his bare hands, to add to the authenticity and thus, the "honesty" of the dish.
  16. If you don't watch television, how can you speak to the value to the viewer, real or perceived? It's like me opining on molecular gastronomy, when I have never tried it or read a book about it. Jamie Oliver does good work with his restaurant training programs for young tear-aways, but he is not a dietician, an argonomist or an economist. His opinions are just that: opinions.
  17. Exactly. It is marketing and meant to make the consumer feel more virtuous, more honest, indeed more caring than that guy over there.
  18. Holding everyone to that kind of standard is going to be difficult if not impossible, Soba. If not more than a little preachy.
  19. Tom has said he digs fishin'. Knowwhatimean?
  20. Welcome! Your English is much better than my German. You are not being offensive at all.
  21. You just know there is going to be fish throwing at Pike Place. In fact, there will probably be a challenge where they have to throw the fish into their Toyota (name of current model being plugged) filled with Glad bags. Maybe Tom will agree to literally jump a shark?
  22. Not that I'm aware of. My mother has told me about gigging bullfrogs when she was a girl and I am reminded of that every summer when they start in "serenading" us. I think they are kind of cool, in a Hypno-toad way, so I'll leave them unmolested and off the table. Alligator? I'd rather have shoes made from their hides.
  23. annabelle

    Cooking for 26!

    That's right, baroness. If you keep lifting the lid to stir things or "get a better look" you are letting the heat out and defeating the purpose of the slow cooker. I'd be reluctant to leave a pot unattended even over a low flame in a houseful of novices. Boil over and gas everyone or set a tea towel on fire and whoosh! I wouldn't take the chance.
  24. Trenchers? You effete degenerate! You'll eat it from your bare hands, and like it! Food itself is honest, regardless of what it is or who made, and from what. ...but implying that it makes for more 'honest' food is just another form of snobbery. Heh. You mean like Alice Waters roasting an egg in a long spoon over a night's worth of firewood? Surely you jest! It's honest and authentic, and really, whose Gran didn't do it the same way?
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