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A club sandwich, no cheese, with a side of corn? A plain Biltmore burger with no bun, a side of baked beans and french fries?

I agree with the others who have said sneaking food isn't going to accomplish much. It's not like you can take a victory lap around the kitchen afterwards chanting, "I got you to eat garlic!" I know with many picky kids, getting them to help select the food or help with the cooking makes them want to try things they choose or helped prepare. Maybe invite her on a trip to a farmers' market so she can see a variety of things, and let her see you ask the farmers lots of questions and get excited about the food. Then another day ask her to either cook with you or help you prepare for a dinner party. Maybe that will make her more adventurous.

Here are some estimated numbers on foodbourne illnesses and deaths: My name is Tammy, and I am a Google-aholic.

Yikes! I cringed while I read this. A homecook may feel this way, but I don't want to think that any professional kitchen selling food would have this laissez-faire attitude. Going to a restaurant shouldn't involve a risk - if I want to take risks, it's up to me to do it on my own time. Don't forget - it's a business. ← Driving a car involves a lot of risk, but I still want the car manufacturers to follow safety regulations to make my risk as low as possible. I am not in the food industry, but as a consumer food safety does concern me. I remember one time I went to the rest room right after a staff member, and I found that the only soap dispenser was empty. Sure, the employee might have gone into the kitchen to was her hands, but maybe not. And if they can't keep the soap dispenser full in the rest room, I shudder to think at what else they might not be keeping an eye one. I recently coordinated the food for a festival that fed hundreds of people. The volunteer staff was good at following the strict guidelines -- they had to wear gloves when handling food, no one handling food could go anywhere near the money, and cold food was kept cold and hot food hot. If a bunch of inexperienced volunteers can handle that, I see no reason why we should expect less from professionals.

I lived in rural Minnesota where we joked that every restaurant in the county had one menu. They all offered the same things: roast beef and mashed potatoes, homemade soup all year long, fried chicken, and burgers galore. The food was all homemade and very good. I don't think the rural setting is what made the food good though. When I travel, I always seek out small restaurants -- the type that locals eat at and typical tourists ignore. These are places owned by people who honed their cooking skills under the watchful eye of parents and grandparents instead of culinary instructors. When I lived in rural Minnesota I was an hour's drive away from the nearest big grocery store. Now I live next to a small city and I'm 10 minutes aways from an assortment of grocery and specialty stores. I have all that convenience, yet I still have a cafe just down the road from my house that serves homemade foods native to this region that are just delicious.

I think faux meats are available for convenience. Many families are a mix of vegetarians and nonvegetarians, and mealtime can be simpler if the person cooking can make real ribs and faux ribs, rather than real ribs and something completely different. Without faux meat as a substitution there are many cookbooks that are rendered useless, and many favorite comfort foods a vegetarian would have to give up forever. Besides, vegetarians still need their protein and these faux meats are often a good source of protein. In a restaurant, however, I would much prefer something without faux meats. I'd rather pay for the creativity of the chef. Maybe have a few standards on the menu like a veggie burger, but for the rest of the menu I would prefer original dishes.

The issue, for me anyway, is that CJD takes years to develop. If there are problems now, we won't know the damage they caused for a decade or more. Ten years from now we might have countless people suffering from CJD, or we might find out the Alzheimer's disease actually is a direct result from the years we fed dead cows to our beef cattle. Still, I am not going to stop eating steaks over a concern of what might happen in the future. But after reading Fast Food Nation, I did start avoiding hamburgers from restaurants (especially fast food restaurants). Since commercial hamburger can contain bits of a hundred cows but a piece of chuck can only come from one, I buy the chuck and grind it myself. IMO this makes a safer and tastier burger. I was in Canada when the mad cow disease was found. The US banned Canadian beef, and upon returning to the US the Border Patrol searched our cooler and quizzed us about whether or not we had any Canadian beef in the car. Fast forward to the US finding evidence of mad cow, government representatives plead for other countries not to stop accepting their beef and proclaim that one cow doesn't mean anything. I guess when the shoe is on your own foot, the whole scenario changes.

Boston Globe – July 6, 2005 Local beef, hold the anxiety Farms offer natural meat, full of flavor but not additives By Alison Arnett, Globe Staff Where to find it --------------- Cut for the grill By Joe Yonan, Globe Staff --------------- SHORT ORDERS Hot lunch Sel de la Terre's bread -- black olive, fig-anise, rye, and sourdough -- forms a base for some fabulous sandwiches. Everything is homemade there, including the mayo. Box rebellion So imagine our surprise when we discovered this delicious little organic red ($30) from winemaker Jean David in France's sunny south. The bag inside holds 5 liters, which is about 6 1/2 bottles; it collapses around the wine as you pour it out, so there's no way for air to get in. Kept in a cool spot, the wine will stay fresh for a month. A bed for bacon For breakfast, bacon and eggs often overpower waistline anxiety, and for lunch the pair has a sturdy home in Panificio's spinach salad ($7.75). Rings of red onion, feta cheese, and mustard vinaigrette are pert foils for the spinach, but creamy hard-cooked egg and crumbled smoky bacon gird the entire enormous dish. Bone of contentment Pino Maffeo's Asian ribs ($12) are transporting. And while they won't exactly take you to a beach in Southeast Asia, you will feel far from the city on the patio of Restaurant L in Louis Boston. To marinate or not to marinate? Chris Schlesinger of East Coast Grill, author of ''How to Cook Meat" with John Willoughby, finds tenderizing marinades a misnomer. Tastes like tradition Terra Burdigala red wines are products of Bordeaux's Right Bank. The main component of the wines is merlot, with some cabernet franc. The first vintage was 2001; these are the current releases. --------------- A seafood dish that's spicy and rich By Clea Simon, Globe Correspondent Recipe: * New Orleans barbecue shrimp --------------- Kitchen essentials don't always come with the summer rental By Andrea Pyenson, Globe Correspondent Making a list --------------- With peelers, different styles serve different purposes By Joe Yonan, Globe Columnist Where to find it

Toronto Star – July 6, 2005 In my backyard Potlucks are a time-honoured tradition for many Canadians, but not necessarily newcomers Students training to be ESL teachers find potluck suppers to be unsettling --------------- Wine lovers look to Spain Gordon Stimmell recommends wine to pair with tomato-sauced pastas and roasted leg of lamb. --------------- Barbecue Recipes Recipes: * Barbecued Prime Rib * Zucchini Bean Dip * Sweet Potatoes & Lime --------------- Port Credit newcomer isn't a 10 Judy Gerstel reviews Ten Restaurant and Wine Bar in Mississauga. --------------- What's for lunch? Pizza pie? Christian Cotroneo discusses the lunch offerings at Giovanna. --------------- Restaurant Happenings Check out the happenings at local restaurants, including Mistura restaurant winning one of the Distinguished Restaurants of North America's (DiRoNa) Award of Excellence. --------------- Give our beer an edge --------------- Live 8 music lovers feast on free chocolate --------------- Bowling for your breakfast

Boston Globe – June 29, 2005 Sweet land of ice cream Frosty drinks are the American way By Leigh Belanger, Globe Correspondent --------------- The plain truth: We love vanilla By Alison Arnett, Globe Staff --------------- Sandwiches grow up By Andrea Pyenson, Globe Correspondent Recipes: * Ice cream sandwiches * Malted chocolate frappe --------------- SHORT ORDERS Frozen treats Definitions of a frappe, float, milkshake, and smoothie. Here's the beef Heat Wave Cookery: Watermelon-tomato gazpacho Straight from the leaf Great shakes Take the steak Baking in the great outdoors Recipe: * Camper's cornbread in a can

Toronto Star – June 29, 2005 Beaver tales Game to try anything, we head north for a cookout starring the animal that is a Canadian emblem --------------- `Rolls-Royce of paprika' --------------- Steak out on the bay Judy Gerstel reviews Top of the Cove in Port Severn. --------------- Subterranean soup spot is a hit Christian Cotroneao reviews Soup Nutsy in Toronto. --------------- Renée's `baby' turns 20

Boston Globe – June 22, 2005 Don't try this at home Pino Maffeo brings chemistry to the kitchen By Joe Yonan, Globe Staff --------------- Mothers helper: Baby food to cultivate palates By Tina Cassidy, Globe Staff --------------- A sweet slice of homemade success By Jonathan Levitt, Globe Correspondent --------------- SHORT ORDERS: Mama's got a cheese box Blueberry pie It's bean fun with fresh favas Recipe: * Roman-style fava beans For a fish dinner, why not wing it? Recipe: * Broiled skate wingswith brown butter Project chili Salmon in season --------------- The history of six liquids flows in 'Glasses' By Stephen Meuse, Globe Correspondent

Toronto Star – June 22, 2005 Building an empire Gordon Stimmell also describes several wines made outside of Ontario. --------------- What's in store A listing of new products, including Sprite ReMix Aruba Jam, Becel Topping & Cooking Spray, Gay Lea's Spreadable Butter Blend, and Häagen-Dazs' banana ice cream. --------------- Scaramouche's silver anniversary --------------- Restaurant happenings What’s going on at several local restaurants, including one that is closing for the summer. --------------- Welcome to Korea Judy Gerstel reviews Sariwon in Thornhill. --------------- Get thee to an eatery Stratford dining --------------- Not running on empty --------------- Tex-Mex, the `lovable ugly duckling' Jennifer Bain reviews The Tex-Mex Cookbook: A History in Recipes and Photos.

That's not a perception. That's a fact. If you drink a 1-calorie can of sugar-free soda instead of a 180-calorie can of soda-with-sugar, you will drink 179 calories less. If you're eating a 600-calorie meal, and you switch from soda-with-sugar to sugar-free soda, you can have 179 more calories worth of food and in the end consume the same number of calories. To see those calories as "freed up" is not at all unreasonable -- it's just simple arithmetic. Likewise, if you go to McDonald's and order a Big Mac Extra Value Meal with sugar-free soda, your meal will have fewer calories than the exact same Big Max Extra Value Meal with soda-with-sugar. In fact, the difference in calories between the two orders will be exactly the difference in calories between the two sodas. Now, if some people see sugar-free soda as "license" to eat more calories than the number of calories they save by drinking sugar-free soda instead of soda-with-sugar, that's something interesting to know. But it's hard to swallow the notion that such behavior means diet soda causes obesity. Rather, it would tend to demonstrate that people aren't very good at estimating the number of calories in food. ← Since I do understand arithmetic, I will assume that "frees up" was a bad choice of words on my part. Yes, if someone substitutes a diet soda for a regular soda they will save 179 calories. But if someone does not like regular soda and would choose water if diet soda was not available, they are not saving those calories, they simply are not consuming those calories through that beverage choice. I suppose it is a matter of perception. If I have a beer once a week, on that day I consider it adding 150 calories to my intake for that day. I do not think in terms of saving 150 calories the other six days. If someone else perceives it as saving 150 calories a day for the remaining six days, then they probably would eat those calories through another food or beverage choice. I do not think diet soda directly leads to obesity. I also do not think that it directly leads to losing weight or maintaining a healthy lifestyle. It is a beverage choice -- nothing more, nothing less. I believe it causes some people to overestimate what it can do for them in terms of calorie conservation, but I don't think that is the fault of the soda.

I have some friends who drink two or more diet sodas a day, and their response to the question "Why?" is "I like to eat my calories." So for them there is a perception that drinking a diet soda "frees up" the calories that would otherwise be consumed by drinking regular soda. If instead they though of diet soda as a substitute for water they might not eat the 300 or so calories that they "saved."

Boston Globe – June 15, 2005 Now starring: Mavericks in the kitchen By Alison Arnett, Globe Staff Finally, [Tony] Maws sits down in the dining room with a cup of tea to talk about the last few years and being named one of Food & Wine's 10 best new chefs of 2005. The little 42-seat place, with its mismatched tables, eclectic decor, and boundary-pushing menu, is just 2 1/2 years old. Maws, like other award-winning restaurateurs in this region, may seem like an unusual choice in this superheated industry, where multimillion dollar design budgets and acres of stainless steel kitchens prevail. --------------- Rustic meets regal in these cookies Homey oatmeal and bittersweet chocolate: a classy combination By Lisa Yockelson, Globe Correspondent Oatmeal cookies that are graceful and radiate with craggy pieces of bittersweet chocolate combine an earthy texture with deep, resonating flavor. If a batch of oatmeal cookies can be called glamorous, then these qualify. Recipe: * Bittersweet chocolate oatmeal cookies --------------- The eggplant parm of their dreams By Joe Yonan, Globe Staff However it's pronounced, a hankering is a hankering. So when the couple -- particularly Paul, executive director of the Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism -- gets a voglia for eggplant, he can satisfy it only with a trip to Artu. At this trattoria on Prince Street in the North End (another location is on Beacon Hill), the prices are reasonable and the melanzane parmigiana just like mama's. Recipe: * Lola's vegitalian sandwich --------------- SHORT ORDERS Chef's special If Dad is the cooking and entertaining type, this linen bistro apron ($35) will let him serve his favorite dishes in style. Veal of the sea Fish steaks will satisfy most diners, but your hungry Dad might want to tackle a thick, meaty chop. Not pork or veal, but one cut from swordfish. A pressing need The pie iron -- also called ''hobo pie," ''pudgie pie," or ''camp cooker"-- has been used by campers for many years to make toasted cheese sandwiches and all kinds of improvised ''pies." If Dad is camping with the kids, take along this nifty tool, made of cast iron or aluminum and designed to really take the heat. Dessert course In our experience, an unfettered day on the golf course is all Dad really wants -- on Father's Day or on an ordinary Sunday. You'd still like to use this holiday to show him what lovely offspring he's raised, and you can't bear to visit him just to watch golf on TV with him or wait for him to get home from two quick rounds. So tear Dad away from the tube or the course and head to J.J.'s Dairy Hut in Cohasset, a South Shore soft-serve standby. --------------- Three weeks of strawberry fever By T. Susan Chang, Globe Correspondent But every year, the three weeks of strawberry fever arrive like a whirlwind, peaking between Father's Day, which is Sunday, and July Fourth. Local strawberries are the first sweet taste New England fields yield up from their cool, rock-strewn soils. At last they have arrived. The succulent, ruby-tinted, juice-dripping pleasure will be ours, along with a brief paradise of cobblers and shortcakes. --------------- The time is ripe for picking at these local farms By Stacey Perlman, Globe Staff The following is a list by town of some pick-your-own strawberry farms. --------------- Dessert showcases the cream of the crop By Debra Samuels, Globe Staff Strawberries Romanoff is an old presentation in which ripe berries are surrounded by vanilla ice cream and whipped cream infused with orange liqueur. The updated version here lets the berries, not the cream, take center stage -- in all their ruby-red glory. Recipe: * Strawberries Romanoff --------------- For perfect smoked meats, grill power is not enough By Joe Yonan, Globe Staff Gas models now make up an estimated two-thirds of the $2 million US market for grills, and the appeal is obvious: No messy charcoal, no messy ashes, no smelly lighter fluid. That makes gas the obvious choice for everyone whose primary desire when cooking outdoors is no-hassle burgers and dogs at a moment's notice. But for those seduced by the alchemy that happens when smoke slowly infuses meat -- the definition of true barbecue as opposed to grilling -- something other than gas has to burn.

I am a firm believer in innocent until proven guilty. Therefore, I think children should be allowed their privacy when it comes to meal choices until such a time that they do something (as in the case of diabetics not adhering to their diet) to break that trust. To me, giving parents the automatic right to monitor their child's eating habits is saying the child is guilty until proven innocent. And unfortunately, I have seen way too many mothers who are obsessed with what their young daughters eat and tell their slender daughters that they are fat or going to get fat. It would not surprise me if these girls feel as though they have to lie to their mothers about what they eat.

Toronto Star – June 15, 2005 New school district Real world is the classroom for fresh batch of chefs in Prince Edward County Restaurateurs in the tourist spot are desperate for staff --------------- Puck aims for the middle --------------- Saucy Lady wins an award Congratulations to Toronto Star food editor Jennifer Bain, winner of a 2005 Association of Food Journalists award for food column writing. --------------- Wine for the global village Gordon Stimmell reviews two such wines. --------------- Condiment hoarders must beware of spoilage --------------- Fish dish rules Judy Gerstel reviews Cuisine of India in North York. --------------- Allen's patio is a charmer Christian Cotroneo discusses lunch at Allen’s restaurant in Danforth.

I agree that personal responsibility should play a part in food choices. However, there are very few personal consequences for those personal choices. Thanks to Lipitor and Prilosec and the like -- people don't have to suffer any pain or discomfort from these personal choices. And when these choices cause more serious problems, all of us bear the burden of those healthcare costs. But rather than having the food police come to take my cheese curls away, I'd rather see the other factors that influence bad food choices fixed -- by increasing nutrition education in schools, by demanding more jobs that pay a living wage so families can get by on one or two jobs and have more time for food preparation, and so on.

The first thing I made without any help was porcupine meatballs -- beef, rice, and tomato sauce molded into balls and baked. It was the day I told my mother I hated cleaning the kitchen after dinner. She told me she hated cooking, and anytime I wanted to cook, she would clean up.

point and match to busboy ... ← True, but until apples are manufactured with high-fructose corn syrup they aren't going to compare in price to Pop Tarts no matter where you live. That's one thing I would call a factor in all of this -- how much of a profit margin companies can get from junk food because ingredients like high-fructose corn syrup are so cheap. Another is that we don't expect or demand that one job be enough to support a family like we did forty years ago, leaving much less time for food preparation at home. And I'm sure there are many more factors as well.

I completely agree. This show has given me a new perspective on how much work goes into a show like this, and what kind of person can pull it off. But while I find this show informative and entertaining, some aspects of it bother me. The contest rules made me think that this is just another attempt to undermine the value of this type of work in order to acquire cheap talent.

I'd be happier if instead of shelling out millions for lobbyists, the food industry helped pay for education in schools about proper food choices. I know a lot of well educated people who don't have a clue about proper nutrition and meal preparation, and while filling yourself up with junk food may be an adult's prerogative, sometimes obese 10-year-olds with skyhigh cholesterol are the ones who have to live with the adult's choices.

Toronto Star – June 8, 2005 Guide to farmers' markets Our second annual guide tells you where to shop in Ontario this season --------------- There's no place quite like Rhone Gordon Stimmell writes about the 13th annual Hospice du Rhone fine wine festival. --------------- Dark secrets --------------- Prix fixe but food varies Judy Gerstel reviews Brasserie Royan. --------------- Saloon slips in a few surprises Christian Cotroneo reviews Shoxs Sports Saloon. --------------- Once upon a Calendar Recipes: * Mushroom & Leek Soup * Pizza Quiche * Mocha Banana Trifle

Boston Globe – June 8, 2005 You call this cooking? For the time-pressed and hungry, pre-prepared ingredients mean dinner's in the bag By Joe Yonan, Globe Staff Gone are the days when Bryant, 28, would have poked through supermarket produce, found what looked freshest, and carried it all back to her Back Bay apartment to start washing and cutting. That was before she discovered that Trader Joe's had done it for her, with a container of pre-washed, pre-cut vegetables dubbed Asian Stir-Fry Mix. Add bottled teriyaki sauce and you practically have a meal. --------------- Consumers have red tide jitters By Alison Arnett and Joe Yonan, Globe Staff In restaurants and seafood markets across the area, customers worried about red tide are asking more questions. So far, demand for seafood hasn't dropped. State officials say that all seafood currently on the market is safe to consume, since beds are closed as soon as samples show that red-tide concentrations are at or near toxic levels. --------------- Kick off summer with a little sparkle By Stephen Meuse, Globe Correspondent But before you pop the cork on that $30 bottle of nonvintage Champagne during this season of weddings and graduations -- or just for some cool back-porch sipping -- give some thought to the alternatives. After all, the world of sparkling wine extends well beyond the stately chateaux of France's Rheims and Epernay. --------------- Good recipes are easy to find,but their ingredients aren't By Meg Colton, Globe Correspondent Meg Colton, an eighth-grade student at Hingham Middle School, reviews The International Cookbook for Kids by Matthew Locricchio and Marshall Cavendish. Recipe: * Country-style pork --------------- SHORT ORDERS Take them for a spin The new spinner from Zyliss makes cleaning greens so easy and -- dare we say it? -- fun that you may actually find yourself making more salads than ever. SOS benefits from a seven-course meal A culinary traveling show hits Cambridge on June 16 when UpStairs on the Square holds a gala dinner as part of a seven-city Share Our Strength (SOS) campaign to combat hunger. A better cracker Hydrogenated oil is the lifeblood of a tasty cracker, so finding one that tastes good without it is a rare thing indeed. Not only are there none of those much-maligned trans fats in these new Late July sandwich crackers ($3.79 for a 6-ounce box; $5.49 for a tray of 1.5-ounce packages), they are also organic, and filled with thin layers of organic peanut butter or organic cheddar cheese. Cod with a crunch Arbor, the Mediterranean restaurant in Jamaica Plain, offers a parsley-crusted native cod ($22) that's fresh, flavorful, and just right for this time of year. The boneless fish is coated with parsley and the Japanese bread crumbs called panko, then pan roasted until crisp for a satisfying texture and crunchiness. Sparkling wishes You don't need a degree in fizzics to figure it all out, but you may need a bit of help sorting through what's on the shelves. The best guide to these pop stars is likely the staff at your local wine shop. Recipe: * Salmon with morels and peas --------------- Look closely is the morel of the story By Nancy English, Globe Correspondent Finding mushrooms in the woods requires training, since the fungi lie tucked into the messy ground. But stare long enough and you'll be amazed. Morels, cone-shaped and full of little fissures like ocean coral, wavy as a naked brain, just might pop up in the suburban garden mulch with their promise of a fine dinner. --------------- Heirloom treasures are a find at farmers' markets By T. Susan Chang, Globe Correspondent The sequence never changes, but the selection does. This year should see a tidal wave of new and unusual produce at local farmers' markets. Diversity is the hot new trend: Armenian cucumbers, pea tendrils, purple potatoes, squash blossoms, amaranth, and water spinach are in the lineup. From farm to city and town More than 90 farmers’ markets are operating statewide this summer. Most begin this month or early in July and stay open through October. Below are the markets closest to Boston; the complete list is at www.state.ma.us/dfa/massgrown/farmers_markets.htm. --------------- Flash-frozen pastries are baked fresh in the morning By Andrea Pyenson, Globe Correspondent At Carberry's commissary here, a new flash-frozen method has been implemented, so that croissants and other baked goods can be mixed and shaped, then frozen briefly until the confections are cold and solid. Frozen breads are more than just a half-baked idea While Carberry's is flash-freezing their confections when they are shaped but not yet baked, many companies partially bake their creations before freezing and distributing them to vendors, a process known as par-baking. This can have mixed results, depending on the originating bakery.