Saturday, April 30, 2011

Single Serve Coffee Website

I recently found this website devoted to all things that coffee drinkers who own single serve makers would enjoy. It bills itself as "the one cup cofee lovers website" and has reviews of all coffees, teas and cocoas that come in single serve containers. We own a Keurig but my uncle owns a Nespresso which takes their own unique pods. Singleservecoffee.com reviews K cups and pods for the leading coffee makers and actually rates coffee based on aroms, acidity, body, flavor and mouth feel. For example, a new K Cup by VanHoutte Coffee, Raspberry Chocolate Truffle scored quite well in those mentioned areas. It scored 10 in aroma, 9 in acidity, 10 in...

Friday, April 29, 2011

Burger King's biggest item yet & Japan as its ironic first customer

(Ignore the current no.1 cause for a heart attack on your left) To begin with, when you're asked to think about the biggest burger a fast food restaurant has to offer, what comes to your mind? A whopper? A big mac? Maybe you imagine something ridiculous, something like stacking two whoppers on top of each other. Crazy? Well Burger King is taking the cake on this one with their introduction of Meat Monster -- which doesn't really sound too great but (seriously) does justice for its name. So what is it? Meat Monster (ˈmētˈmän(t)-stər) n., The best burger in the world *ahem* An invention created by Burger King that may be composed of 2x whopper...

Monday, April 25, 2011

Homemade spices or prepackaged?

For those who love cooking, there will always be a conflict that they may find themselves pondering over: to use homemade spices/flavoring or to use premixed spices...

Friday, April 22, 2011

Food Facts: Disturbing truths about what you eat

I thought I would change it up a little bit. So instead of the usual recent news about food, I figure i'll fill your heads with some mind blowing trivia about food. So, here I present some factoids about food that will probably make you think about taking that next bite...

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Maybe I'll rethink how much sodium I eat.

Ever since my grandfather has been on a low sodium diet, I've been reading food labels religiously. It's been very difficult finding food that is low sodium and has some semblance of taste. I'm told going low sodium is an acquired taste but it's something I'm not looking forward to. I've always wanted to know what level is considered low sodium and what products were rated well in many food categories that were low sodium. I did some research and found some great websites. Food that is low sodium has 5 percent of the total sodium count for the day and 100 mg or less per serving is recommended. Any foods with more than 480 mg per serving is not recommended. The other website showed a comparison of fast food restaurants and their foods by category in calories, sodium, fat and carbs. What I...

Food in the Gulf of Mexico?

The thought of food in the Gulf of Mexico would probably fuel certain thoughts ranging from BP's oil spill to the probably devastated seabed. As such, has anyone ever come across the thought of whether or not the locals, that may or may not be dependent on seafood, are able to actually eat what is caught in the gulf? Wait a minute, everything that thrives in that large body of water is dead...Right? Wrong. Although humans are able to significantly change the environment in both good and bad terms, the ecosystem's strength is sometimes underestimated. As such, the perfect example would be the status of the Gulf of Mexico, and the associated...

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Glowing Meat?

In recent news, a certain shanghai resident has discovered to her dismay that there was an ominous glow coming from her kitchen. When she went to investigate it, she found that it was her slab of pork. No, this wasn't a case of radioactive meat. When she had bought it, it was just your average slab of meat from your average market (though how average a Shanghai meat market is can be debated). The slab of pork was left out on the kitchen table. Why is this fact important? Because it has been scientifically proven that meat, if stored in conditions that would make a porter-potty seem sanitary, can sometimes cause it to glow. What is the reason for this? Jason Best at Slashfood.com quotes in his article " writers of Meat Hygiene name the likely culprit: phosphorescent bacteria, such as Pseudomonas...

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Boar's Head has another fan.

We have what we think is a 14 year old cat. He was rescued from the mean streets of Island Park. Learning that cats are obligate carnivores and eat only meat we are finding out some interesting things about his preferences in human food. He loves Boar's Head deli meats. His preference is for roast beef but chicken or turkey will do in a pinch. What is so surprising is that even though the usual supermarket my parents shop in doesn't carry Boar's head, the cat knows and will not eat any other line of cold cuts. I did an experiment one day to see if he could tell the difference. I gave him Waldbaum's non Boar's Head turkey and bought a small amount...

Debunking the viral video: Pop corn with cell phones

You can view the video here: Cooking kernels with cell phones. In short, the video depicts a few outdated cell phones surrounding a number of kernels. The phones are set off and the kernels are cooked or in other terms, "popped." As such, it's amazing that there is so much fear and/ or concern in radiation that people do not realize we're exposed to radiation...All. The. Time. In this case, the viral video depicts the idea that these cell phones are emitting enough radiation to cook kernels. The problem is that this is physically impossible.  Wired.com provides an article that debunks this video through several statements made by physicists such as Louis Bloomfield, a professor of the University of Virginia. All of which boils down to the explanation:  In a microwave oven, energy...

Friday, April 8, 2011

Radiation in your life? Nonsense!

Let's give it up to the idiots who assume that every little dose of radiation is a guaranteed trip to cancer. But as a result of such nonsense, I'm here to take a break from coffee art and present to you the reasons why the recent events concerning Japan's failed nuclear station may mean absolutely nothing to food with an increased level of radiation -- to a point. As many of you may know, the resulting leak from the nuclear plant did not only result in local increases of radiation but tests have shown that radiation has been detected in milk as far as California. So should we be worried? Should we, who find ourselves under the sun all the time,...

Thursday, April 7, 2011

New York City: No Toying Around

Do your kids like collecting toys from fast food restaurants? They might not be able to do so for long. It has been recently unveiled that some New York City council members are planning to propose a bill to ban toys from being given away with meals from fast food restaurants. Why would they do this? City Council Deputy Majority Leader Leroy Comrie claims " banning toy giveaways would reduce the allure of fast-food restaurants for children and encourage the industry to provide healthier options." While this proposition looks good on paper, would it really solve the issue? While removing the toys could lessen the overall consumption of unhealthy food among children, it doesn't take away the fact that the children with problems related to consuming fast food are those that like those foods...

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Food Shopping at Target

I read somewhere that Wal-Mart and Target are trying to include fresh foods in their stores. I know Wal-Mart has supermarkets in some places but the local Wal-Mart do not include them. After a trip to Target I was surprised by the quality of produce and meat sold there. As I was browsing the cold food cases I saw bagged salads, yogurt, fruit, cut up vegetables and steak. It would have been easy for a person to make a complete meal from what Target had to offer. For a single person or a small family Target could easily replace going to a supermarket and I saw many younger people browsing in addition to myself. The prices were very competitive...

Friday, April 1, 2011

Day of The Living Zombies!!

A typical day in Wall Street. It's official: Zombies exist in real life! Well, not really. Zombies as we know it are humans turned dead, then undead, and now crave human-mind-slurpies (a.k.a. brains). No, I did not meet one of those. But I did meet a zombie. Yes, that's right! A ZOMBIE!! ...

Want to lose weight? Go high protein!

Many of us, when thinking about dieting and losing weight,immediately picture one thing: salads. It has been a popular image even in showbiz that the key to losing weight is eating plenty of greens in lieu of munching down some hotdogs or grabbing a burger. But is eating greens really the answer to shedding pounds that we can't stand to have...

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