Food Tech - The UltimateFatBurner Blog

WIRED: “What’s Actually Inside an Average Cup of Coffee”

LOL – I love coffee AND chemistry, so this little vid from the folks at WIRED magazine is a two-fer for me. Ok, I also (sort of) enjoy stuff that (gently) twists the tails of the “chemophobes” in our midst. You know, the ones that make a distinction between “natural” foods and the stuff with all the “chemicals.” It’s a chemical world – the WIRED account just scratches the surface...

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Would I Eat a Snack Bar Made of Crickets? Sure!

Particularly because the snack bars discussed in this article are made from cricket flour. A new energy bar made primarily from ground-up crickets is now ready to order, thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign. Chapul bars are made from baked crickets that are then ground up into a powder and mixed with other ingredients. The process is derived from the Aztecs, who commonly included crickets as part of their regular diet. You...

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Why Supermarket Tomatoes Suck

We moved here to NE Washington in late March, so – as you might expect – it took a while for us to get settled in. Despite the effort involved in unpacking, I still took the time to plant a few seeds. My original intent was to plant the seedlings in containers, and “garden” on the upstairs porch, but at the last minute, I decided to clear out a weed-and-grass-choked raised bed in the backyard, and transplant my...

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If You Like Sushi, Stick with Expensive, Restaurant Fare

Admittedly, I don’t care for sushi. I don’t explicitly hate it, either, but for me, there’s just no “there,” there. The only time I ever eat it, is when I happen to be dining out with a sushi-lover, who’s just dying to take me to his/her favorite restaurant. While I’d much rather eat Italian, Mexican, Thai, Vietnamese, Indian etc., I inwardly shrug and go along with it. I usually end up having...

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NPR: “Time for a ‘Bug Mac’?”

NPR has an interesting story about Dutch research on protein. Specifically, bug protein. Ph.D. student Dennis Oonincx is checking out his mealworms living in the cricket lab, and says his research into how the worms metabolize a waste product shows how superior insects are as a protein source — better than cattle or sheep. “You can produce more food for people with less input,” he says. “It’s good food and...

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Poultry Inspectors Protest USDA “Modernization”

And I share their concerns… According to Food Safety News: Around 100 poultry inspectors gathered outside the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Monday, right under Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack’s window, to protest a proposal to expand an inspection system that shifts federal inspectors away from inspecting for quality defects and allows slaughter lines to speed up. …Under the proposed rule, the agency would...

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