Over the course of the past two years, or so, I’ve really been reading up on food both through books and via the web. Trying to understand how the food is processed that I’m putting into my body. Maybe it’s because I really enjoy cooking, and I’m by no means a chef. I do believe that I’m pretty mindful of what I put into my body, but where that food comes from is what I’ve been looking into. It’s also why in previous posts i’ve talked about the idea of trying to grow my own veggies, why I want to learn to pickle, partly why I took up fishing again. I do my best to support my local farmers and shop at my farmer’s market for my produce. Buy Fresh, Buy Local. Still I find that during these lean economic times, the more I can do at home, the better.
I’ve had an idea from a film that was going to look into food, from family farms to factory farms. I didn’t want to go for shock value of slaughter house imagery, but I did want to investigate if organic is really all it’s cracked up to be, or the idea of cage free for example. The project seemed so daunting and my head would spin as I tried to figure out the best way to distill down the research into something that would be informative and entertaining. Well, as usual, someone else had the same idea and beat me to the finish line. At the very least it validates my own idea. The name of the movie is called Food Inc. Their website is a great resource for action and it best describes the film:
“In Food, Inc., filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation’s food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government’s regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Our nation’s food supply is now controlled by a handful of corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livelihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment. We have bigger-breasted chickens, the perfect pork chop, insecticide-resistant soybean seeds, even tomatoes that won’t go bad, but we also have new strains of E. coli—the harmful bacteria that causes illness for an estimated 73,000 Americans annually. We are riddled with widespread obesity, particularly among children, and an epidemic level of diabetes among adults.
Featuring interviews with such experts as Eric Schlosser (Fast Food Nation), Michael Pollan (The Omnivore’s Dilemma, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto) along with forward thinking social entrepreneurs like Stonyfield’s Gary Hirshberg and Polyface Farms’ Joel Salatin, Food, Inc. reveals surprising—and often shocking truths—about what we eat, how it’s produced, who we have become as a nation and where we are going from here.”
I haven’t seen the film yet, and am waiting to go see it, unfortunately it’s not showing in my area as of yet. If you do get the opportunity to see it, please post a comment and let me know what you thought of it or of this topic in general.
Over this past weekend, Sus and I went to a beer pairing event at one of the grocery stores we shop at. This was a kick off event because this gourmet grocery, Wegman’s, has battled PA and won the right to sell 6 packs of beer to go. They invited in 6 local breweries and had chef’s pairing food with each individual style of beers that were offered. It was a great event and we had a good time. The beer selection there was fantastic, not huge by any means, but I can tell it was carefully thought out. The craft beer was on prominent display, while that yellow fizz that passes as so called beer was stuck in a corner for once.
After we traversed through the various six stations, we ended up in the craft beer section. As I took my time examining all of Wegman’s offerings. I was looking at a few of the Belgian selections when I overheard a woman say, “Wow! for $11, I’d buy a bottle of wine!”
I thought to myself a bit about this, kept my mouth shut, and now I need to retort. First off an $11 bottle of wine, won’t be bad, but it definitely won’t be the best. I must also admit that this bottle of belgian beer was also a 750ml bottle, so as far as pure volume is concerned we are comparing the same amount. Secondly, I’m a wine drinker, and enjoy wine, but over the course of the last three years or so, I’ve been exploring beers more and more. What I’ve found out, is that with beer, there are so many more styles and variations within each style, that may not necessarily exist in wines. Yellow fizz has cheapened the idea of beer so much, that by default wine is considered a better choice. So I guess basically what I’m saying is that although a greatly crafted wine is excellent. What makes wine more expensive? I guess this woman would just prefer to buy a mediocre bottle of wine vs. an excellent craft beer because she’s …. well……you fill in the blank to this ending.
Last Sunday evening I photographed the Phish reunion tour in Camden, NJ. It was a great show, with great light. They opened the show with Chalkdust Torture, next was Fee and then onto Wolfman’s Brother. When one photographs a concert the rules typically are the same, you are only allowed to photograph the first 3 songs, no flash. I’m escorted into the pit area, between the stage and the front row, where all the bouncers are. When I photographed the Grateful Dead last month we were alloted the first 15 minutes, due to their long improvisational jams. I was expecting the same thing with Phish but they actually let us shoot the first 3 songs, which was cool, gave us a bit more time to make some great images.
If you’d like to see some highlights of the show, click on the Sportsshooter link in the blogroll on the right, and enjoy!yu
It was a calm leisure mid-morning weekend kind of day. I packed my lunch, two tall boys of PBR (a guilty pleasure), loaded up the cooler, grabbed the camp chair, tackle bag and my fishing rod, kissed the Mrs. for good luck and headed out the door for an afternoon of fishing on a local lake. When I arrived, the lake was packed given that the temperature for the day was a mild 80ºF. There were people fishing on the lake from bass boats, kayakers, windsurfers, and people just picnicking and enjoying the day. I unloaded my car, grab my gear and walked into the woods along the west side trail system to go find a fishing hole that I could set up as my base camp. After about 10 or 15 min. I came across an opening and I don’t know if it was because I was thirsty, or just ready to fish, but it felt “right,” so I set up camp.
Before even leaving the house I geeked out that morning, watched a couple of fishing shows I had on Tivo and pre-rigged up my rod. I chose a drop-shot set up for the early morning, with a green/pumpkin plastic worm on it. Well after settling into camp, I cracked open the first beer, and made my first cast of the day. It took a bit of getting used to with the drop shot rigging, the weight at the bottom was affecting my cast…probably because I’m still working on my casting skills, but never the less I wasn’t going to give up. So I fished this way for the first half hour or so. I then decided to change out my rigging and try something different, but I also had decided to stick with soft plastics that day as my choice in lures.
The second rigging was a 2/0 weighted barbless hook, with a chartreuse Zoom fluke rigged up Texas style. I did a few casts off to my right and then did a casts off to my left, varying the speed and style of return. On about my third cast to the left I felt something and thought that I had become tangled in some weed grass, so I gave the rod a hook set action, figuring I’d clear that grass off the lure, but instead I set the hook on a largemouth bass!! Once I realized I had my Fish On, I started playing and wrangling it in, then as I realized I was going to land the fish, another thought crept into my mind. Let’s see the last time I probably caught a fish was about 25 years ago when I was 10 and my Dad always did the hook removal. Not that it’s rocket science, and again I press my barbs down for minimal damage to the fish, I realized I was going to finally do it myself. I just hoped that the fish didn’t fully attack my lure. Of course, once I had him in my hands, I went to work to remove the hook and realized that my lure was about half way down his gullet. Great. I started to remove it and was experiencing a bit of difficulty and the fish went limp on me. Not wanting to harm let alone kill the bass I put him back in the water so that it could get some air, once it kicked back to life, I pulled it out of the water again, and this time was successful at removing the hook. I promptly put it back in the water, wished it well being and sent it back into the depths.
It was wild actually catching a fish this time. It has sparked a renewed since of energy around fishing while also increasing a sense of confidence. The peaceful and calming qualities of being in/near or on water, always renews my spirits.
Yesterday, my local homebrew club, BUZZ (Brewers Unlimited Zany Zymurgists) hosted their annual Buzz Off beer competition. This year I decided to submit two beers: Spaz Stout an oatmeal coffee stout, and Big Bad Leory an indian brown ale. The stout received a score of 36.5/50 and I believe first the category received a 41. Still pending full results. The brown ale did poorly but the comments received are extremely helpful so I may adjust my recipes and continue to grow as a brewer. One of the judges is an AHA (American Homebrew Association) Grand Master Judge III, which means he has a ton of experience and the feedback on the stout was fantastic and it looks like I will be able to tweak the recipe a slight amount for next year’s competition.
On the day of the completion I also participated as a steward, or basically a waiter, who fetched flights of beer from the walk-in cooler to give to the judges, made sure they had enough cups, etc. The benefit of doing this was that I also sat at my assigned judges table and could listen in on the comments/conversation between the two judges as well as they offered my tastes so I too would know what they were talking about. It was a great experience! and I look forward to becoming more active with this group of brewers.
Each beer that wins first place in each category then advances to the best of show, this aspect of the competition is each judge receives a taste from all the beers and then they have a table talk discussion to narrow down to the best of show. This was fascinating to watch and listen to. Very comical as well as you can imagine that the best of show doesn’t get judge till the end of the day and many of these judges have been tasting since 9 am.
