Balance of Food

Add vegetables to processed lunch choices for flavor and nutrition

Running around the house getting ready for work, and remember that you haven't prepared a lunch for the day?

So you're stuck with a can of pasta or a frozen meal, knowing that a few hours later your lunch will be underfulfilling.

You don't have to be stuck in that rut as long as you realize you can supplement whatever processed food you buy.

If you have roasted red peppers handy or mushrooms, you can add those to a can of pasta for desperately needed taste and nutrition. Sure that lean microwave meal has vegetables already, but you can always add more. 

Living within the confines of the food in front of us can be frustrating if you are bored or easily distracted. Sandwich must come with chips or fries and a pickle. Microwave meals must be eaten as is. This works most of the time, but shaking things up can make food more fun and sssshhh, healthier.

Often with these types of meals, we complain about being hungry a couple of hours later, and that is when we reach for that 3:15 candy bar. You still might snack in between lunch and dinner, but you may be driven toward a healthier sack if lunch fills us up. And vegetables can fill you up. 

If you don't like canned mushrooms, saute your own and refrigerate them for later. Add cooked spinach or any of a number of vegetables to the mix. The cost and effort of the meal will go up, but you'll get more out of the meal, and that benefits everyone in the long run.

Watching how TV affects how we eat in restaurants

Back when I covered the world of marketing, grocery stores would do research on the music playing in the store, using the music to keep shoppers in the store longer so they will buy more food.

Restaurants don't always rely on music but in two establishments on the same night, I found television being used, one in a highly distracting manner and the other perhaps a subliminal way to get us to eat more in a restaurant.

I was in a KFC restaurant, and the rather prominent TV was tuned to the Lifetime Movie Network. Everyone will agree that I am not the target audience for this channel, but the sequence was a stalker trying to beat up and kill his victim. This was not acceptable dinner fare.

When asked, the staff offered to switch the program to news. I then joked that it couldn't be as violent as this program. It could be, but their news choice ended up having a baseball game, where the only hitting was bat on ball.

My primary purpose for being in that neighborhood was dessert at Bakers Square. I eat very little pie these days, but save one time a year for a slice of Key Lime pie. The décor was a huge contrast, much more open and friendly. And the restaurant had huge TVs. The TVs themselves weren't a big deal. After all, TVs in eating establishments are a part of our lives.

What was intriguing about the Bakers Square choice was that the TVs were tuned to the Cooking Channel. Not even the Food Network, but the Cooking Channel. The episode featured Giada and the twins making a meal for Todd and his office buddies, and then ravioli of some kind. Seeing all that delicious food did tempt me to order more food, and that could have worked if I was in there for dinner. Of course, I did make the joke in my head that having the Cooking Channel put pressure on Bakers Square to have better food, otherwise the TV food could intimidate the regular food.

DMK Burger Bar, an upscale grass-fed burger joint/bar in Chicago, specializes in showing kitschy and cult classics on dueling TVs all with the sound turned down. The visual spectacle fits in well in a bar but looks out of place when eating an elaborate burger or one of its intense fries combinations. And bars have been showing sports on TV while serving mediocre bar fare to get you to drink cheap domestic burger with that so-so food.

We are a society that eats in front of the television or computer screen or smart phone. If we are going to eat with a screen, we might as well get some pleasure out of the experience, as long as it isn't training us to overeat.

Temptation of the Week: Hunger strikes

This week's temptation has little to do with food, but more about the significance of food ...

News of the famine in Somalia has been lost in debt ceiling crisis stories and the usual celebrity pop news. And this is likely difficult to believe given how much food people have in the United States, but more people are starving or underfed in new ways.

Being poor can often mean you don't have much, but you have some food. When you are very poor and food prices are rising at amazing levels, harder choices are the result.

This summer, outside a major downtown metropolis farmers market, I have seen two different people for two different reasons on a hunger strike.

Having a hunger strike outside a farmers market is only part of the point; the market is right across the street from City Hall. But the juxtaposition of food and hunger strike, plus the world's rising food costs, made for a curious question. For what reason would you go on a hunger strike? And how long would that strike likely be?

We are also in the month of Ramadan, the Muslim observance where they fast from dawn to dusk, but then feast once the sun is down. Ramadan is going without food as a sacrifice, not as a hunger strike.

Unfortunately, some people have a harder time doing a hunger strike because of low blood sugar.

Naturally, we go about 10 hours without food on a regular basis each day. We sleep during that time. But the idea of going 20 hours without food is extraordinary.

When you are on a hunger strike — a real hunger strike — you go 24, 48, 72 hours, and longer without food.

Whether your cause is social, political, or some other form of -al, hunger strikes are serious business. And even if you go a short time without food, maybe even in solidarity with someone's cause, you might just appreciate food all the more, especially when you live in a country with an abundance of food.

Eating meat, but not as much

We have spent time examining alternatives to meat in our diet, not to eliminate meat completely (at least for me), but to have a variety of protein options. And red meat can be a nice complement to the plate with a few strategic ideas.

"When buying meat, select lean cuts such as sirloin, flank steak, eye of the round, beef tenderloin, lean and lean and extra lean ground beef, pork tenderloin, and center cut pork chops. ... If you eat red meat, cancer experts advise eating less than 18 ounces per week. Limit your serving size to no more than three ounces. To help reduce portion size, enjoy small amounts of red meat in stir-fries and pastas. When having steak, serve it in thin slices rather than as a whole piece." -- Dietitian Leslie Beck in The Globe and Mail (Toronto, Canada)

That doesn't sound like fun. Though in reducing heterocyclic amines (HCAs), which are linked to colon issues, she suggests a small portion size, "cook at a lower temperature, and marinate your steak (ingredients in marinades reduce the formation of HCAs)." In other words, medium-rare is better for you than well-done, and marinades help.

Chicken and turkey offer health advantages over red meat. A little bacon never hurts. Meat can be a part of your meal plans if that is what you want. Just rethink portion size and how you use meat.

Asking people to give up meat, or dairy, or any of a number of "bad" food areas isn't practical. Some will completely give them up, but reducing the intake is helpful, especially if enough people get involved.

Garlic festival finally a chance to get enough garlic

I definitely have more than 50 things I want to do before I die, but one of those is still the Gilroy Garlic Festival.

The issue has been finding a way to get there without having to rent a car (and significantly increasing the money spent on the trip). I now have a way, and my plan is to go next year — hopefully.

The idea of a garlic festival intrigues me since typically, dishes that identify themselves as “garlic” barely have any garlic in them, or at least, not enough to make an impact on my taste buds. The idea of having too much garlic — by my tastes — seems almost impossible.

Until then, my love for garlic will have to be satisfied by items here and there. Until I heard about a garlic festival that didn't involve air fare or a rented car.

Highwood, IL isn't necessarily known within Chicago, much less outside the Windy City. But the northern suburb has a Wednesday evening farmers market with restaurants, and decided to adapt that weekly event into a garlic festival. The festival was in a small park outside City Hall, near the suburban train stop.

I had no expectations that this could match up to Gilroy, even though I have expectations on what Gilroy will be like. Highwood never smelled like garlic during my entire stay.

While scouring around the festival site, I met one of the garlic queen contestants. She didn't smell like garlic, but she was very nice and helpful to point out garlic dishes.

I started with roasted garlic soup. The soup was served with a little fresh tomato salsa, croutons, and splashes of fresh squeezed lemon juice and olive oil. The roasted garlic soup wasn't very exciting, but it was a great way to start in on the garlic. But my taste buds were looking for more exciting.

After I had finished most of the soup, I was on to garlic ice cream (image at the top). I wanted to go to Gilroy to try garlic ice cream. I'm not sure if this even came close.

Vanilla ice cream mixed in with minced garlic pieces. While the frozen concoction was nice, you had the feeling that it wasn't garlicky enough. Still, it was the spiciest ice cream I can recall.

Still felt like I wasn't getting enough garlic. I thought about the garlic salmon at a booth, but someone had convinced me that it wasn't garlicky enough. I settled for garlic French fries with garlic sauce. Garlic French fries is mostly a miss in the hit-or-miss choices. A noble attempt most times, often it fell way short of garlic much less garlicky.

Garlic was in the air and on the plate. Again, garlic but not quite garlicky. And I'm still not sure where the garlic sauce was all that garlicky. Still, I was further down the path to garlic heaven.

Time was running out; the trains only came once an hour. So I grabbed some garlic rolls to go. This was the dish I turned down when I got the garlic fries. The pieces of French bread was cooked and the soaked in garlic butter with pieces of garlic and then sprinkled with parsley and oregano.

The garlic rolls had the truest definition of garlic of any dish I had since I got the garlic and oil appetizer from the Stinky Rose on Columbus in North Beach in San Francisco. The San Francisco dish had cloves swimming in oil with focaccia bread for dipping. I stunk of garlic so bad that no one sat in my row on the flight back.

No one sat next to me on the return trip train car, but that had little to do with garlic. This dish was intense, but then again, I think the previous garlic ingestion had caught up, and so while the garlic rolls were very intense, I couldn't finish them.

A truer test would have been to try them first as I may have just ingested too many carbohydrates to appreciate the garlic rolls.

One dish that I would have tried but they ran out by the time I was ready for them was garlic crab claws, from the same place as the garlic rolls.

I had enough garlic for one night, even a week. And I learned that too much of a good thing could be too intense, but you still want to try. Yet I also learned that I'm not quite ready for the big leagues, that is, Gilroy.

Based on the Gilroy garlic fries at San Francisco's National League ballpark, the name Gilroy is going to deliver a lot of garlic. I will need to pace myself with items that have a lot of garlic and eat a little of them so I can get a good variety without OD-ing on garlic.

Unlike some food obsessions, garlic has wonderful properties and can substitute flavor for such overused condiments such as salt. And even when garlic is overdone in a meal, rare as that is, garlic is still the most ideal spice. Especially in ice cream.

Gilroy 2012??

pictures by me

Temptation of the Week: Poutine at the ballpark

Canadian cuisine is barely visible within Canada, much less the United States. However, Canada has one dish that is gaining prominence below the 49th parallel, even if people aren't quite sure what it is.

Poutine is spreading across the United States, and I hit the road to a land known for cheese to see its take on the Quebecois dish.

As I mentioned earlier, Miller Park in Milwaukee had a contest over last winter to add new food items to the ballpark menu. Poutine came in 2nd to a kebab featuring the 5 prominent sausages.

One piece of advice that I unfortunately ignored was looking up online the location of the obscure food item. I started in the 2nd deck, the poutine was in the 1st deck, and my seat was in the 4th deck. Several concession workers had no idea what I was talking about.

Turns out, the Brewers have the poutine in the Pommes Frites area near Section 129, in case you are headed to see the 1st place Brewers. The item isn't listed on the menu under "poutine" but "Montreal." Once I saw "Montreal," I knew I reached my destination.

Wisconsin is known for cheese and cheese curds, so I was looking forward to see the cheese impact of the Miller Park poutine. While Quebec is proud of its cheese curds, Wisconsin celebrates cheese in all forms. So in multiple ways, poutine has a kinship with cheeseheads.

So let's go to the scorecard to see how this Wisconsin version of a Montréal classic looked on the plate (get it, home plate):

On the negative side of the sheet, poutine purists will point to the obvious difference: waffle cut fries certainly aren't traditional. And the cheese was lightly scattered, and tiny in size, making little impact in the dish. And the poutine at the ballpark sets you back $7.

On the plus side, the dish smelled liked poutine when it was placed in front of me. The concessionaires used plenty of gravy. And the poutine did hit the spot.

This was the second ballpark where I have seen poutine. In 2002, I saw three Expos games at Olympic Stadium in Montréal, but I didn't order it then. This was back before I discovered what poutine could do to the palate.

The Expos traveled to Milwaukee from 1998-2004, but poutine wasn't well-known at that time outside Canada.

This version of poutine won't make the Temptation Hall of Fame. It would have scored more with a little bit more cheese and $2 off the final bill. Miller Park's poutine wasn't a home run, more like a bloop single.

picture via me

'Futurama' fun with fast food and farmers markets

Though the show takes place in the year 3000 and beyond, "Futurama" often finds itself spoofing the 21st century. Last week's episode had an exchange betweeen eating fast food and going to farmers markets. And in true satirical fashion, both sides took a few shots.

The Planet Express crew finds themselves in line at a fast food outlet when they return from the latest delivery. Leela, the ship's captain, asks what is in the "buggalo tots." The fast food worker asks if she has a warrant.

She decides to order from the lighter menu, choosing a "gardener lovers salad." The order taker asks her what kind of cheese filling she wants, totally blowing apart the "lighter" concept. Leela then says she'll get the fruit cup. The order taker asks her what kind of cheese filling she wants with the fruit cup.

In the next scene, we see Leela eating from the cup, but she is horrified to realize that fruit is spelled Froot and "Froot" is in quote marks. Then she finds a bone in her "Froot" Cup.

The crew then visits a farmers market where Leela is all excites about how local and fresh the food is, offering to pay way more for locally grown eggs.

Finding a medium between fast food of unknown origin and eating anything that says "local and fresh" is where most people spend their food energy. The message of the episode is "no need to rush to either extreme."

Since comedy is best done in a visual medium, hopefully you will get a chance to watch the episode. Comedy Central will re-air this episode Thursday night at 9:30 pm Eastern, just before the newest episode at 10 pm.

Video and screen capture via Comedy Central

Deep-fried butter gets upgrade at Iowa State Fair, but how much can you really eat?

For all the horrified reaction to last year's blog entry on deep-fried butter, my culinary adventure seems so quaint compared to the "upgrade" in deep-fried butter at this year's Iowa State Fair.

Where I consumed four small balls of deep-fried butter that was mostly coated batter, the entry in Iowa is a stick of butter that is battered and deep-fried. I had a pat or 1½ pats of butter tops.

I have to admit the golden brown coating sure beat what I bought about a year ago. Color draws us to food, and that dark brown coating (above) looks good enough to eat by itself, much less with melting butter. Certainly looks better than last year's model (below).

If you go, you might be in line with America's #1 non Michelle Obama fan, Sarah Palin. The former Alaska governor is not currently running for president, but likes hanging out near those that are. "I'm excited to try some of that famous fried butter-on-a-stick, fried cheesecake-on-a-stick, fried Twinkies, etc.," Palin sent in an e-mail. "I'll enjoy [the fried food] in honor of those who'd rather make us just 'eat our peas.'" The last line was a nudge at the president as opposed to the First Lady.

Since I won't be getting to Iowa this year, the question I want to know is "How much of the fried stick of butter would you actually eat?"

Sure if you are with a bunch of friends and you like them enough to share their saliva on your deep-fried butter, the serving size is much more reasonable.

I did share my deep-fried butter with my brand new friends in Toronto. And years ago, when I tried a deep-fried Twinkie, I shared that with friends. But neither of these portions were as huge as a whole deep-fried butter stick.

Earlier: Eating deep-fried butter at last year's CNE in Toronto.

What if your SO doesn't want to try it, and you're stuck eating it all or wasting the rest?

Would eating a whole stick of deep-fried butter actually taste good?

The first few bites are good, as I can swear to doing. However, after half a stick of deep-fried butter, do you stand there and say, "more" or "moo"?

Do understand that if I were on the fairway at the Iowa State Fair at Ames, I would line up to order one, even if I didn't finish it all. I did this in Toronto; why wouldn't I do so in Iowa?

A little bit is more of a novelty: "Look, I tried deep-fried butter." A whole stick is more of a "I have the ambulance on speeddial."

We are taught not to waste food, but if you try a deep-fried butter stick in Iowa, don't be afraid to waste some. Or have a lot of daring friends around. And if you went against the advice, and ate it all, let us know. Iowa isn't that far away.

picture credit

Temptation of the week: How would you make a truly 'happy meal'?

This week's temptation brings us to an update on a recent story on McDonald's changes to its signature Happy Meal, reducing the amount of fries, increasing apples, and giving parents the option to forego fries for apples sans caramel sauce.

I joked in the earlier column that McDonald's will never replace the Happy Meal with a portabello burger with organic condiments, baked sweet potato fries, a broccoli stem, and an Al Gore climate change action figure. While that was my best joke in some time, the more poignant result was wondering what a healthy "happy meal" could look like.

Should we start with the premise of a sandwich, carbohydrate side, vegetable or fruit, and a toy? Or mix up the allotment of items?

If we stuck with the sandwich theme, a portabello mushroom with spinach and roasted red peppers in a wrap would be nice, but really messy. And sprouts would get all over the place. Maybe a fake meat burger would be more appealing.

Having a salad of some kind would involve more extensive packaging, and our "happy meal" might not be so happy.

With a wrap, we have carbohydrates to spend here. Maybe in keeping the "fries" theme, we could bring back something like the long-ago sourdough sticks from Boudin with the parmesan peppercorn dressing. Mmmmmm.

The fruit/vegetable would have to be something that kept well. Broccoli might work, and carrots/celery would be better suited here. Plus, you could have peanut butter (natural, of course) dipping bowls for the vegetables.

As for the toy, Al Gore figures would fly off the shelves. But you could also do stickers with a cool saying or important fact about the food supply.

What would make you happy in a "happy meal"? Submit your suggestions below in the comments section.

Price of chocolate is not bad if you keep portions small and high-quality

Chocolate is enduring, whether it comes in the form of a milk chocolate candy bar by the supermarket checkout counter or the fancy bars with the cacao levels. And who hasn't dreamed of having a chocolate fountain at their wedding?

We know chocolate is full of antioxidants, yet a lot of the chocolate we eat is overshadowed by milk, sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, and other assorted ingredients.

Diametrically opposed sides: milk chocolate has the taste level we expect, but fancier chocolate is closer to what we need to get the health benefits. When we say we want chocolate, do we want taste or health? And can we have both?

Having visited Choco-Musée Érico in Quebec City, I have sampled 100% cacao chocolate: pure chocolate with no sugar. Very healthy but non-existent sweetness. Once you've had 100% cacao, 75% cacao is a lot sweeter than you think.

If your diet is highly processed milk chocolate bars, getting up to 60% and 72% cacao will take a degree of adjustment. If you are already in that club, you're in a good spot. But even if you already eat 60%, 72%, or 86% cacao, you might find that a square of the fancy chocolate isn't fulfilling enough.

The truth about chocolate is if you let a little go a long way, your body will be happy. Whether your taste buds can adjust is up to you. But you should know that even a little bit of chocolate packs a punch on the numbers.

Here is a breakdown of a very well-known brand of fancy chocolate at 72% cacao.:

Fancy 72% cacao chocolate

Category	1 square	3 squares	Whole bar
Calories	67	200	500
Calories from Fat	50	150	375
Total Fat	6g	17g	43g
Saturated Fat	3g	10g	25g
Total Carbohydrate	6g	17g	43g
Dietary Fiber	1g	4g	10g
Sugars	3g	10g	25g
Protein	<1g	2g	5g
Whole bar based on about 2.5 servings and a serving size of 3 squares

 

Other notes: 3 squares of the chocolate contain 51% of the daily value (DV) for saturated fat. So a whole bar would provide 127% of the DV for saturated fat. As for fat, 3 squares provides 26% of the DV, and the whole bar has 65% of the DV. 3 squares does provide 15% of the DV for iron, a whole bar has 38% of the DV.