Balance of Food

What's Tempting: Homemade pancakes

I grew up on pancakes made from Bisquick. They were lovely pancakes, complete with Log Cabin syrup and lots of butter. Those were my childhood pancakes.

As an adult, I don't eat nearly as many pancakes as I used to do. Since I rarely eat breakfast out, if I'm going to eat pancakes, well, I have to cook them.

Those Bisquick pancakes were made with whole milk and white eggs in a carton from the store. My eggs were brown from a local farmer and the current "milk" in the house was almond coconut milk. These would not be my childhood pancakes.

Without Bisquick, I resorted to the ultimate cookbook: the Internet. Found a basic recipe, but clearly I had to improvise.

The recipe called for salt and white sugar, neither of which I had. Seasoned salt and maple sugar did the trick, though I put in less sugar than the recipe wanted.

I had white flour, though I could have used whole wheat flour. And I wanted to buttermilk my "milk" even with essences of almond and coconut. I went with white vinegar to "buttermilk" a cup, adding ¼ cup of non-buttermilk milk.

I had the dry ingredients all set to go. Then inspiration came. Cinnamon.

The only ingredient I didn't measure with excruciating detail was the cinnamon. Not too much but way more than a teaspoon.

Combining the batter was easy. Pouring the pancakes did not produce the smooth procedure from my childhood. My batter was definitely thicker, possibly due to the recipe or my changes.

They were darker due to the cinnamon, but otherwise they looked like pancakes.

Next time, I will try to have salt in the house and use raw sugar instead of maple sugar. Not too bad for a long stretch of time in between pancake attempts.

Other than the mess, making homemade pancake batter was fun. I used ingredients that I liked, and threw in a curveball or two. This is definitely an activity to do if you have children, in creating, making, and eating.

Bisquick is a very nice product and a shortcut if you need one. However, taking a bit more time and adding a homemade touch or two gives you more than just pancakes. You have a connection to something you created, even if it lives for a very short time before going to the stomach.

Oh, and enough of that Log Cabin "syrup." Buy some real maple syrup, ideally Canadian and Grade B. You and your homemade pancakes are worth the extra money for your extra effort.

Colbert deservedly mocks Domino's Smart Slice

Domino's reportedly has 4,900 outlets in the United States, as of the third quarter of 2013. The pizza chain has more than 3,000 locations … inside school lunchrooms.

No bricks, no mortar, little overhead and these customers can't go to Pizza Hut or Papa John's.

Our schools don't have enough money for education and to feed the children in their care. So we farm this out to private companies, such as Domino's.

The pizza chain couldn't be in the schools unless it offered a healthier food product, one that you can't find in the 4,900 outlets outside school walls.

The Smart Slice has 35% less sodium in pizza sauce, ½ the fat in the "Lite Mozzarella cheese" and a 100 mg reduction in sodium, and pepperoni with 33% less fat and ½ the sodium.

The kicker is a "magic" concoction of 51% white whole-wheat flour designed to replicate the crust found in the public Domino's locations.

The school requirement is 50% whole grains hence the 51%. Domino's identifies it as "white whole-wheat flour" and says the pizza has 4g fiber per serving.

The mock element is riper than the tomatoes they use for the sauce to put on the pizza. The Colbert Report segment takes care of a few of those points.

Domino's is adamant about not offering the slightly healthier option in its public stores. This tells us that the taste is altered significantly enough that its customers could tell the difference.

The students who eat the Smart Slice likely notice a difference as well, but they're kids and pizza in school is still pizza.

It's easy to say that either version of Domino's pizza is not that great. When Domino's announced that it's improving its product, the underlying theme was that the previous product was not that good.

Full disclosure: I don't eat much pizza because of my physical issues with mozzarella cheese. Even with that, I haven't had a slice of Domino's since 1986. By contrast, I've had Pizza Hut pizza within the last 2 years.

The larger point is why the [bleep] does Domino's or any other fast food outlet have 3,000 location in school lunchrooms in 38 states. The slightly healthier pizza Domino's offers in schools isn't close to the pizza they are hinting you should buy in the outside world. Literally bait and switch. While school children should learn that lesson at some point in their lives, this is not the road to take.

Kids will learn enough about brand names in the outside world without that being reinforced in schools. While it's "fun" for kids to have pizza in school, learning about food in school means finding different ways to achieve nutrition goals, and you can't live on pizza in the outside world (especially since that pizza is significantly different than the pizza in school).

Pizza is not a vegetable, even with lycopene in the tomato sauce. Pizza is a delivery technique for high-fat cheese, sodium-rich cheese and meat with some occasional vegetables thrown into the mix. Sure it's fun in moderation, but building an existence on pizza, even ones that barely meet borderline standards, is no way for children to get through lunch at school.

When we hear the phrase "think of the children," we should think about what they have to deal with at school. We wouldn't treat our kids at home the way we seem to expect to treat them at school.

Kids are not a commodity. Companies have the freedom to think of people as commodities, but we should have higher standards, much higher than 51%.

video credit: Colbert Report

What's Tempting: Embracing butter

Time magazine is telling its readers and casual bystanders this week that the experts were wrong about butter and saturated fats, and we should stop the war on butter.

Some of us never fought that war.

The cover story by Time magazine was wonderful news for those who felt deprived because certain factions were telling them butter (and other saturated fats) were bad.

Some of us enjoyed butter in moderation, using butter when we needed that flavor, taste, and consistency.

Time magazine might be the loudest voice, but this is only the latest news on the benefits of whole real food. As we found out this spring, full-fat (and therefore more saturated fat) dairy products helped reduce obesity.

The butter in the Swedish study was of much better quality than what most Americans consume as butter. If you feel well-grown meat and milk are a concern, then butter also falls in that list.

Good quality butter in moderation, as part of a balanced diet.

Extra virgin olive oil is my go-to fat in the kitchen. Butter makes an occasional appearance. Bacon grease makes surprise visits. Most of the time, extra virgin olive oil wins out for being a good fat.

Previous coverage:

What's Tempting: Full-fat dairy products

Deep-fried butter: a little is all you need

Butter has a soft spot in my heart. Yes, I have eaten deep-fried butter, and I grew up in a family that used melted butter for fondue.

I understand the power of butter: use well, use wisely.

If you are jumping back into butter, welcome back. You have been missed and we welcome you back with no judgments. We do have one new recommendation: buy better butter.

This does mean paying more for butter, but we have good news. You will naturally use less butter each time.

Using better butter means using less butter that helps in two ways: 1) you won't overdo good butter so you don't have to worry about overdoing butter, and 2) by using less butter per serving, the cost differential is sharply reduced. So you might not spend that much more for better butter.

Americans envy the French because they eat rich, decadent foods and don't gain weight as much as those in the States. Eating the rich, decadent foods without understanding the approach is only working with half the story.

The Time magazine cover story will give people the "freedom" to eat butter once again. They should also have the responsibility to eat butter well.

Eat a wide variety of fats. Avocadoes, olive oil, butter, nuts. Meat and fish provide fat. Cheese and milk, too. And maybe an occasional dose of bacon grease.

Like any other food category, eat mostly good fats. Add some "bad fats" in moderation. And have fun with them. Be mostly good and the guilt can melt away … like butter.

photo credit: Time magazine

How Casey Kasem tried to get us to give up meat

Casey Kasem played many significant roles in his 82-year-old life: disc jockey, countdown host, actor, cartoon voice, role model for the Arab-American community. However, I will remember Casey Kasem as the first person who tried to get me and others to give up meat.

I was working in radio in 1991 (almost certain this was 1991, maybe 1992) and filling in on the midday show of a full-service AM radio station in Battle Creek, Michigan. They had scheduled a phone interview with Casey Kasem, who would talk about the Great American Meatout. This was a similar concept to the Great American Smokeout where people would give up smoking for a day. So the idea was to give up meat for a day.

A whole day. In 1991.

I had time to prepare for the radio interview with information about the Great American Meatout. My humor of the day compelled me to read the material while eating Burger King hamburgers. The literature went into a lot of reasons why giving up meat was a good idea. Animal welfare, health, the planet. I remember being curious about how vegetarians got protein if they weren't getting it from meat. Milk, butter, eggs were obvious thoughts, but I hadn't given the topic much thought. Still, I wanted to do a good interview so I read up on what was in front of me.

The interview was scheduled for after lunch: my brain says 1:45 pm, but just after lunch time. I was given the super secret phone number of the Kasem residence, since Casey would do the interview from his house. A gentleman in a low tone answered "Kasem residence." I knew this wasn't Casey Kasem. About 1-2 minutes later, Casey Kasem was on the phone with me … off the air. I introduced myself and explained how this was going to work.

I was about to go on the radio with Casey Kasem, a man who knew his way around radio, and I was telling him what was going on.

I remember writing out the intro, mentioning not just the countdowns but his cartoon voice work. After all, Kasem was the voice of Shaggy on "Scooby-Doo" — one of the hungriest characters in cartoons (and the list included Jughead from The Archies and Wimpy from Popeye).

Kasem was pleased with my intro. Good. The ice was broken. I led Kasem with relatively softball questions about what was the Great American Meatout. I figured if I didn't know, then most listeners wouldn't know.

There are a lot of reasons why people give up meat. The conversation hadn't gone on for long before I figured out why Kasem was so passionate about the cause: Animal welfare.

Kasem spent a lot of time talking about the cruel ways animals were treated. I tried steering the conversation away from that, not because it wasn't important, but figured my listeners had just finished lunch and the talk was turning my stomach.

I tried to bring the conversation back to alternate sources of protein. Kasem addressed that point, but quickly the conversation went back to animal welfare.

Soon enough, the conversation was over and that was my moment in the sun with Casey Kasem. He was by far the most famous person I interviewed during my brief stay in radio.

I look back at that conversation, when food and how it was brought to the table wasn't an issue. Back then, cheap was the ruling point of order. I feel like that conversation summed up my approach to the topic years later. I still have a hard time with hearing stories of animal welfare, even if we should know what is happening. My concerns over making things practical, such as finding alternate sources of protein, is how I run this blog.

I try and remember that interview and preparation when dealing with people who don't know much but really want to learn. As much as we know about alternate ways of eating, there was a time where we didn't know much. Though Casey Kasem took a direction where I wasn't comfortable, the fact that Kasem approached food in this different way long before it was cool to do so inspired me to ask questions along the way.

I doubt he was aware, but I'm sure he would have been horrified at the story of his wife, Jean, throwing raw meat at his daughter.

I respected the fact that he could go without eating meat. I respected Casey Kasem for who he was and what he had accomplished. But I started to think from that day forward that protein wasn't just meat-based. There were options and alternatives to meat for protein.

I still haven't become a vegetarian, and I doubt I ever will be. But I'm a lot more cognizant about vegetarians, vegans, and protein. The person that started me down that road was Casey Kasem. RIP.

Searching for Canadian food in the U.S.

We do have a bit of fun with finding Canadian food, especially in the United States. Seriously, why is it so hard to find a butter tart?

Nanaimo bars, maple walnut fudge, tarte au sucre (sugar), and butter tarts: in the U.S. capital, but hard to find otherwise.

If you enjoy Canadian food, or the adventure of finding unusual treats, check out this column from our sister blog, CanadianCrossing.com.

You'll want to pay extra attention if you live in New York, Washington, Chicago, and Denver.

What's Tempting: Keeping FDA away from artisanal dairy products

Can we keep the FDA away from our natural dairy products?

The FDA wants to prevent artisanal cheese producers from using wooden boards because they can't be "adequately cleaned and sanitized."

There was a case in New York state in 2012 where listeria was found with a small cheesemaker. Clearly, there were issues in that scenario that don't exist elsewhere.

The FDA isn't targeting just domestic cheesemakers. The plan is to ban the import of cheese that use wooden boards.

Now the FDA has backed away a bit from this draconian step.

"The FDA does not have a new policy banning the use of wooden shelves in cheese-making, nor is there any FSMA requirement in effect that addresses this issue. Moreover, the FDA has not taken any enforcement action based solely on the use of wooden shelves.

"In the interest of public health, the FDA’s current regulations state that utensils and other surfaces that contact food must be “adequately cleanable” and properly maintained. Historically, the FDA has expressed concern about whether wood meets this requirement and has noted these concerns in inspectional findings. FDA is always open to evidence that shows that wood can be safely used for specific purposes, such as aging cheese.

"The FDA will engage with the artisanal cheese-making community to determine whether certain types of cheeses can safely be made by aging them on wooden shelving."

The FDA wants safety. Food producers want safety. The difference is that they have very different definitions of safety.

Artisanal good producers want to produce safe food because sales, money, integrity. If something goes bad, the impact is significantly worse on artisanal food producers than mainstream food producers. So they work harder to ensure a quality product.

No food producer, artisanal or mainstream, is perfect, which is why we have food inspectors. Well, not enough food inspectors, not even close.

And when we hear from the FDA or the USDA, the impact is stronger on artisanal food producers. Artisanal cheese and raw milk freak out the government while GMOs, mad cow disease, and antibiotics and hormones are a part of everyday business.

Previous coverage:

What's Tempting: Raw milk in 2014

Raw milk has to go underground despite a lack of negative proof

Colbert showcases government extreme on addressing raw milk

Artisanal cheesemakers are really worried, despite the FDA backtracking. Mainstream meat producers sleep well because they know they can keep doing the status quo with little to no punishment, even if caught. Tyson reportedly buying Hillshire, reducing the number of players in the mainstream meat industry, reinforces the impact that these companies are "too big to fail."

Smaller food producers aren't "too big to fail" and the FDA and USDA can show muscle without ramification back in DC.

The U.S. food system allows ingredients that other countries actively ban. But the FDA can't stop that. Ground beef is actively encouraged to be cooked to 160°F because of the meat process. But the FDA can't stop any element of that process. (At least they aren't like Canada that makes it a crime for restaurants to cook ground beef less than 160°F.)

One case of listeria on one farm and the FDA wanted to destroy artisanal cheese worldwide. FDA! WTF?

The FDA take on safety is for us to live in bubbles with plenty of padding in case we fall down. They might lead to "safe" but boring and completely unnecessary. A bit of steak tartar with well-grown meat, artisanal raw milk cheese, and a glass of raw milk from an organic farm is a meal that should be celebrated. That is freedom. This isn't for everybody, but the people who want it are those who know to search out quality options.

Eating cheese could be considered dangerous in itself. Lots of bacteria involved. In this cheese battle, the FDA gets confused between good bacteria and bad bacteria.

We need more food inspectors in this country, but we need a more independent approach to food inspection. More resources spent on mainstream producers and smarter resources spent on artisanal producers.

Artisanal producers shouldn't receive less treatment because they're artisanal. Food safety is important, but right now, what little effort is spent on that is tainted by politics and money. This approach damages the integrity of our food inspection system.

Restaurants and open carry guns are not a good mix

Would you be more likely to eat at a restaurant where you wouldn't run into someone visibly carrying a gun?

If confronted with large guns in a Chipotle, my instinct would be to get my food to go.

We've seen several chains — Chili's, Chipotle, Sonic, Jack in the Box — express concern over open carry demonstrations, most notably in Texas.

Restaurants try to not get involved in political discussions. After all, restaurants are all about customers and food. They want left-wing and right-wing people to come eat there.

We've written about Chick-Fil-A from the other side of the political spectrum. Will gun enthusiasts react similarly to chains that discourage open carry?

The good news for those chains is that they may not have to pay a high price for their actions. Those on the left are more about boycotts than those on the right. Also, the restaurants are concerned with open carry vs. concealed carry.

To be honest, I'm still learning about concealed carry since I live in the last state to switch to concealed carry (and we didn't even vote on this) and next to the 49th state to go to concealed carry.

We see the tiny signs banning guns from property, reminders that guns would otherwise be allowed in the building. Still getting used to this new world.

Police officers eat a lot in restaurants, and they are armed. Open carry but not in a way that the open carry protesters are doing. They don't bother me in the slightest. First of all, you should eat where cops eat because they know the best places to eat. But if something were to happen, then I would feel safer.

The eating environment is preached on both sides of the political spectrum. Conservatives talk about family values and eating together as a family; liberals do too but conservatives are louder on this topic. The eating environment should be about comfort, whether dining at home or in a booth in a restaurant.

For most people, seeing heavily armed private citizens while eating in a restaurant is not a comfortable environment for digestion.

Drive-thrus, when available, offer a compromise. Those carrying serious guns can keep them in the car while ordering their food.

Open carry vs. concealed carry might be splitting hairs, but in a restaurant environment, this can make a huge difference. May never get used to the idea of concealed carry, but that looks smarter compared to open carry.

We mentioning the police. They are armed and everyone knows it. But the police do so in a way that isn't, well, obnoxious.

People need to respect guns. And people respect people who respect guns. Police really respect their weapons. These open carry protesters aren't respecting their weapons.

The eating experience doesn't always have to sacred, but it should be enjoyable. And ideally gun-free.

What's Tempting: Marijuana edibles

"The caramel-chocolate flavored candy bar looked so innocent, like the Sky Bars I used to love as a child." — Maureen Dowd, columnist for The New York Times.

We certainly applaud food tourism. But if you are headed to Colorado this summer, you might want to exercise some portion control … but not for the usual reasons.

Dowd clearly had some problems with her marijuana edibles, as profiled in Tuesday's column.

The "worst" of it for Dowd is that she "lay curled up in a hallucinatory state for the next eight hours."

Dowd got advice the next day that she clearly needed before eating the candy bar: "candy bars like that are supposed to be cut into 16 pieces for novices; but that recommendation hadn’t been on the label."

Like a good journalist, Dowd threw herself into her quest to sample the marijuana edible at full force. If Dowd had followed the advice, there would be no column.

We don't know from the column how long Dowd waited once she arrived to eat the candy bar. Having been in the Canadian Rockies in 2012, higher elevations can mess with you. There's a reason why John Denver sang about "Rocky Mountain High."

Dowd might be better off exercising that right in Washington state, though that state has been really sssllooooooww in implementing legal marijuana. Soon, you will be able to get pot-infused coffee in Washington state. That product might be more Dowd's speed.

Marijuana edibles serve a significant purpose where marijuana is legal. Smoking pot has many drawbacks. Some physically can't handle smoking. The smell turns off some people. And it's more obvious that you are consuming pot when smoking it.

The marijuana edibles world is similar to how things go in the food world: a little goes a long way.

Eating 1/16 of a candy bar seems eccentric. However, a marijuana edible is not a regular candy bar. In fact, if you do it right, you might want a regular candy bar … or three once the marijuana edible has kicked into form.

Dowd pointed out a couple of extreme cases in the column. Same message for Dowd goes for everyone: a little bit goes a long way and know how much you can handle. Same goes for food, though not for the same reasons.

Marijuana edibles are not food in the traditional sense, even if they look like food. Perhaps the labels should reflect that better (a marijuana leaf on the package, perhaps) but we live in a country where front labels can be pretty deceiving.

Know what you are putting into your body: food or drug or both.

Michelle Obama fights back against GOP school lunch cuts

Watching liberals, progressives, and Dems celebrate the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act in 2010 was heartening and a little sad all at once.

Those fighting for reforms in the school lunch program had waited 36 years for a non-inflationary increase in school lunch funding. True, all they got was 6¢ per lunch, but 6¢ was more than 3+ decades of 0¢.

Sad because if the GOP got control of the House later than year in 2010 (which happened), the Republicans would fight hard to water down the tiny increases, and use soft drinks as the water.

Michelle Obama has been fighting back, which is good since she has been the target, the symbol, of trying to help kids get better food so they can learn more and better in school. Her latest salvo comes from an op-ed in The New York Times last week.

Yet some members of the House of Representatives are now threatening to roll back these new standards and lower the quality of food our kids get in school. They want to make it optional, not mandatory, for schools to serve fruits and vegetables to our kids. They also want to allow more sodium and fewer whole grains than recommended into school lunches. … Remember a few years ago when Congress declared that the sauce on a slice of pizza should count as a vegetable in school lunches? You don't have to be a nutritionist to know that this doesn't make much sense. Yet we're seeing the same thing happening again with these new efforts to lower nutrition standards in our schools.

The move by the House Appropriations Committee last week to allow more flexibility has more bark than bite. But the GOP has been successful at making small cuts to the tiny increases.

Childhood obesity levels are shrinking. Let's Move and the First Lady have played their part. And the investment over time can grow by leaps and bounds.

Mrs. Obama points out that "we spend more than $10 billion a year on school lunches and should not be spending those hard-earned taxpayer dollars on junk food for our children" and "we already spend an estimated $190 billion a year treating obesity-related conditions." A generation of school lunch program money vs. 1 year of treating obesity: that's an investment worth making.

This is about starting this movement with children but spreading the word to adults.

This is a story of two races … no, not those kind. For most Republicans and conservative Dems, feeding school children is a race to the bottom. What Mrs. Obama is fighting for isn't even a race to the top, but to average. And we are nowhere close to the average.

The government does not want to tell you and your children what to eat. If we had a $1 for every time someone said that the government does, we can make a difference in the school lunch program.

We aren't even arguing about how well to feed our kids. Those on the other side don't want to feed them, and somehow if we have to do so, to then spend as little money as humanly possible. In a land of cheap crappy food, this is so easy to accomplish.

Michelle Obama is asking us as a society to reassess this attitude. Parents should be protesting the GOP attempts to cut back on healthier eating in school lunchrooms, but they are too busy raising their kids. Those that have a stake in the status quo don't have to protest. They quietly go into Congress and lobby.

Mrs. Obama, you have a good fight still to come. Thanks for being in the ring for those who don't have time and energy to fight.