nosh nook #31 - monday, april 27, 2009

grade schoolers sample 'snack squad' treats (link)
04.26.09 - the williamston enterprise - by brad ritter

theme song (sung to the tune of ghostbusters)...when you've got the munchies...and you need a fix...who you gonna call? the snack squad! when you need a muffin...well don't get pissed...you should just call...the snack squad! actually, the snack squad is made up of fourth & fifth graders from a school in the lansing, michigan area, so there's likely little that they can do for you & you probably shouldn't be calling them...but they could teach you a thing or two about healthy snacks!

according to brad ritter, months back, 130 students from explorer and discovery elementary schools (in williamston, a town of 4K just outside of lansing) decided to form a "snack squad" & learn a thing or two about healthy eating. ritter spoke with spoke with 4th-grade teacher steve forrest, who said that "...the students were asked if they wanted to do a music presentation or the snack squad. they met 10 weeks and learned about cooking, nutrition and fitness."  once again, food trumps music.

every week, the students got to serve the snacks--a sampling of things like fruit cups, homemade salsa & the aforementioned muffins--to fellow classmates.  in addition, the kids made a healthy cookbook, so if you're attending the may 14th ice cream social, make sure to pick up a copy.  according to the april 09 explorer informer, all proceeds will go to the make-a-wish foundation & the school's "fit for life" program, so you can be sure that by buying one of the cookbooks, you're not supporting gun runners in sudan.  that's spending (and snacking) with a conscience.

nosh nook #30 - friday, april 24, 2009

day of pigs (link)
04.23.09 - examiner.com - by liza zimmerman

hot dogs are sweet. tiny hot dogs are even sweeter. wrap them up in a puff pastry & you've got "the bomb." if you feel like i do, you're in luck, because today is national pigs in a blanket day. i would have had no idea were it not for the heads up from lisa zimmerman, who got the heads up from her editors & then decided to reminisce about her personal pig in a blanket dealings...cute headline, ms. lisa.

as a kid, they were her favorite thing about dinner parties. as an adult, she once worked for "a high-brow publishing house in new york, where the publisher's favorite food was pigs in blankets." nuff said there. pigs in a blanket are obviously adored by both young & old.

i have to be honest though. her recommendations for drink pairings--a number of different red wines--strike me as odd. i know that the pig in a blanket is most famously a snack for cocktail parties, where folks are often drinking wine, but essentially she's saying "this wine goes great with a hot dog." there's just something about the mixture of typical low-brow (hot dog) with typical high-brow (wine) that cracks me up...although i suppose that once you've miniaturized that hot dog & wrapped it in a puff pastry instead of a bun, you've, at some point, crossed the border into high brow.  it just seems weird is all.  day of pigs!

nosh nook #29 - thursday, april 23, 2009

cambodian spiders under threat (link)
04.22.09 - voice of america - by rory byrne

it turns out that i've lived a sheltered life. here i am, months away from the midpoint of my thirties & i still haven't tried spider. it doesn't end there. i've never tried truffles or waterboarding or snake meat either, meaning that i still have a full life to live, things to do, arachnids to taste...miles of spider-filled tastiness to go before i sleep.

as rory byrne reports, in cambodia, giant spiders are all the rage as snacks. back in the 70s, a time when pol pot & the khmer rouge were running around screwing up the country by killing millions of citizens & forcing millions to flee, giant spiders (along with geckos & scorpions) became a source of food for refugees. currently, people looking to munch on some garlic & herb giant spider travel to the town of skun, where "every day thousands are sold in the town's big spider market" for around 50¢.

byrne spoke with locals to gauge the current market for giant spiders. while a local spider catcher sang the praises of spider meat & a local farmer spoke of the health benefits of spider wine, a local seller noted that farmers have been destroying spider nests. this, in combination with overhunting, threatens the giant spider's existence.  unless something changes, future cambodians may never get to experience the pleasure of a tasty giant spider. we humans are experts at doing that. we take the tastiest of god's creatures & do our best to try to eat them until they're threatened with extinction...delicious, delicious extinction.

nosh nook #28 - wednesday, april 22, 2009

fast food police: caribbean takeaway closed down for opening too close to schools (link)
04.21.09 - the daily mail - by dan newling

a proposal to separate fast food and schools (link)
04.21.09 - the ny times - by cara buckley

europeans are always way ahead of us in everything--fashion, the arts, abolishing slavery, etc. once again, they've beat us to the punch, this time in the u.k., in waltham forest, a borough in east london, where they've passed britain's first law that prohibits takeaways from selling fast food near schools. yesterday, the police moved in & shut down their first shop.

according to dan newling, "bamboo joint," a caribbean takeaway that opened just six weeks ago, was ordered by police to close the place down within three days.  the owner says that her place sells food that's "not even unhealthy. (they) sell jamaican-style rice and peas, and jerk chicken" and the "street is full of takeaways selling fish and chips and burgers," so she's not sure why she was targeted...because the local government's playing nanny...that's why.  sorry bout your livelihood, ma'am.

not to be outdone by our british counterparts, queens councilman eric gioia came up with a plan & this weekend, he put forth a proposal that would prohibit new fast-food restaurants from opening within a tenth of a mile from a school. sound familiar? who knows if gioia is even aware of the recently passed east london law?  either way, it's very coincidental.

as cara buckley reports, one thing he is aware of is a recently released study, "the effect of fast food restaurants on obesity," which linked students' obesity to the proximity of fast food joints to their schools. as such, he's proposing his ban along with "other tactics to fight childhood obesity, like easing access to food stamps, putting greenmarkets in poor neighborhoods and educating children about healthy eating." at least there's that last part in there about educating kids, because last i checked, we live in the u.s.a. & people should be able to open restaurants if they want to. ultimately, the root of the problem is not the existence of the fast-food restaurant. it's the consumer's lack of healthy eating habits & self-restraint. the nanny state stuff is for the birds.

nosh nook #27 - tuesday, april 21, 2009

woman's snacks gain popularity (link)
04.19.09 - cincinnati enquirer - by ryan clark

people find inspiration everywhere--from celebrities, from their religion, from excessive post-pet death depression baking. marilyn baker's dog died five years ago & she found the inspiration to bake her own pretzels, a snack that she named "zels." five years later, last tuesday, her zels ended up on rachael ray as the "snack of the day." my rachael ray knowledge is relatively limited, so i had no idea such an item existed until now, but based on her indie rock tastes & the fact that her face is on boxes of wheat thins, i'm going to assume that being named that is a good thing.

as ryan clark reports, marilyn, a covington, kentucky area woman, has seen an increasing amount of success spring forth from her initial grief. at first, she sold her zels at the gift shop at the medical facility she works at. these days, she has her own place in covington--the yankee doodle deli--and the pretzels are now sold in over 120 locations...& now there's the rachael ray thing.

zels actually sound pretty tasty & since they're pretzels, they're esentially good for you. there's a spicy flavor, a honey flavor & a cinnamon flavor. the yankee doodle deli even has treats for your dog, whole wheat snacks called "karma's kookies." if there's one thing i know about dogs, it's that they love whole wheat & if you buy some of these for your dog, a portion of the proceeds will go towards a dog park that he or she will likely never see.  luckily, he or she will never know the difference either way.