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Posts Tagged ‘food writing

Appreciating the Fact That Good Food is a Luxury

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“Making food makes you happy?”

I was on a walk with two friends and we had somehow arrived on the subject of food- a frequent occurrence in my everyday life. She was a bit surprised that food in general was on my list of things that made me feel good.

“Well, yeah.”

I thought about it for a second. “It’s a way to de-stress… if I have too much going on I feel good being in the kitchen and making something. It’s like a meditation.”

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Should We Care About Organic Food?

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“I now feel completely vindicated for NOT buying organic foods.”

Well, great.

The internet was abuzz with the recent study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine that found little evidence that organic foods are more nutritious than conventional grown food, and I found myself getting severely agitated by comments like the above posted in social media circles. Granted, I spend a lot of time thinking about food, but simple statements like the aforementioned prove to me that we are entirely removed from the food process and what we are eating. We are oversimplifying a complex issue.

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Written by Anna Brones

September 11, 2012 at 08:18

Would You Like a Scoop of Geoduck Ice Cream?

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Salted caramel ice cream. Orange coriander ice cream. Sweet summer corn buttermilk sherbert.

The whole put-anything-you-can-find-and-see-if-it-works-in-ice-cream-trend is tasty at times, edgy at best, but has become so ubiquitous that off-color flavors rarely merit a reaction.

That was until I saw the geoduck ice cream sign.

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Written by Anna Brones

September 8, 2012 at 12:57

25 Things You Wish You Had Overheard a Foodie Saying

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“All I had to bring was this jar of homemade pickled carrots.”

“Oh the popcorn? Yeah, it’s the truffle oil that does it.”

“It was Sunday. So I got the pan-fried trout.”

These are all direct quotes that I overhead, or caught myself saying, in the last week. If you spend any time around food lovers, or are simply food obsessed yourself, and you will pick up on some humorous things. Absurd even. If fermentinfuse or are co-op are part of your vocabulary, you know what I am talking about. But don’t you just wish that the foodie world would take it to the next level? Here’s what you wish you had overheard.

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Written by Anna Brones

August 18, 2012 at 12:46

The Complete Guide to Traveling Like a Foodie

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“You can’t eat yet.”

My tablemates were ready to dig into their meal when my best friend and travel partner Rachel alerted everyone that they had to wait for a few.

“Just one second,” I said, while whipping my phone out to snap a quick photo.

“She does this a lot, you just have to get over it,” my friend said matter of factly, with a slight eye roll.

It occurred to me then and there that most people don’t take a photo of everything they eat. Let’s not go overboard here: I don’t photo document every single thing that ever crosses a plate in front of me. I do however like to have inspiration for other meals, and when it comes to travel it’s all about keeping a visual diary of all the new foods that were experienced. Again, normal for some, not so normal for others.

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Written by Anna Brones

July 30, 2012 at 14:51

Budapest, the City of Coffee, Fröccs and Paprikash

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“Normally they have rooster testicles, but I think they’re out of them today.”

Right.

We were staring at the wide array of meats behind the glass, busily snapping photos of everything from beef lungs to goose liver, knowing perfectly well that meat photos aren’t necessarily the most appetizing of food porn. With several floors of fresh produce and more meat than you can handle, the Great Market Hall, the largest indoor market in Budapest, has plenty of it, and Carolyn Banfalvi, owner of Taste Hungary, a Budapest-based company that offers food, wine and market tours, was taking us on a quick run through to make sure we knew all about fried fat and the importance of duck meat.

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Written by Anna Brones

July 24, 2012 at 10:22

What Food Are You Traveling With?

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Five minutes before I needed to be out the door I was running around like a madwoman. Leaving is always like this, even if it’s just for a short trip. Trash taken out? Check. Wallet? Check. Computer? Check. Computer charger? Check. Anything else? Shit. The hazelnuts and raspberries. Grab bulk bag of hazelnuts from freezer, not taking time to measure out how many I actually needed, and pulling the glass jar of raspberries from the fridge and stuffing it in right next to my computer case.

Completely normal.

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Written by Anna Brones

July 11, 2012 at 07:15

Plate & Pitchfork: Changing Perspectives on Food with Local Farm Dinners

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Originally published here.

An organic dinner of farm raised ingredients. A table full of jovial guests and local wine. A summer night to appreciate good food and where it comes from. There’s a lot of talk about farm-to-table, and most of us living in high paced atmospheres have a tendency to romanticize pastoral images of happy cows and organic tomato plants. “If only I could be a farmer,” we think, forgetting the hardships that go into devoting a life to agricultural production. But part of having a better appreciation for what we eat, means having a better connection to where it comes from, and at the simplest level, that means eating there.

That’s the idea behind Plate & Pitchfork, an Oregon based business that helps people have a better of understanding of food and where it comes from, by serving it to them in the same place that it’s sourced. Hosting farm dinners, Plate & Pitchfork founder Erika Polmar puts consumers and purveyors together, in the ultimate farm-to-table experience.

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The Ultimate Food Guide To Summer: 100 Things to Do With Your Vacation

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Even if you’re not on an academic schedule, the longer days of the season mean that you have way more time on your hands than usual. Which indicates that it’s high time to stop drooling over blogs about backyard homesteading and actually do something. Welcome to the official Foodie Underground Guide to Summer, with a list of everything you ever wanted to do when it comes to food, and a few things you never thought of.

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Written by Anna Brones

July 7, 2012 at 08:00

Are You Part of a Food Trend or Part of a Movement?

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This is the latest installment of my Foodie Underground column.

“I just had a Portland moment and only you will appreciate,” my friend said, calling from Tuscon in the middle of a Sunday.

“Ok, what?”

“Well, so we walked into this cute coffee shop and the first thing I thought to myself ‘I wonder where they roast their beans?'” she paused. “Who am I?”

At first thought I saw nothing wrong with this situation. Good coffee shops tend to sell good coffee, and if they’re really good, they’re probably running a coffee roasting operation in the back. Nothing weird there.

But at second thought, I realized what she meant. Most people, even those in coffee-centric cities, are probably more concerned with what coffee drink they’re going to buy than where the beans were roasted. We’re in the minority.

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Written by Anna Brones

June 12, 2012 at 06:49