- Making French cheese in the Himalayas.
- The latest on how to build your perfect dog.
- “The scientists are putting the all the trees which must be saved into a data bank.” Clever scientists.
- Polyploidization so, so much more than merely the sum of genomes.
- “The expected direct reduction in total agricultural production in the absence of animal pollination ranged from 3 to 8%…” Thank goodness for Operation Pollinator, eh?
Nibbles: Dahlias, Perennials
- Dahlias: good to look at, good to eat.
- Why agriculture bypassed herbaceous perennials, until now.
A menu of political diversity
“Traditional” usually means indigestible or overcooked. “Organic” means it costs more.
I’m not going to fall into the trap of taking satire seriously enough to correct misapprehensions. ((Actually, I am; indigestible is a good thing, if by that you mean a lower glycemic index, which confers all manner of health benefits. And organic needn’t cost more, especially if externalities are properly internalised.)) But that’s a tiny snippet from a very entertaining piece on The Economist’s Europe View. It explains menu items such as Cutlet Carpathian Style ((You’re halfway through eating it when the Ukrainians take it away and say the rest belongs to them.)) and other gems. What I want to know is, could we do the same for traditional, neglected and underutilised species?
Around the world in a grain of rice
A great image of agrobiodiversity from Italian Grazia magazine, with thanks to Linda for cutting it out and saving it for me. It’s not online, so this is a scan. Click on the image to enlarge it. The spoonfuls are, from the top:
1. arboreo rice for risotto
2. long-grain basmati rice
3. mixture of rice, oats and Khorasan wheat
4. Sisa rice for sushi
5. black Venere rice
6. long-grain red rice
7. basmati again
8. mixture of unmilled rices
Nibbles: Poisonous cassava, Methane, Beer
- Tragic. But was cassava really to blame?
- Breeding the wind out of cows.
- “I just got back from Italy, where there are now 250 breweries. A few years ago, there were only 20 or 30. They’re on the verge of an explosion of beer culture…” Really? I do hope so.