Cooking

January 21, 2015January 21, 2015

Chefs help conserve peanut butter and jelly sandwiches

I believe we have Nibbled both of these articles, but I think they could stand another few minutes in the limelight. One describes how self-described “farmer-scientist” Dr Brian Ward of Clemson University — with a little help from his friends — is bringing back from near extinction a peanut variety called Carolina Africa Runner:

Luckily, in the 1940s North Carolina State University collected samples of a variety of peanuts during a breeding program, and the Carolina’s germplasm was preserved.

The second article is about maverick Washington State University breeder Dr Stephen Jones’s attempts to come up with better tasting bread.

Several years ago, he started a project called the Bread Lab, a Washington State program that approaches grain breeding with a focus on the eventual culinary end goal. The idea came about because Jones says he was tired of the USDA and Big Ag dictating the traits that he needed to breed for. “They would tell us [a certain wheat variety] doesn’t make a good loaf of bread. Well, what they meant was an industrial, high-speed, mixing, full of junk, white — just lily-white — bread,” Jones says. “And we didn’t want that opinion, so we had nowhere to go.”

~~What~~One of the several things the stories have in common is the involvement of chefs. Now, there must also be one out there interested in heirloom fruits. Then we could bring them all together…

January 21, 2015January 21, 2015

Nibbles: CGRFA, Kew crop job, CC and PGRFA, MAGIC, SDGs, Bushmeat, Biofortification, Protecting trees, Wild coffee, Money honey, Nutmeg story, Colonial cooking, Armenian food

The Platform for Agrobiodiversity Research breaks down this week’s Fifteenth Regular Session of the Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture for ya.
Kew looking for a crop person! I wonder if the successful candidate is in Rome today.
Mauricio Bellon on why smallholder farmers need crop diversity to adapt to climate change. He’s in Rome.
Multi-Parent Advanced Generation Inter Cross (MAGIC) deconstructed. Compare and contrast with above.
The SDGs in one cool interactive infographic. But where’s nutrition?
Where is overhunting for bushmeat occurring? Gotta get your nutrition where you can…
Want to invest in a biofortified crop like iron beans? Here’s how to work out where you should do it. Interesting to cross-reference with that bushmeat thing above?
Ancient Greek tree preservation order.
Ethiopian forest dwellers protect wild coffee. No preservation orders needed.
Tracking honey. Follow the money.
Could say the same about nutmeg.
Meat stew with garden eggs. Sounds yummie. Not much used in Kenya these days any more, alas.
Delving into Armenian Ottoman foods. Because we can. No sign of garden eggs.

January 20, 2015January 19, 2015

Nibbles: South Sudan livestock, Zanzibar spices, Sustainable fisheries, Wheat heat, Cape Town gardens, Saving chocolate, Camel cheese, Khaaaaaaan!

South Sudan crisis affecting its livestock too.
Sugar, spice, and everything nice in Zanzibar.
The secret to sustainable fisheries: recycling waste.
Wheat going to be hit by heat.
The history of growing food in Cape Town.
More from the University of Reading’s cacao quarantine facility. With video goodness.
You can get Austrian camel cheese at the Jaipur Literary Festival.
Khan Academy does biodiversity.

January 16, 2015January 16, 2015

Nibbles: Sake worries, Idaho apples, Local cuisine, SP leaves, Baobab superfood, CWR training, Physic gardens, Forest questions

As if Japan doesn’t have enough to worry about, its sake is in trouble.
Update on that Idaho Heritage Tree Project.
Why local cuisine is best. Who needs fusion, eh?
Sweet potato leaves are good, and good for you. But you can’t eat them if they’re not part of your local cuisine.
Same goes for baobab.
New Samara has report on crop wild relatives training in Uganda.
A medicinal plant garden in Philadelphia.
How can we improve agriculture to reduce the pressure in forested areas? One of the top 20 questions for forestry and landscapes, apparently.

January 15, 2015January 15, 2015

Nibbles: Tibetan tea, Fancy maps, Fermented foods, ICIPE bioinformatics, Bull Story, Bee comeback, Men are from Mars, Hot crops

What I really need today is some Tibetan amdo milk tea. Very parky out.
Failing that, these cartograms will keep me warm.
This list of supposedly amazing agriculture maps is only meh, though. Needed more cartograms.
Oh wait, there are other fermented options out there.
ICIPE gets into Big Data.
Toystory has some big data of his own. Worrying perhaps to think what he’s done to the diversity of the breed, but let’s not be churlish about his achievement. At least he wasn’t a Nazi.
UK welcomes back some bees.
There was a big UC Davis–Mars Symposium yesterday on “An exploration of scientific discovery, innovation and collaboration in food, agriculture and health.” Some of it was on Twitter.
Roundup of crop wild relatives etc. research at US Davis.