Nibbles

Nibbles: Spinifex industry, Tsiperifery pepper, Pacific taro, Coffee double, Guadeloupe genebanks, Cucumber history, Gourmet maize, Peruvian cuisine, Heirloom rice

Spinifex fibres for ultra-thin condoms, with indigenous approval.
Piper borbonense getting its 15 minutes.
Cook Islands shares taros with Samoa. Fingers crossed they’re TLB resistant.
A couple of videos you may only be able to get on Facebook, or at least I can’t find other sources: Ethiopian coffee ceremony, and INRA/CIRAD’s banana and yam collections in Guadeloupe.
Speaking of coffee, drink it while you can. And yes, it’s China’s fault.
The cucumber in England through the ages.
Gourmet maize in Oaxaca right now.
All kinds of gourmet food in Peru right now too.
Ok, ok, a Filipina chef on gourmet heirloom rice too.

“By fitting gold wires to the back of individual whitefly and measuring the electro-chemical signals as they fed on the plant sap, the team found the insects spent more time ‘roaming’ and less time feeding on the wild varieties than those which settled on the commercial plants.”
New Iraqi plants includes onion wild relative.
Early farmers couldn’t stop fiddling with the bones of their dead.
“That message has come through clearly. Flavor is a priority because if people don’t want to eat carrots, they’re not going to buy them.”

Species flying poleward.
FAO unveils pulse infographic. No word on whether any are harvestable by machine.
Potato farmer adds value the old-fashioned way.
Talking of old, here’s a really old horse.
And the oldest evidence of fermentation for food preservation. But you’ll need a strong stomach.
KitKat is certified crap.
How (and Why) Farmers Maintain Crop Diversity: The Book. Some reviews.
And here’s a specific example from India.
And here, courtesy of Bioversity’s Ann Tutwiler, is why farmers need some help sometimes.
Oh and here’s another one. People visit ICRISAT genebank in Niger, see stuff they like.

The latest meta-analysis of organic agriculture says it can feed the world.
The latest update on saving the wild ginseng adds pretty much nothing to previous updates.
The latest look at Aboriginal land burning says it did no damage.
The latest study of insects as feed says they’re good for you. Still no word on whether they’re good.
Not sure whether I’ve ever seen a study linking biotech corn for biofuels with the abandonment of rotation, but it makes sense. And more.
The latest investigation of early childhood nutrition still says it’s important.
The latest Italian food scam involves painting olives.
The latest pean to crop wild relatives says it’s still about control, man.
The latest report on dams again says you have to be careful.

No, I don’t think the history of potatoes is at an end, but I know what they mean.
The history of rubber in pics.
The history of the wheat dwarfing gene.
Svalbard makes history.
Sicily goes back into its history for its daily bread.
Another foothold in history for Gary Nabhan.
History, shmistory, we need to look forward. Biohacking is the future of food. Say twelve year olds.