The great How Stuff Works website has a whole series of videos on how to make chocolate. If only the World Cacao Federation had got in touch with them!
Nibbles: Grazing, Blog
- Sheep grazing on natural grassland taste better and are better for the envioronment.
- Student goes around world looking for seeds. How’s it going, Adam?
Nibbles: Bees, Bourbon, Cattle, Ug99, Horses, Neanderthal, Bear, Organic, Flowers
- Bees? We don’t need no stinkin’ bees.
- “…a distinct product of America…”
- Friesians? We don’t need no stinkin’ Friesians.
- Kenya tests for Ug99 resistance.
- Iceland’s horses walk funny.
- Neanderthals ate snails.
- Bear meat? We don’t need no stinkin’ bear meat.
- Organic agriculture in China gets NPR treatment, survives.
- Rice? We don’t need no stinkin’ rice.
The rain in Spain…doesn’t predict olive production
Came across two interesting snippets on olives this morning, both from Spain, both involving indicators, of production and ecosystem health respectively. In one study, year-to-year fluctuations in the olive harvest were found to be best explained by differences in the annual pollen index and the maximum temperature in March. Ok, but how sustainable is production in any given orchard? Well, for that you have to look at the number of ladybugs, apparently.
Nibbles: Health, Fungi, Health, Pollan, Organic
- Nobellist praises biodiversity, ignores food.
- TED video on world-saving mushrooms.
- God: “Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yieleling seed; to you, it shall be for meat.“
- Pollan: “Vote with your fork, for a different kind of food. Go to the farmer’s market. Get out of the supermarket… Plant a garden… Declare your independence from the culture of fast food.”
- Rodale Institute: “Yield data just by itself makes the case for a focused and persistent move to organic farming systems.”