So yesterday, an ugly Ice Storm hit my town and our power went off. This was not the first time, but I hope it will be the last. The last that our publishing schedule will be disrupted. In the end, power was restored yesterday afternoon…
We have ordered a new, state of the art automatic backup generator big enough to keep our office, studio and research operation going if the city power goes off again. I should, I suppose, say ‘when’, not ‘if’. But after the last ice storm – a few months back, last fall – we’ve been on a waiting list for that genny because there was a stampede among small businesses and home owners to get one installed before the next major disruption. there’s still a major backlog. *SIGH*
Nevertheless…
I had a chance to clean up my desk a bit while cut off from the outside world and found the following points to address…
Italy to outlaw lab-cultured meat
You might think they’ve gone a bit barmy in the Old Boot lately. First, applying for UN heritage designation as a world treasure for their entire culinary culture. Compare that with France, which recently won heritage protection for its ages-old, beloved Baguette. Some said that couldn’t be done. And that’s just a loaf of bread…
Anyway, days after that story finally dropped of the food news cycle, Italy was back, with a new attempt to get lab-cultured meat banned, at least withing its own borders.
A new parliamentary measure would ban lab-grown products in both human and animal foods. The bill’s supporters say it’s needed to, “keep their agri-food heritage alive and strong.” Any company caught cheating on the new law would face fines of up to (US)$65,000 per count.
Pushback is strong
Head of policy at the Good Food Institute Europe, Alice Ravenscroft, says, “The passing of such a law would shut down the economic potential of this nascent field in Italy, holding back scientific progress and climate mitigation efforts. [The bill is] an ideological, anti-scientific crusade against progress. […] People must be able to make an informed choice.”
According to Anti-vivisection group LAV, the bill is, “an ideological, anti-scientific crusade against progress.” LAV considers lab-grown meat a good alternative to the traditional farm-raising and slaughtering industry.
Did Michelangelo use egg yolks in his paintings?
Of course he did. So did all the other pro painters of the Renaissance.
The practice started with murals (like Michangelo’s own Last Supper) and continues through to smaller paintings. It goes back to the practice of artists of the era making their own paints using their own formulae and pigments.
So why was one food blogger whose work I regularly read so surprised to learn that?
Turns out that a recent study found egg yolks in the oil-based paints artists of the time made and used, too.
Linseed oil plus egg yolk = magic?
Study author Ophélie Ranquet of the Institute of Mechanical Process Engineering and Mechanics at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany told CNNN: “There are very few written sources about this and no scientific work has been done before to investigate the subject in such depth. Our results show that even with a very small amount of egg yolk, you can achieve an amazing change of properties in oil paint, demonstrating how it might have been beneficial for the artists.”
“The addition of egg yolk is beneficial because it can tune the properties of these paints in a drastic way,” Ranquet said, “For example by showing aging differently: It takes a longer time for the paint to oxidize, because of the antioxidants contained in the yolk.”
What I want to know is, what did Michelangelo and his fellow geniuses of the brush and pallet do with all the orphaned egg whites their work must have produced? Probably committed a flagrant waste of perfectly good food. Albeit hundreds of years before folks worried about waste…
KIVA and Fatburger deploy weed-infused Ketchup
I’ve railed over this before and I won’t miss this opportunity to do so again.
Remember those posts I make a couple of times a year abut new cannabis-infused edibles that might confuse kids and cause overdoses? KIVA is back at it again, colabbing with Fatburger to create and dispense weed-infused Ketchup packets for distribution at Farburger locations in jurisdictions where the edibles are legal.
The stuff looks just like other plastic ketchup pouches. You have to read the label. And that’s where the problem arises. Kids may just see the familiar-looking squeezy and grab it without reading it it all. Younger kids might not be able to read yet, at all. Each pouch contains 10 mg of THC (the active ingredient in cannabis) – twice the recommended dose recommended by other makers and users.
If you really think you need it, the condiment is available at participating Artist Tree and Sweet Flower Los Angeles locations for only $5. per pouch.
When will people ever learn?
~ Maggie J.