It's a Gassy Topic ...

... But someone has to talk about it.

It's everywhere:
Eat more fruits and vegetables ... whole grains ... beans!

Have you tried? Lots of people eventually forego this advice, not because it can't be translated into the delicious, but because it gets transformed into the vaporous. Cabbage and onions, multi-grain bread, three bean chili, split-pea soup, the list of potential gas-producing foods is formidable. And gas in the bowels, apart from being poorly recognized socially ...

Responses by participants of a 2003 study on their behavior when passing gas in public:

• 59 percent left the room
  
• 24 percent denied it was them
  
• 22 percent coughed
  
• 10 percent blamed someone else or a pet

... can be downright uncomfortable. Certain sugars and starches (oligosaccharides) in these foods (See Beano's Gassy Food List.) are difficult for humans to digest, especially humans who've spent years chewing white bread instead of gnawing on stems and husks. Until your body develops a tolerance to these carbohydrates (and it will, to some degree, if you keep eating them) you can swallow some harmless enzymes along with these foods to help break them apart and assist in their digestion ... before they hit the bowel and your resident bacteria have a gas-producing feast.

Beano* contains an enzyme (alpha-galactosidase) that helps digest these foods. People have variable success with it, but that's probably related to taking too little, taking it too long before or after eating the offending food, or taking it to ease the discomfort of lactose intolerance. (Beano doesn't work on milk sugars, for that you want Lactaid.) Of course, there are lots of medical conditions, e.g. irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), that lead to the gas and bloating typical of poorly digested beans. Beano won't help there either.

The science supports it, so if your pocketbook can support it, it's worth a shot. It may even land you a little action:

“Beano saved my marriage. My wife now lets me sleep in her bed again.”
- Mr. L. Szabo, California

* The Fanatic does not necessarily endorse or favor the use of Beano compared to other alpha-galactosidase containing supplements. It appears here because it is a widely available, affordable, commercial product representative of the type useful for malodorous vapors.

Run, Chicken, Run

© 2000 DreamWorks L.L.C., Aardman Chicken Run Limited and Pathé Image. All rights reserved.

Fluish? Have some hot chicken soup.

It hydrates.
It provides nutrients.
It's better that just hot water at making mucus run.¹
It improves effectiveness of your immune system (beyond the benefits of mere vegetable broth).²
It feels good.
It will make whoever prepared the soup for you (you lucky dog) feel good.

But whatever you do, don't halt the therapy prematurely!:

"A case is reported in which a previously healthy individual, having received an inadequate course of chicken soup in treatment of mild pneumococcal pneumonia, experienced a severe relapse, refractory to all medical treatment and eventually requiring thoracotomy. The pharmacology of chicken soup is reviewed and the dangers of abrupt termination of therapy are stressed."³

~~~~~~
¹ Saketkhoo K, Januszkiewicz A, Sackner MA. Effects of drinking hot water, cold water, and chicken soup on nasal mucus velocity and nasal airflow resistance. Chest: 1978, 74; 408-410.

² Rennard BO, Ertl RF, Gossman GL,Robbins RA, Rennard SI. Chicken Soup Inhibits Neutrophil Chemotaxis, in vitro. Chest: 2000, 118; 1150-1157.

³ Caroline NL, Schwartz H. Chicken soup rebound and relapse of pneumonia: report of a case. Chest: 1975, 67; 215-216.

Nutrition ... Facts?

From the label above, can you tell how much vitamin C is in a 1 cup serving of Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice Cocktail?

100%, right? 100% of what? How much is that? Say you're an adult male who smokes. Say some pedantic nutritionist tells you it's a good idea to be getting at least 125 mg/day vitamin C.¹ Are you satisfying your needs with 1 cup of Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice Cocktail?

Below is a label for Stonyfield Farm yogurt:



From this label, can you tell how much calcium is in this 6 oz. container?

30%, right? Argh! How much is that? Something about this stinks of contempt for the intelligence of the average person. Vitamin bottles list amounts, why can't food packages? Maybe they thought the average person would assume 3 servings of this yogurt, or any other food whose label advertises 30% calcium, would just about satisfy daily calcium needs, whether for a teenager, a postmenopausal woman, or a Starbuck's addicted computer programmer. (Of course, without actual amounts, the only thing a person could do is assume.)

I can understand the FDA's desire to simplify and standardize these labels. And, let it not go without saying that I'm Really Happy to have a label at all. But I miss the days when labels listed vitamins and minerals in amounts, not percentages. What if I was one of those fanatics who liked to get 500 mg/day vitamin C if I felt a cold coming on? How many glasses of Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice Cocktail would I need to consume?

Ok, enough of my silly suspense ...

That cup of cranberry juice has 60 mg of vitamin C. (Nowhere does it say that.) The fanatic who wants to get 500 mg would need to drink 8.3 cups, not 1, to get what she fashions as her needs, her 100%. The non-fanatical smoker would need to drink at least 2 cups, not 1, to get his 100%.

And that container of yogurt has 300 mg of calcium. (Nowhere does it say that.) A teenager should be getting at least 1300 mg/day, and older women should shoot for 1200-1500 mg/day. So that container only supplies 23%, not 30%, of the teenager's needs, and even less of the woman's needs.

That's why I miss when labels used to carry amounts.

(If you're interested in knowing the figures that label percentages are based on, go to Appendix A of the FDA's Food Labeling Guide. It lists the "Daily Values" that manufacturers use as a standard. Unfortunately, these values don't reflect the range of variation in recommended intake based on gender, age, lifestyle, fanaticism, etc.)
~~~~~~
¹ The Institute of Medicine, the people who develop RDAs and DRIs, confide that the DRI for vitamin C for an adult male (90 mg) is inadequate if that male smokes: "Because smokers suffer increased oxidative stress and metabolic turnover of vitamin C, their recommended intake is increased by 35 mg/day."

Disinfect Me, Please

If you click the little bull's eye above it will take you to Microsoft's new (beta), and free (for now) AntiSpyware download page.

Sheesh, the fanatic's pc had more spies than the Kremlin during the cold war.

Have Some Peanuts With That Tea

When you think of antioxidants, what foods come to mind?

Green tea? ... Check.
Blueberries and Strawberries? ... Check.
Red Wine? ... Check.

Roasted peanuts? ... No?

Yes!

"When it comes to antioxidant content, peanuts are right up there with strawberries.", says Steve Talcott, professor and lead author of a study appearing in the journal Food Chemistry that documented peanuts' potent free-radical scavenging property.¹

If you've been reading this blog, you'll recall that antioxidants benefit us by sacrificing themselves for oxidation, saving our cells from free-radical damage. (See "They're rancid".)

Although peanuts contain moderate amounts of the antioxidant vitamin E, the recent discovery in antioxidant power from these tasty little nuts (actually seeds from a legume or pea plant) is due to their polyphenolic content. And that polyphenolic content is increased, up to 22%, by roasting. In fact, these researchers found that roasted peanuts were richer in polyphenols than carrots, apples, or beets!

Another group of researchers found that a tea made from peanut skins had greater antioxidant activity than green tea.² So take your peanuts roasted, with skin on. Be mindful of calories though:

One oz. (about 3 tablespoons) Spanish peanuts contains:


~~~~~~
¹ Talcott ST, Passeretti S, Duncan CE, Gorbet DW. Polyphenolic content and sensory properties of normal and high oleic acid peanuts. Food Chemistry. 2004; 90(3): 379-388.

² Yu J, Ahmedna M, Goktepe I. Effects of processing methods and extraction solvents on concentration and antioxidant activity of peanut skin phenolics. Food Chemistry. 2004; 90(1-2): 199-206.

Keep the Java, Bag the Little Fishies

People with gout (a painful form of arthritis in which uric acid crystals form in the joints) are often advised to limit their consumption of, among other things, caffeine-containing beverages.

Why?

Well, note the similar 2-ring formations in the objects below:


Now, if I told you that gout was a result of having lots of uric acid in your blood, and if I told you that uric acid is a product of the breakdown of something called purine, you might guess that caffeine could be a problem since it is so structurally similar to purine. In fact, some literature states that caffeine breaks down into uric acid in the body too.

I can understand the initial logic behind attempting to reduce the level of uric acid in the blood by reducing the amount of uric-acid-producing foods, in this case caffeine. I just can't find good evidence to support that logic. What I can find evidence for is:

1. Most (85-90%) of the uric acid in our blood comes not from the purines we eat, but from the purines that are manufactured or already reside in our body.


2. Even among foods we eat, caffeine-containing beverages are relatively low in purine, compared to, say, organ meats (intestine, kidney, heart, brains) and little fishies (anchovies, herring, sardines).


3. Caffeine acts as a diuretic, encouraging loss of uric acid through urine. (I read that caffeine "impairs kidney function which is needed to get uric acid out of the body", yet no mechanism was described. I tend to place statements like that, along with others, e.g. "It cleanses the body.", under the heading of Bogus, until I'm convinced otherwise.)


4. Caffeine may interfere with uric acid tests, producing inaccurately high serum levels.

There's even a Japanese study from 1999 that found coffee-drinking actually reduced uric acid concentrations.¹ And the American Academy of Family Physicians lists coffee under the "No Limitation" column on a table of foods to avoid following a gout attack.

So why are we limiting these undeniably enjoyable, uplifting, and certainly in the case of tea, antioxidant-rich beverages to people who endure an intimate relationship with their pain thresholds?

I'm not sure why this advice is perpetuated. If there was anything I'd steer a gout patient away from, it would be beer.

~~~~~~
¹Kiyohara C, et al., Inverse association between coffee drinking and serum uric acid concentrations in middle-aged Japanese males. British Journal of Nutrition, 1999, 82(2), p. 125-130.

Gomasio (Sesame Salt)

I was introduced to gomasio about the time I was introduced to Macrobiotics - a Japanese philosophy that, among its many food-related principles, extols the virtues of sesame salt, not least for what it claims are its natural healing properties. Well, the Macrobiotics didn't stick (although there are some good basic tenets there), but the gomasio sure did.

Gomasio is one flavor powerhouse. Used as a replacement for salt on whole grains (it's very good on rice), soups, stews, and vegetables, it's a delicious way to reduce sodium while adding a little calcium, magnesium, iron, protein, and fiber.

Note: The photo above is a juxtaposition of my raw, unhulled, unroasted seeds on the left, and my toasted, ground seeds on the right.

Gomasio is made by grinding dry-roasted sesame seeds with salt. You can purchase it prepared, but it's easy to make, and the fresh-roasted sesame seed taste isn't something you're likely to find in a jar that has been sitting on a grocery store shelf for god knows how long.

The seeds are about 50% oil by weight, almost half of that is the rancid-vulnerable polyunsaturated type. Luckily, as Harold McGee writes in his book On Food and Cooking, The Science and Lore of the Kitchen:

"[Sesame seed oil] is remarkable for its resistance to oxidation and rancidity, which results from high levels of antioxidant phenolic compounds (lignans), some vitamin E, and products of the browning reactions that occur during the more thorough roasting."

From what I can tell, sesame seeds aren't chock full of vitamin E, not like an almond. Maybe there's enough there to supply a little seed's needs, if not the needs of a 100 kg human male. One nutrient they are chock full of is calcium - 60 mg in just 2 teaspoons!


Ingredients

1/4 cup raw, unhulled sesame seeds
1 tsp. table salt
~~~~~~
1 Place seeds (any color - black, brown, red, yellow, tan, ivory, etc.) in a clean, dry, frying pan and toast on low heat, stirring often, until golden or until they start to pop - try to pull them off the heat before popping takes place.

Note: I used the lowest setting on my gas hob. My seeds toasted in 20 minutes. Many recipes claim they'll toast in 5 minutes, but I suspect they're using higher heat. The longer, lower-temp toasting will result in more even heat distribution, more even browning, and a more potent roasted flavor (since more seeds will have undergone browning reactions).

2 Allow the seeds to cool for about 10 minutes, then place in a small electric grinder with the salt and pulse a few times until most of the seeds are cracked open. Be careful not to grind to a flour consistency; you want some of the texture of the seed to remain.

Note: Change any quantities you like. The typical ratio is 8 parts sesame seeds to 1 part salt, but you can use less or even no salt if you prefer.

The technique for making gomasio shown above is convenient and time-saving. The traditional method (learned from my Macrobiotic days) involves toasting the salt, preferably a fine grain sea salt, until it shines; letting the salt cool; then grinding it by hand with a Janapese mortar and pestle (suribachi). The seeds are roasted in the same manner as above, but then ground in the mortar with the salt until most of the seeds have cracked open.

Enjoy!

Angel Food Cake

Just before Christmas, Cooking for Engineers' (CFE's) posted a recipe for Strawberry Glazed Angel Food Cake. It's kept my appetite whet for angel food cake ever since. I hadn't made one in, well, a very long time, since trying to reduce the amount of white sugar and white flour in my diet, and especially since the language of glycemic index (GI) hit the lay man's vernacular.

But I like angel food cake. Years ago, before Atkins and other low-carb regimens, it was considered a healthy dessert, suitable for those trying to lose weight - since it had few calories, was fat-free, and could be gussied up easily and deliciously with any type of fresh or cooked fruit (also fat-free, and a good fiber source). I'm salivating now. It's reassuring to see that amidst the low-carb trend, the American Heart Association continues to list it in its dietary guide.

So, I made one. Following is the recipe I used. It's similar to the one on CFE except I use a little less sugar and a little more egg white. (CFE includes lots of great how-to pictures and a nice strawberry glaze/filling.) I ran a nutrient analysis on my recipe (see below), which confirmed its low-calorie, fat-free reputation. And I took a look at its rank on a GI chart (and was pleasantly surprised):

* GI is a measure of how high your blood glucose will rise after consuming a certain food, relative to consuming pure glucose (GI=100). GIs less than 55 are considered low. GIs greater than 70 are considered high.


Ingredients

1 1/2 cups cake flour
1/3 cup granulated sugar

12 large egg whites (1 3/4 cup), at room temperature
1 1/2 tsp. cream of tartar
1/4 tsp. salt
1 1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

~~~~~~
1 Preheat oven to 375°F.

2 Sift together, at least three times, cake flour and 1/3 cup sugar.

3 In a large mixing bowl, whisk the egg whites until just frothy. Sprinkle the cream of tartar and salt over the froth and continue whisking until soft peaks form. Start to sprinkle in the sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, as the mixer (you or a Kitchen Aid) continues whisking. Stop whisking when all the sugar has been incorporated, is mostly dissolved, and egg whites form stiff peaks.

Note: If you're using a stand mixer (which can produce peaks in no time!), keep the speed at low-to-medium until all of the sugar is incorporated. You don't want stiff peaks to form before all the sugar has been added. Turn the speed up to medium-high at the very end to stiffen the whites.

4 Sift or sprinkle the flour/sugar mixture over the egg whites, about 4 tablespoons at a time, and fold in gently using a clean spatula. Sprinkle the vanilla extract in 1/2 tsp. increments between additions of flour.

Note: Use an up-from-the-bottom fold-motion. Four or five folds ought to be enough to incorporate each flour addition. When all the flour has been added, fold the entire batter a few more times until no dry-flour areas remain.

5 Spoon into a 10 by 4 in., two-piece tube pan or angel food cake pan. Bake for 35 minutes at 375°. Turn the oven off and allow cake to continue browning for about 5 to 8 minutes more. Cool, inverted, until completely cool, 2 to 3 hours.

Note: An angel food cake pan usually has three tabs extending up from its rim so the cake may be inverted while cooling. If your tube pan is not tabbed or your cake extends above the tabs, invert the cake over the neck of a funnel, beer or wine bottle. No jumping jacks in the kitchen while cake teeters on bottleneck.

6 When cool, slide a thin knife between the cake and the pan to dislodge. Slice with a serrated knife. You'll need to wipe the knife clean about every third slice to keep it from tugging and pulling the cake.

Note: Slices shown are the suggested 1/16 serving size.

Enjoy!

News - Dietary Guidelines 2005

I have a gripe. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) came out today with their updated Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005.

Here are a few of their key recommendations:

Daily Exercise

• To prevent chronic disease: 30 minutes a day, moderate intensity - "above usual activity" but "more vigorous intensity or longer duration" exercise is better for most people.
  
• To prevent weight gain: 60 minutes a day, moderate to vigorous intensity.
  
• For weight loss: 60 to 90 minutes a day, moderate intensity.

Daily Diet

• 2 cups fruit (whole fruit, not juice)
  
• 2.5 cups vegetables (whole vegetables, not juice)
  
• 3 cups low- or no-fat milk products (no apologies for lactose intolerance, even though the government states that up to 50 million Americans, 75% of African Americans and Native Americans, and 90% of Asian Americans are afflicted.)
  
• Half of your grain-based foods should come from whole grains (not foods made with flour)

Here's my gripe:

Hours in a day: 24

Hours needed in a day to perform basic activities, not addressing these new guidelines: 22.3:

• Sleep: 8.0
  
• Hygiene, morning: 0.5
  
• Hygiene, evening: 0.5
  
• Dress, morning: 0.25
  
• Dress, evening: 0.25
  
• Work: 8.0
  
• Commute to work: 0.5
  
• Commute from work: 0.5
  
• Make, eat, clean up breakfast: 0.5
  
• Make (or order), eat, clean up lunch: 0.5
  
• Make, eat, clean up dinner: 1.0
  
• Mail, bills, emails, PDA, phone calls: 0.5
  
• Laundry, ironing, dry cleaning: 0.3
  
• Say hello to spouse and children and ask how their day went: 0.5
  
• Run one errand (after-school activity, grocery store, gas station): 0.5

This leaves 1.7 hours in a day. Can you think of something you do on a regular basis that would cut into this time? Do you have a child or other dependant to care for? Do you have a pet to walk, feed, pet? Plants or a lawn to tend to? Do you like to take maybe 30 minutes a day to read a book, magazine, browse the internet, maintain a blog, meditate, or pray? Do you take more than 30 minutes in the morning to brush, floss, eliminate, shower, shave, dry hair, put on moisterizer/sunscreen/makeup? Is your commute, from the moment you leave the house until the moment you clock in, exactly 30 minutes? Do you like to hug and kiss? Do you regularly call your parents, children, friends, etc. and talk for more than, say, 15 minutes at a time? Do you follow sports? ... any TV?

Well, our government wants you to stop doing some of the above (what would you cut out?) so that you can:

• Exercise for at least 60 minutes a day, 90 minutes if you have to lose weight (not counting time to dress for it, commute to/from it, shower after it).
  
• Eat fresh fruits, vegetables and whole grains that don't lend themselves to 10 minutes from the freezer, to the microwave, to your plate. And since they aren't in the freezer, require more stops during the week to the grocery store. And since you'll be cooking more, you'll have more pots, pans, and dishes to clean. Does this extra food shopping, cooking, and cleaning come without a time cost?

My gripe is that it's easy to tell someone what to do to get/stay healthy. But it's unrealistic and irresponsible to make recommendations that are almost impossible to follow given the structure of today's lifestyle. It takes the monkey off their back; it doesn't solve the problem.

(Here's an alternative.)

Carrot Apricot Squares

More Squares.

These were the FRE's favorite until I improved my use of Halloween decorations for baked goods. (See Butternut Squash Squares.) But I would wager he still ranks these high, especially the ones I made with fresh cranberries over the holidays (just add 1/2 cup fresh cranberries to the batter). If you like the color orange, these are for you. The carrots, apricots, and orange juice conspire to create a confection that would do FD&C Yellow No. 6 proud, except the color of these squares come from all-natural carotenoids. Try one. They're low-fat, fiberful, contain no white flour, no granulated sugar, and serve up fair amounts of the antioxidants beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, lutein, zeaxanthin, and beta-cryptoxanthin. Your eyes, hair, skin, and taste buds will thank you.


Ingredients

1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 tbsp. wheat germ (raw or toasted)
1 tbsp. wheat bran
2 tbsp. soy flour
2 tbsp. freshly ground flax seeds
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 cup orange juice
1 tbsp. fresh lemon juice
3 tbsp. vegetable oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup brown rice syrup (or honey)
1 large egg

1 cup grated carrots
1/2 cup diced dried apricots

~~~~~~~~~~
1 Preheat oven to 350°F.

2 Rub 1 tsp. vegetable oil on the insides of an 8 by 8 inch cake pan.

Note: I've also used an 8 by 4 inch loaf pan with good results.

3 Combine the orange juice, lemon juice, oil, honey, and rice syrup. Whisk or beat vigorously until fully blended. Stir in the carrots and apricots.

4 Stir together the first 9 ingredients (dry ingredients).

5 Whisk the egg in a small bowl. Add about 2 tbsp. of the liquid ingredients to the whisked egg and beat. Slowly pour the beaten egg back into the liquid batter, whisking the batter as you pour.

6 Add dry ingredients to wet. Fold in slowly until just combined and no dry lumps remain. Pour into prepared 8 by 8 inch pan. Bake at 350°F. for approximately 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

7 Cool thoroughly (1 to 2 hours) in the pan before cutting into squares. They may be eaten then or stored in the freezer.

Enjoy!

My Spanish Clementine

I hope, I hope, these are better than last year's. The price was right: $4.99 for a 5 lb / 2.3 kg crate, holding 24 fruits. The appearance was ok, even better than just ok. They had a LOT of them, stacked up on an island by themselves, so I guess they were reasonably fresh. Still, I was fooled by these traits last year.

I like clementines. They're small, totable, easily peeled, easily sectioned, and have no seeds. A cross between a tangerine and an orange, they're not as sweet as the latter and have, or you might expect them to have, a little bite like the former. For all these reasons they make a great addition to recipes, e.g. stir fries and salads. But I bought them to eat out-of-hand.

Excuse me while I see what's inside ...

Ohh...
Oh my darling, oh my darling,
Oh my Spanish clementine,
You're not lost or gone forever,
Here's to this year's clementine.

My Random Access (Boxed) Database

I'm making braised lamb shanks for dinner tonight. So, possibly, are 7 out of the last 20 people who visited this site, owing to some combination of "lamb", "shanks", and "braised" appearing in search terms from my referral list.

I haven't been running this site for long, but I've begun to find it indispensable for recipes of dishes I make often. I used to rummage through a shoe box full of recipes on pieces of paper ... torn from magazines, dashed off on index cards, collected from mass mailings for publications I'd be too embarrassed to let my mailman see I subscribe to. (It's remarkable the things a mailman can come to know about the people whose boxes he delivers to daily.) Whenever I remake a recipe, I try to note improvements or qualifications on that little piece of paper. So, sometimes a recipe will have its original 1 1/2 cups scratched out and replaced with 1 1/4 cups, which is scratched out and replaced with 1 3/4 cups, which is scratched out and replaced with the original 1 1/2 cups and some qualifier about how to change egg quantity with flour amount. Honest to god, I could barely read them after a few years. But now I come here. So far, I've been pretty conscientious about updating posts that weren't up to snuff. For the sake of my brimming recipe box, I hope I continue.

Must go. According to this shanks recipe, its time to add the carrots.

I Like Charts

After rendering such an oily review about the drawbacks of consuming fats that have been mishandled to the point of rancidity, I feel compelled to discuss the range of vulnerability in these fats.¹ All fats are not created equal. Some can stand the heat more than others.

What makes a fat more vigorous in this regard? For one, how saturated it is. What is it saturated with? Hydrogen (H) atoms. A saturated fat is absolutely loaded to capacity with as many H atoms as it can take on. It's full and sedated and stable (much like the FRE after dinner). It takes a fair amount of energy to get a saturated fat up and moving around. On the other hand, a fat that's not saturated is more open to interaction. It's hungry. If you serve it some H atoms under the right conditions, it will chow down. (This is called hydrogen-ation.) If you serve it some oxygen (O) atoms under the right conditions, it will chow down. (This is called oxygen-ation, or in this case, oxidation.)

So, a saturated fat isn't going to be chowing down anytime soon. An unsaturated fat is, and will, in effect, become what it eats. If it eats H, it becomes saturated and stable. If it eats O, it becomes unstable and is primed to walk down the path of rancidity ruin.

This is one reason why manufacturers hydrogenate oils. Saturated fats resist rancidity. A cracker sitting in a box on a grocery store shelf that's made with partially hydrogenated soybean oil (the cracker, not the shelf) is going to smell fresher after 6 months than a cracker sitting in a box right next to it made with non-hydrogenated soybean oil (the cracker, not the box).

Saturation of a fat is only one guide in telling how vulnerable a fat will be to rancidity, with saturated (and fully hydrogenated) fats the least vulnerable, polyunsaturated fats the most vulnerable, and monounsaturated fats somewhere in between.

The following chart shows the degree of saturation of the oils found in the nuts that typically occupy a mixed nut bowl. Notice that most oils contain a mixture of different types of fatty acids. This is also true for butter and lard, which are referred to as saturated (fats receive designations based on their predominant fatty acids), but actually contain some unsaturated fat making them prone to rancidity.

By looking at this chart, can you tell which nut is more likely to go rancid before the others?



~~~~~~
¹ I use the terms oil and fat interchangeably. An oil just refers to a fat that is liquid at room temperature.

Resident Eaters

It's a gift to have people at home who tolerate your kitchen antics ...
... and who always eat the capers.

Hammy Bird

Oh my. That effort wasn't worth its salt in succulent flesh. Not that the flesh wasn't juicy. For sure, I got what I asked for, a squirting bird. But there were so many other disappointing qualities born by my brined and roasted chicken that I doubt I'll return to this process, at least until its memory fades. I felt like I was eating slices of cured, salty, pink ham. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) Even the texture was different. Gone were the discreet slivers of cream-colored muscle fiber that I (used to) take enjoyment threading off the breast. Gone was a brown, crispy skin. Gone were those chewy pockets of brown leg, oh yes, how I love a bit of brown leg. Gone! My bird was homogenized ... in color, taste, texture. Were it not for its recognizable bird-like appendages, I might be convinced I was consuming some sort of hammy cold cut (a.k.a. lunchmeat, deli, ... bologna!)

Of course, I could give it another go, tweak the salt/sugar percentages, the brining time, the solvent source (Eric's apple cider solvent sounds like a good choice for a pork brine). I mean, brining does seem to have its following in culinary esoterica.

I guess I'm just an unpreserved old bird who has a soft spot for unpreserved old birds.

Brining my Bird

I've tried a few things in my kitchen but this was never one of them. The Holidays, however, produced a pork roast and a turkey breast, both of which were wanting for juice. Juice, baby, juice. I feel terrible when after spending hours seasoning and roasting a fine cut of meat I serve up rawhide. So I've been shamed into learning to brine my bird.

What I'm discovering might be enough to develop in me a taste for rawhide.

After checking a few cookbooks and browsing the web, I settled on this brine mix:

Ingredients

1 gallon water
1/2 cup kosher salt
1/4 cup sugar
1 bay leaf
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp dried rosemary
~~~~~~
1    Dissolve the salt, sugar, and spices in the water.

Note: When I'm cooking, I like to use the cleanest water I can get. In my case it was cool tap water that I had run through a Brita Water Filter and which was sitting in a pitcher in the refrigerator. Let me tell you, by no feat of physics will 1/2 cup of kosher salt and 1/4 cup of granulated sugar dissolve in a gallon of cold water on contact. You may stir and stir until your bird takes flight, but alas, those hard little granules will resettle back to the bottom like fake snow in a Christmas water-ball ornament.

So, an instruction that would improve on my No. 1 might say: Dissolve the salt and sugar in a half-gallon of the water that has been heated to some degree less than boiling. (A microwave works well for this.) When fully dissolved, add the remaining half-gallon of cool, unheated water to the solution, along with the spices. Allow entire solution to cool. (It seems contrary to everything I learned about food safety to submerse raw foul into warm water and allow it to incubate there. Thus the cooling.)

2    Rinse bird in clean water inside and out. Submerse the bird in brine for 12 to 24 hours. Place a weight on the bird if it takes to floating.

Note: Logistics are key here. First, instructions I read said to place bird and brine in a large pot. That I can do. Then it says to place said pot in the refrigerator for 24 hours. Unfortunately, there was no bottle of juice, carton of milk, or flask of vermouth that agreed to give up their hallowed place in my fridge. Am I the only person who can't find room for a 6 qt. stock pot in her fridge? I recalled one person saying they used a Ziploc bag for brining. I suspect they were referring to its use for a couple of pork chops. Still, this was an idea I could work with.

So, an instruction that would improve on my No. 2 might say: Place bird in a one-gallon Ziploc storage bag. (I used Ziploc Freezer bags because they're sturdier than their Storage bags.) Pour brine into cavity of bird until bag fills. (I had about 2 or 3 cups of brine that didn't fit.) Seal bag and place upright into a carved-out corner of your refrigerator for 12 to 24 hours.

Luckily I double-bagged, because my inside bag leaked. And as you can see, I used an 8-inch baking dish to contain the brining bird while it was in the refrigerator. This served to prop it and to catch any floods that might occur overnight ... none did. Another benefit of brining in a bag: I did not have to contend with a floating bird.

Holy brined birds, Batman, no wonder people don't bother pickling their poultry!

The taste test is tonight.

(Oh my, was it a Hammy Bird.)

You Do It Like This

Me: "You know, I like blogging, but..."
FRE: "But?"
Me: "Well, I end up sounding so pedantic.¹"
FRE: *silence*
Me: "What?"
FRE: "What, what?"

A few days later I'm flipping through my new cookbook, From My Mexican Kitchen, Techniques and Ingredients, compliments of the FRE, when I read in the Introduction:

"I have tried to think and stress (without, I hope, being pedantic) what is important ... "

The author, Diana Kennedy, proceeds to discuss certain Mexican dishes:

"It is just a matter of spending a little time looking them up in the right cookbooks!"

And here, she's talking about a particular spice:

"The heavy use of achiote is also to be deplored. Its strong, musky flavor is unpleasant and overpowering when concentrated in a sauce - I shudder when I remember the nouvelle types I have come across ... "

Ms Kennedy? I'm sorry to dash your hopes, but, um, pedantic pretty much describes ...
Oh ... What's this on page 187? Yeah, Baby ... It's a pedantic discussion on mole making!

(Oh well, I guess pedantism is an idiosyncrasy of food writing.)

~~~~~~
¹ Pedantic: adj.; Marked by a narrow, often tiresome focus on or display of learning, especially its trivial aspects; Characterized by concern for formal rules.